Posts Tagged ‘Ukraine’
“Just as none of us is outside or beyond geography, none of us is completely free from the struggle over geography”*…
There are lessons to be learned from history. Noah Smith cautions us to be sure that we’re learning the right ones…
… 2022 saw authoritarian powers suddenly on the back foot. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was a military and geopolitical disaster, and Xi’s economic mismanagement brought China’s growth to a momentary halt. Meanwhile, the U.S. started looking a bit more politically stable and started to take action to preserve its remaining industrial advantages, Asian democracies like Japan and the fast-growing India continued to flex their muscle, and Europe seemed more united than it had in…well, ever. All of this naturally had some people in the West optimistic that Cold War 2 would ultimately end much like World War 2 and the first Cold War.
Unfortunately, early optimism can easily give way to complacency and cockiness. We’re still in the opening moves of Cold War 2, and the minor victories of 2022 are likely to revert to the mean. 2023 is already shaping up to be a year in which the authoritarian powers recalibrate their strategy and find their footing.
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Americans need to realize that Cold War 2 is fundamentally unlike Cold War 1 or World War 2. Those 20th century contests were ideological battles, where people fought and died for communism, fascism, and liberal democracy. But China is not an ideological, proselytizing power; its ideology, basically, is just “China.” Xi Jinping doesn’t care whether you have elections and protect civil rights or send minorities to the death camps, as long as you support Chinese hegemony abroad.
Cold War 2 is therefore a bit more like World War 1 — a naked contest of national power and interests. And if the U.S. tries to turn it into an ideological battle, it could backfire…
A provocative argument that we shouldn’t make too much of what are only the opening moves in “Cold War 2”: “2023 is when the empires strike back,” from @Noahpinion.
* Edward Said
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As we grapple with geopolitics, we might recall that it was on this date in 1975 that South Vietnamese forces withdrew from the town of Xuan Loc in the last major battle of the Vietnam War. The North Vietnamese victory there occasioned the resignation of South Vietnamese President Nguyễn Văn Thiệu, who was replaced by Trần Văn Hương, who was ordered by the National Assembly to seek a negotiated peace with North Vietnam at any cost.
“We all have our price, and mine’s a lot lower than that”*…
From Model Thinking, a modest proposal to end the war in Ukraine…
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has caused the loss of countless lives, hundreds of billions in damage and about $150bn financial and military aid from allies, primarily the United States and the Europe Union (EU).
One potential idea to end the conflict is to pay Russian soldiers, often unwilling combatants, to surrender. Indeed, the Ukrainian government, shortly after the invasion began, offered Russian soldiers 5 million roubles ($48,000), or four years’ salary for the average Russian, to do so.
More than a year later, the scheme has received very little public attention. At the time, Bryan Caplan, an economist at George Mason University, said the scheme would have limited effect because Russian soldiers considering it had to weigh it against three large costs, namely the risks of:
- Being shot for desertion by the Russian army
- Ukrainian soldiers disobeying international law and shooting any captured prisoners
- Them being returned to Russia in a peace deal where they would most likely face death or imprisonment for defecting.
Caplan suggests an improvement: offering not only payment but also EU citizenship for Russian soldiers and their families. This means that defecting soldiers and their families can both establish themselves and permanently enjoy an income several times higher than their previous life while facing little risk of forced repatriation. Although this scheme has attracted some interest elsewhere, no attempt has yet been made to model its impact.
In this post, we provide a simple model of the effect of such a policy. Conservatively, we conclude that if there is a <17% chance of death while trying to defect, a $100,000 payment is sufficient to incentivise the average Russian soldier to do so – meaning that it might cost as little as $20bn to end the war entirely…
A fascinating (if perhaps optimistic) analysis of how much Russian soldiers would need to be paid to defect if also offered EU citizenship: “Paying for Peace,” from @DuncanMcClement and @jasonhausenloy in @model_thinking.
* Your correspondent’s motto
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As we put the mercy in mercenary, we might recall that it was on this date in 1958 that the Peace Symbol made it’s public debut at the British nuclear disarmament movement’s march from Trafalgar Square to the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment at Aldermaston in Berkshire.
Designed by Gerald Holtom, it featured the super-imposition of the flag semaphore for the characters “N” and “D,” taken to stand for “nuclear disarmament.”
“Between shortage and absolute poverty an ocean of shades and gradations do emerge on the scale of deficiency”*…
Even on the shallower end of that scale, there are consequences: it’s time to whip up some alternative bean dips…
We can expect a dip in hummus supplies thanks to a forthcoming chickpea shortage.
Chickpeas are just one crop in a string of supply chain issues due to weather conditions, war and woefully backlogged shipping vessels across the globe. Quantity issues have been bolstered by worldwide fertilizer shortages and widespread supply chain issues, with crops such as tomatoes and wheat [pita!] being hit just as hard.
According to Reuters, chickpea crop yields are anticipated to drop as much as 20 percent this year. This decrease in the quantity of the legume—an important protein source for many diets— comes as a result of both unfruitful weather conditions and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Russia and Ukraine were top exporters of chickpeas, and the war has led to supply chain shortages. In fact, with Ukraine rendered unable to seed its chickpea crop, the result was a deficit of an estimated 50,000 tonnes of chickpeas that otherwise would have ended up in the European market. Before the war, Russia was responsible for around a quarter of global chickpea trade. Other prominent chickpea growing areas, such as Australia, are struggling to keep up with demand as farmers deal with drought and sellers fight for freight space on shipping vehicles.
Shipping—along with drought and flooding— is also a main concern for the American chickpea market. Merchants are contending with ocean vessels backlogged with deliveries and, in turn, grappling with increased prices of land-based legume transportation. The result is a hike in prices for the once cheap and efficient source of plant protein. In the US, chickpea prices have increased 12 percent from last year, according to NielsenIQ data and Reuters’ report.
It seems unlikely that chickpea stocks will be replenished anytime soon. Turkey, the second largest exporter of the legume, banned chickpea exports in March in an effort to ensure food security and enough stock on its own shelves…
“A Global Chickpea Shortage is Looming,” from Modern Farmer (@ModFarm).
“Mmm, this is delicious. What’s in it?”
“Chickpeas, lentils and rice.”
“And what’s in this?”
“Chickpeas and lentils.”
“Try it with rice.”
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As we ponder paucity, we might send comforting birthday greetings to Dorcas Lillian Bates Reilly; she was born on this date in 1926. A chef and inventor, she worked for many years in the test kitchen at the Campbell’s Soup Company– where she developed hundreds of recipes, including a tuna-noodle casserole and Sloppy Joe “souperburgers.” But she is best remembered for “the green bean bake”– or as it is better known, the green bean casserole— a holiday staple in tens of millions of households every year. While her recipe made good use of her employer’s Cream of Mushroom Soup, she believed that the French’s crispy fried onions were the “touch of genius” in the dish.
“A nation that destroys its soils destroys itself”*…
The cliché, avidly promoted by Moscow, is that Russia, one of the world’s largest petro-states, will be a relative winner in climate change; but a new book argues that the country will find itself in deep trouble. Sophie Pinkham unpacks the lesson’s in Thane Gustafson’s Klimat: Russia in the Age of Climate Change…
Thane Gustafson, a longtime specialist on Russian energy, wrote Klimat: Russia in the Age of Climate Change before the [Ukraine] invasion, when the Covid pandemic seemed the great unexpected event complicating every prediction. Yet with its focus on the future of Russia’s energy, grain, and metals markets, all of which have been reconfigured by the war and the new sanctions, Klimat could hardly be more timely. Gustafson argues that Russia’s days of hydrocarbon-funded might are numbered. Unfortunately, the end of this era will not come soon enough for Ukrainians, or for the planet.
Russia is warming 2.5 times as fast as the world on average, and the Arctic is warming even faster. The cliché, avidly promoted by Moscow, is that the country will be a relative winner in climate change, benefiting from a melting and accessible Arctic shipping route, longer growing seasons, and the expansion of farmland into newly thawed areas. Gustafson counters, with a dry but persuasive marshaling of facts, that in the redistribution of wealth and power that will result from climate change, Russia is doomed. After reading Klimat, Russia’s attack on Ukraine begins to look like the convulsion of a dying state.
About two thirds of Russia is covered in permafrost, a mixture of sand and ice that, until recently, remained frozen year-round. As permafrost melts, walls built on it fracture, buildings sink, railways warp, roads buckle, and pipelines break. Anthrax from long-frozen reindeer corpses has thawed and infected modern herds. Sinkholes have opened in the melting ground, swallowing up whole buildings. Ice roads over frozen water, once the only way to travel in some remote regions, are available for ever-shorter periods. The Arctic coast is eroding rapidly, imperiling structures built close to the water…
Russia’s forests are the largest in the world, accounting for a fifth of Earth’s trees, but they are being grievously damaged by fire, drought, and disease, all of which are caused or exacerbated by climate change. Smoke has choked Siberian cities. During the 2019 fires that burned about 10,000 square miles of forest in Siberia, the Internet lit up with protest, and Russian singers and actors took part in a flash mob called “Siberia Is Burning.” President Putin sent in military units to help extinguish the fire, but he was soon rescued by rain. The problem was forgotten. As burning, dying, clear-cut forests become carbon producers rather than carbon sinks, they make the problem of climate change even worse. The same is true of melting permafrost, which releases methane, another potent greenhouse gas…
Imperialism originates in a struggle for resources; the ideology justifying the brutality of conquest and control is secondary. Oil has been one of the most coveted resources of the modern era, but the oldest and most essential resource is food. Ukraine’s famously fertile “black earth,” desired by many invaders and colonizers over the course of the country’s history, may also be among the motivations for Russia’s new aggression. According to recent reports, Russia has been commandeering or destroying Ukrainian grain stores and making off with Ukrainian agricultural equipment, smuggling the stolen grain to Syria for sale in the Middle East. Gustafson points out that as shortages become more frequent, food will become an increasingly significant tool of geopolitical influence…
Eminently worth reading in full: climate change is coming for Russia: “A Hotter Russia,” from @sophiepinkhmmm on @ThaneGustafson in @nybooks.
Lest American readers feel complacent: “The challenging politics of climate change,” from @BrookingsInst.
* Franklin D. Roosevelt
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As we get serious, we might send imperial birthday greetings to the man Vladimir Putin seems to wish he was: Pyotr Alekséyevich, also known as Peter I, and best known as Peter the Great; he was born on this date in 1672. But even as Putin is trying to turn back the cultural clock, Peter was the Tsar who modernized Russia and grew it into an empire, capturing ports at Azov and the Baltic Sea, laying the groundwork for the Imperial Russian Navy, ending uncontested Swedish supremacy in the Baltic, and beginning the Tsardom’s expansion into a much larger empire that became a major European power.
Peter led a cultural revolution that replaced some of the traditionalist and medieval social and political systems with ones that were modern, scientific, Westernised, and based on the Enlightenment. His reforms had a lasting impact on Russia, and many institutions of the Russian government trace their origins to his reign. He adopted the title of Emperor in place of the old title of Tsar in 1721, and founded and developed the city of Saint Petersburg, which remained the capital of Russia until 1917.
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