William Bendix

Russian offensive appears to be slowing after Musk blocks Starlink access, Ukraine says “They are like blind kittens,” a Ukrainian General Staff commander tells POLITICO.

"Russians have not just a problem on the fronts; the enemy has a disaster."

"In 2025, Germany spent more on defense than any other European country in absolute terms. Its military budget today ranks fourth in the world, just after Russia’s. Annual military spending is expected to reach $189 billion in 2029, more than triple what it was in 2022."

"Germany’s centrist parties are aware of how frightening the AfD is to neighboring countries. They have, accordingly, worked to quarantine it, with the center-right and center-left forming grand coalitions to keep it away from federal authority. But blocking the AfD is becoming harder each year."

"Paris, for its part, might be tempted to reassert itself by significantly increasing its defense spending as a way of catching up with, and containing, Germany, despite France’s domestic fiscal troubles. Paris might also seek closer cooperation with London to counterbalance Berlin."

"Some Polish officials fear that a militarily powerful Germany might one day feel free to restore amicable relations with Russia."

Europe’s Next Hegemon The perils of German power.

"German policymakers ... argue that Germany’s neighbors cannot have both a weak Berlin and a strong one that can defend Europe. Their attitude to European unease seems to be that because the continent asked for the buildup, it does not get to complain about it."

Germany is betting big on killer drones. In Ukraine, they couldn’t hit their targets. Supplier Helsing, a darling of the country’s new defense industry, insists that its unmanned devices are reliable — but data from the front lines suggests otherwise.

"The data from Ukraine raises the prospect that Germany’s latest military buildup could slip into a familiar Bundeswehr pattern — pouring money into new hardware that underdelivers in the field, echoing past failures that left fighter jets grounded, helicopters unflyable and troops scrambling."

The Unsettling Implications of Xi’s Military Purge Why his impatience with Chinese commanders should worry U.S. policymakers.

"Foreigners may be tempted to judge that the chaos inside the PLA means that military action against Taiwan or in the South China Sea is off the table. But that would overlook the signal feature of the purge—Xi’s intensifying impatience with the PLA’s inability to obey his order[s]."

AI agents now have their own Reddit-style social network, and it's getting weird fast Moltbook lets 32,000 AI bots trade jokes, tips, and complaints about humans.

"In the post, the AI agent finds it 'embarrassing' to constantly forget things, admitting that it even registered a duplicate Moltbook account after forgetting the first."

Is America’s Cyber Weakness Self-Inflicted? China didn’t break into America’s telecom networks with futuristic cyber weapons — it walked through unlocked doors. Washington often frames the cyber

"Washington often treats major intrusions as proof of overwhelming adversary sophistication, when in reality, basic, preventable weaknesses still account for much of the vulnerability."
warontherocks.com/2026/01/is-a...

"Large majorities of Democratic and Republican members of the public believe that US alliances in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East benefit the United States. Equally striking,... large majorities of Democrats and Republicans think that globalization is mostly good for the United States."

Only guessed this in four because of a Doors' song.

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Bangladeshi workers lured to Russia for jobs were forced to fight in the war in Ukraine An Associated Press investigation found that Bangladeshi workers were lured to Russia by the false promise of civilian jobs and thrust onto the battlefield in the Ukraine war.

An Associated Press investigation found that Bangladeshi workers were lured to Russia by the false promise of civilian jobs and thrust onto the battlefield in the Ukraine war.

Drones caused 3 out of every 4 Ukraine war casualties, Latvian spies say Injuries and deaths from the unmanned aerial vehicles far outstripped those from guns, tanks, artillery and mines.

"Drones are responsible for between 70 and 80 percent of those injured or killed on both sides of the war in Ukraine.... This makes the war more dynamic at the tactical level, but reduces the chance of either side making a strategic breakthrough."
www.politico.eu/article/latv...

It weakens legal constraint by substituting conjecture about hypothetical futures for shared rules and standards.

Who knows? So, a humanitarian cost-benefit analysis prior to Iraq would not have provided clarity about whether invasion was justified. Adding this kind of speculative reasoning into international law does not strengthen the case for intervention.

It remains unknowable now because we can't rerun history. We can't observe what Iraq would've looked like had Saddam remained in power. Would there have been intensified repression? Another regional war? Continued sanctions and rising infant mortality? A delayed but equally violent regime collapse?

Consider the months leading up to the Iraq war. What guidance would a humanitarian cost-benefit analysis have provided at the time? Suppose the Bush admin had asked: "How many Iraqis will suffer or die if the US doesn't intervene, versus if it overthrows the regime?" The answer was unknowable then.

The problem is not just that these judgments are difficult, but that they depend on counterfactual scenarios that can't be reliably specified or evaluated in advance.

Any such analysis requires comparing the expected costs and benefits of the status quo against those of intervention: two hypothetical futures involving extremely high stakes, innumerable contingencies, and unpredictable downstream effects.

A New International Law Can Rise From the Ashes The United States should use this moment to argue for a different approach to the rules of war.

John Yoo argues, "International law should adopt a cost-benefit approach to interventions. It should allow military intervention today to prevent greater harms tomorrow." In practice, this utilitarian approach to law and security is not workable.
www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...

Document reveals EU-US pitch for $800B postwar Ukraine ‘prosperity’ plan The proposal hinges on a ceasefire that remains elusive while Russian leader Vladimir Putin persists with his full-scale invasion.

"While Brussels and Washington are lining up hundreds of billions of dollars in long-term funding and pitching Ukraine as a future EU member and investment destination, the strategy hinges on a ceasefire that remains elusive."
www.politico.eu/article/docu...

Just checked the Oscar nominations and saw that Nick Cave is up for an Academy Award. Wild.

But his nominated song, "Train Dreams," has got to be dullest thing he's ever written. Still, I hope he wins.

"Canada would have a maximum of three months to prepare for a land and sea invasion. The first indications that invasion orders had been sent would be expected to come from U.S. military warnings that Canada no longer has a shared skies policy with the United States."

"Conscription has been ruled out for now, but the level of sacrifice that would be asked of Canadians remains a central topic, the officials said. General Jennie Carignan, Chief of the Defence Staff, has already announced her intention to create a 400,000-plus-strong reserve force of volunteers."

"One of the officials said the model includes tactics used by the Afghan mujahedeen in their hit-and-run attacks on Russian soldiers during the 1979-1989 Soviet-Afghan War. These were the same tactics employed by the Taliban in their 20-year war against the US and allied forces that included Canada"

"Canada does not have the number of military personnel or the sophisticated equipment needed to fend off a conventional American attack, they said. So, the military envisions unconventional warfare in which small groups of irregular military or armed civilians would resort to ambushes."

Military models Canadian response to hypothetical American invasion Armed Forces envision insurgency tactics like those used by Afghan mujahedeen, sources say. But officials and experts stress a U.S. operation is unlikely, and the scenarios are conceptual

"The two senior government officials said military planners are modelling a U.S. invasion from the south, expecting American forces to overcome Canada’s strategic positions on land and at sea within a week and possibly as quickly as two days."
www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/art...

Had to exhaust myself to guess this one.

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Reposting. Shameless self-promotion.