By John Helmer, Website, 10/11/24

If you want to understand who is winning the American war against Russia on the Ukrainian battlefield, and also in the world’s commodity trade markets, you can start by calculating the life expectancy of a NATO-trained Ukrainian soldier on the front line, or of a NATO staff officer in a command bunker he thought was safe. Then you can check the life expectancy of a Russian pig.

The losses of the former are Russia’s tactical gains; they aren’t yet victory in the war.

But it’s the latter, the Russian pig (lead image) who, upon turning into pork, is breaking through the enemy’s defences towards strategic victory of Russian economic power to capture a world market. This means defeat – unrecoverable loss of market share – for the hostile states led by the once powerful pork exporters, Germany, Spain, Denmark, Canada, and the US. As the most recent European Union (EU) pig and pork slaughter data show, the war is pushing up the energy and feed costs of pig farming, and drastically cutting European exports of pork to the Asian consumer market, the biggest in the world.

There, Russia’s strategic ally China has cancelled the closure of its market in effect for Russia since 2008, and simultaneously has begun pork trade restriction moves against Spain, Denmark and The Netherlands, the principal European exporters of pork to China [3]. In trade war retaliation, China is also steadily reducing the volume and value of its pork imports from the US since 2021 [4].

Behind the Ukraine front, the test of who is winning the war against Russia is also who puts their money and their meat where their mouth is. In Russia, meat consumption is rising per capita to a level never recorded before in Russian history. At the same time, the country has become the world’s fifth largest pork producer [5]. 

From self-sufficiency in pork production in 2018 to the export of market surplus, this industry achievement has been based on direct and indirect state support measures, including retaliation against EU imports which followed the start of the EU’s anti-Russian sanctions in 2014. 

“Practically speaking,” says Yury Kovalev, “we no longer have imports, but not because this is closed, but because over the past fifteen years an entire industry has been created, production has grown every year, and we have almost completely abandoned import dependence.” Kovalev is general director of Russia’s National Union of Pig Breeders (NSS). Kovalev is also forecasting that Russian pork exports will soon capture about 10% of the Chinese import market – about 300,000 tonnes per annum – displacing the Europeans [6]. 

Here is the Russian market story from all sources, just before the opening of the China trade began in September 2023 [7]. 

For the full 15-year, 45-story archive on Russian pork, click to read [8]. The concentration of the pork industry into fewer large corporate hands, including the oligarch-sized Miratorg group of the Linnik brothers (14.3% market share) and the Rusagro combine of Vadim Moshkovich (5.9%), has been analyzed through this archive. According to the latest tabulation published this February, over the past year the Linniks have increased their production by 21% to 803,500 tonnes, and lifted their market share from 12.6% to 14.3%. The top-5 pork producers now have a combined market share of 38%; this has not changed compared with a year ago; by contrast, in 2011 the top-5 Russian producers accounted for 26% of the market.

NATIONAL UNION OF PIG BREEDERS – TOP-20 RUSSIAN PORK PRODUCERS AT END-2023

Published by the National Union of Pig Breeders (NSS), February 2024 [10].

No industry source will say publicly that the financial subsidies, trade protection and other administrative resources applied to the pork industry by the Putin administration to end import dependency and secure the domestic food chain are also responsible for the accelerating concentration of ownership and profit.

In this newly published report on the Russian pork industry, Vzglyad, the semi-official platform for security analysis, explains the reasons for the exceptional success. Between the lines, however, the publication targets the Kremlin economic advisors, led by Central Bank Governor Elvira Nabiullina, for running a high-interest rate policy [11]. Vzglyad did not ask its sources to estimate what the net loan rate to the pork producers is after they offset their cost, investment, tax and other government benefits.

The Russian text has been translated verbatim; illustrations have been added.

——–

Vzglyad

October 8, 2024

Russia has made a revolution in animal husbandry

How has Russia managed to achieve outstanding success in animal

husbandry in twenty years

By Olga Samofalova

Russia has taken the fourth place among the world’s largest meat producers. Experts call it the livestock miracle of Russia. After all, Russia has come a long way from an overwhelming dependence on American meat to reach complete self-sufficiency in poultry meat plus pork. How has Russia raised animal husbandry from its knees in 20 years, who helped the country in this, and why are there not comparably impressive successes in beef so far?

Russia has managed to achieve the fourth place among the world’s largest meat producers. This was recently stated by Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin at a meeting with Chairman of the Board of the Russian Agricultural Bank Boris Listov.

According to the National Meat Association, imports of meat and meat products from 2003 to 2023 decreased from 2.67 million tonnes to 0.64 million tonnes.

Particularly impressive results in import substitution have been achieved for poultry and pork meat. Meat imports in the early 2000s reached 1.2 million tonnes, but in 2023 only 0.23 million tonnes were imported.

“Imports of pork and pork offal, including lard, over the years has reached from 600,000 tonnes to 1.250 million tonnes at its peak in 2010. This year, pork imports will be only 3,000 tonnes, and exports will be about 300,000 tonnes. Beef imports have also decreased significantly, though not because of our successes, but because of changes in the structure of domestic consumption: other types of meat have become much cheaper than beef, and people have begun to eat less beef. Imports in 2003 reached 700,000 tonnes, and in 2023 decreased to 231,000 tonnes, and this year we will supply about 40,000 tonnes of beef for export to other countries,” says Sergei Yushin, Head of the Executive Committee of the National Meat Association.

How did Russia manage to achieve such incredible success in animal husbandry for poultry and pork?

Yushin, chief executive of the National Meat Association, recalls that from the 1990s into the early 2000s, the situation was difficult: 70% of consumption was provided by imported broiler meat – the famous ‘Bush legs [14]’. There was an excess of legs in the USA, as they prefer other parts of the chicken there.

Mikhail Gorbachev and George Bush at the signing of the June 1, 1990, agreement on trade which started the flow of American chicken legs into the Russian market. In 2013 these US chicken exports to Russia earned $303 million. In retaliation for the Obama Administration’s sanctions against Russia which began in March 2014 [16], Vladimir Putin issued a retaliatory import ban in August 2014 which stopped Bush legs in the Russian market [17]. 

“The first investments went specifically into broiler production, because it is the most affordable and acceptable meat for Russians; there are no religious restrictions on its use; a low payback period due to the rapid production of a piece of meat from chicken, unlike pig farming where the terms of investment return are several times longer, not to mention beef cattle where capital costs are also much higher,” says Yushin.

Interestingly, the first major investors in Russian poultry farming were American funds, which began to actively come to Russia after 1998.

An important milestone in the development of animal husbandry was the arrival of Alexei Gordeyev to the Ministry of Agriculture in the early 2000s. “Gordeyev drew attention to the fact that import dependence is dangerous, and if a man-made disaster occurs, or animal disease, then there will be nothing to eat. Secondly, it was a shame that Russia, having huge territories for the production of animal feed, oilseeds, etc., is so heavily dependent on imported meat,” says Yushin (right).

The main problem, he said, was the low and often negative profitability of production, so Gordeyev set about the task of ensuring profitability. Accordingly, in 2005, customs and tariff regulation measures were introduced – quotas were introduced for meat imports, and high duties were imposed on import volumes exceeding the quota. This has led to an increase in meat prices and then to the incomes of Russian enterprises. Europe used the same measures to raise its livestock production after the Second World War, the source recalls.

Since about 2005, thanks to these import duties, a second industry has appeared that has become interesting to investors – pig farming.

“Many foreign companies, primarily German, Danish and French, also took part in the formation of modern pig farming in Russia. They not only built their own pig farms, but also provided expertise, technological equipment, breeding programs, genetic material, and so on,” Yushin says.

The second important stage was the implementation in 2006-2007 of the National Agro–industrial Complex Development Project, where for the first time the state provided preferential loans for livestock farming. Government support and cheap money have done their job – banks have become more willing to lend to companies to build farms.

The third stage was the adoption in 2008 of the state program for the development of agriculture and regulation of the market of agricultural products, raw materials and food, which was in effect for four years until 2012. “This program provided for a number of measures to support agricultural producers, including animal husbandry. These are the construction of new and modernization of old facilities, zero rates for the supply of breeding material from abroad. Then substantial funding was allocated,” the source says.

In 2012, Russia joined the World Trade Organization (WTO), and measures were provided to protect our market for livestock farmers. At the same time, the state support program was extended until 2020.

“All these years, enterprises have been built in Russia. We worked closely with leading foreign companies that supplied us with the best equipment, the best technologies, the best breeding material, and advised on the production of feed for farm animals. Genetic companies, world market leaders, opened their representative offices in Russia and trained our specialists. They have done a lot of work on the development of breeding in Russia. There was a breakdown of stereotypes that the work of a collective farmer is dirty and for the uneducated. Very educated, erudite and active people have joined the industry. Without this, nothing would have happened either,” Yushin believes.

Another factor which helped the Russian livestock miracle happen was the growth of household incomes in the 2000s when meat consumption began to grow in step with the growth of the economy.

Over twenty years, meat consumption in Russia has increased from 52 kg per capita in 2003 to 80 kg per capita in 2023; this includes poultry from 18 kg to 36 kg and pork from 17 kg to 32 kg, while beef consumption has decreased from 17 kg to 13 kg.

TRAJECTORY OF RUSSIAN MEAT CONSUMPTION, KILOGRAMS PER CAPITA

Source:https://www.researchgate.net/ [20]

“Despite the large volumes of imports, we had to produce more and more and the demand of the population supported good prices, which allowed companies to take out new loans and build, build, build. We have built a huge number of enterprises, created more than a hundred thousand new jobs. The development of animal husbandry has prompted the accelerated development of crop production, the construction of the most advanced feed mills, veterinary science, vaccine production, etc.,” says Yushin.

It is clear that at the stage of the formation of animal husbandry in Russia, the cost of meat was artificially inflated by the government’s import restrictions.

“I don’t hide the fact that at the initial stage in the second half of the 2000s and in the first half of the 2010-2020 decade, Russians overpaid for meat compared to the world market. But the goal was to raise profitability and increase local production. So that the moment will come when the competition in the market will be so fierce that meat will become one of the cheapest in the world for us.”

US, AUSTRALIAN BEEF EXPORT PRICE IN RUSSIAN ROUBLES PER KILOGRAM, 2013-2024

Source: https://www.indexmundi.com/ [22]

DOMESTIC BEEF PRICE IN ROUBLES PER KILOGRAM, 2021-22

Source: https://www.statista.com/ [24]

“And indeed, today commercial pork is more expensive in Brazil, in Canada and the US, where traditionally there were cheap pigs – pork is more expensive there than in our country. In terms of poultry meat, we are one of the lowest in price,” says Yushin.

Over the past decade, active work has been underway to open export markets. “We are displacing [other country] imports in the competitive struggle, but our market is also not so flexible — people cannot go on eating infinitely more meat. Our meat consumption level has already increased to 83 kg per person, and this is the level of rich countries. Therefore, our potential is to increase exports. Russia already supplies meat to more than 60 countries on a regular basis,” the expert says.

Exports of meat and meat products have grown enormously in twenty years – by a magnitude of 22 times: from 36,000 tonnes in 2003 (mainly supplied to neighbouring CIS countries) to 800,000 tonnes in 2023. Foreign countries bought 343,000 tonnes of poultry meat, 223,000 tonnes of pork, and 36,000 tonnes of beef. 

An important step was the understanding of the country’s leadership that top officials of the state should develop exports, as did the presidents of the United States, Brazil, the Prime Minister of France, etc., the expert notes. The departments of government have also joined the effort in parallel, and the Ministry of Agriculture has created a strong agricultural attaché apparatus abroad. “We see the result: almost 45 billion roubles worth exports of agricultural products. Who would have believed this ten years ago,” Yushin notes.

Another thing, the expert does not hide, is that the current situation with expensive money due to the high key loan rate of the Central Bank greatly complicates the situation. “To be realistic, the industry may face a period of stagnation in investment and a halt in growth. And then we will lose the fight for world markets to other countries where loans are still cheap. No one will take out loans at 22% to 23%. The cost of construction has almost doubled in price over the past five years. The labour force has not only risen in price, but we also have a shortage of workers,” the source expresses concern.

Another potential for the development of animal husbandry in Russia lies in cattle meat. “Russia has not achieved great success in beef, except that it fully meets the needs of the Russian market in expensive marbled beef, which was previously imported from America and Australia. Consumption of this expensive meat has increased ten times in 10 years. In addition, we also export it. However, there were no large investments in beef, with the exception of a few projects. There are very long payback periods, the infrastructure of cattle raising is not developed, and there is low or even negative profitability. So we see a continuing decline in the number of cattle. We have enough beef, plus there are imports, but beef is where Russia could take the next step, albeit it’s a difficult one. But this requires no less money than other projects. We are talking about a trillion rubles and a period of 10-20 years,”” Yushin concludes. Beef in Russia is also one of the cheapest in the world, and this is one of its tragedies, since the low price scares off investors and slows down the development of the industry.

Reuters, 10/11/24

Summary

-Ukraine is moving to outlaw Russia-linked church

-Kyiv accuses the UOC of spreading Russian propaganda

-The UOC has tried to distance itself from Moscow

-Clerics in Russia accuse Kyiv of religious repression

MOSCOW, Oct 11 (Reuters) – Speaking behind the thick white walls of Moscow’s ancient Danilov Monastery, Archpriest Igor Yakimchuk is adamant: people must not be forbidden to pray in their chosen branch of Eastern Orthodox Christianity.

He speaks calmly but Yakimchuk is one of many Orthodox Christians in Russia who are angry about a law passed by Kyiv in August that targets a Russia-linked Orthodox church that long dominated religious life in Ukraine.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s administration accuses the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) of spreading pro-Russian propaganda in time of war and of housing spies, charges it denies.

Under the law, the Russian Orthodox Church itself was banned on Ukrainian territory and a government commission was tasked with compiling a list of “affiliated” organisations – expected to include the UOC – whose activities will be outlawed too.

“In the 21st century, in the centre of Europe, millions of people are being deprived of their basic civil rights,” Yakimchuk, wearing a black cassock and a large Orthodox cross around his neck, told Reuters in an interview.

“Because what does it mean to ban a church, which is the largest religious denomination in Ukraine, no matter how much the current Ukrainian authorities would like to downplay its scale? Everyone understands perfectly well that it is impossible to forbid people to pray.”

Whether the UOC retains the following it once did is disputed. An independent Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) that was set up after Russia annexed Crimea in 2014 to be fully independent of Moscow has seen its popularity grow rapidly since President Vladimir Putin sent his forces into Ukraine in 2022.

Ukrainian authorities say the UOC is fair game. They have launched dozens of criminal proceedings, including treason charges, against dozens of its clergy. At least one has been sent to Russia as part of a prisoner swap.

CHURCH DIVIDED

However, Yakimchuk’s denunciation of what he calls “absolute lawlessness” in Ukraine is a reflection of how the nearly 32-month war – which Moscow calls a “special military operation” – has divided Orthodox hierarchies in the two countries, even though they all adhere to Eastern Orthodox Christianity.

The UOC tried to distance itself from Moscow once the war was underway, condemning Russia’s actions and removing references to the “Moscow Patriarchate” from its name.

But those attempts angered clerics in Moscow, who have thrown their weight behind what they cast as Russia’s “holy war” in Ukraine against the expanding influence of what they see as a decadent, godless West. The UOC’s efforts also failed to allay Kyiv’s concerns about the church’s activities and loyalties.

The process of shutting down UOC operations in Ukraine – something one Ukrainian lawmaker called “cleansing” – is likely to be lengthy and involve court battles but the church’s days seem numbered. Some opinion polls suggest more than 80% of Ukrainians do not trust the UOC.

The Kremlin, which has forged close ties with the Russian Orthodox Church, has described Ukraine’s new law as “an open attack on freedom of religion”.

One Russian Orthodox priest in St Petersburg, Leonid Trofimuk, branded Ukraine’s action as “Satanism” and compared it to Soviet-era state repression of religion.

“The 20th century is behind us,” he said. “We saw the persecution of the church at that time, but we didn’t think that there would be this kind of persecution that is going on now in Ukraine.”

Ordinary Russian churchgoers interviewed by Reuters also expressed concern.

“There is a kind of total politicization of matters of faith going on,” said Sergei, a St. Petersburg resident. “I would like common sense to prevail and the international community to finally pay attention.”

His criticism of Kyiv’s moves was echoed by churchgoers leaving a golden onion-domed church more than 900 miles (1,448 km) away to the south, in Mariupol, a Ukrainian port city seized by Russian forces in 2022 after a long siege which left much of the city in ruins.

According to the United Nations, 350,000 of Mariupol’s pre-war population of 450,000 fled amid the carnage. The residents who remain are governed by Russian authorities who have brought in workers from across Russia to help rebuild.

“This is wrong, you shouldn’t do this kind of thing,” Olga, a Mariupol resident, said of the Ukrainian move against the UOC.

“How can he (Zelenskiy) interfere with faith in God? This is not a matter for the state.”

By Jeff Childers, Substack, 10/25/24

🔥🔥  The historic BRICS Summit ended yesterday. Among other platforms, Business Insider ran its story headlined, “Putin has spent years championing the idea of de-dollarization — but a new reality is setting in.”

It turns out they aren’t creating a new currency to compete with the dollar. It’s much more ambitious than that.

How historic was this week’s Summit? On Wednesday, Bloomberg ran a story headlined, “IMF Sees Growth Shift Toward BRICS and Away From G-7 in New Outlook.” The G-7 has long been the world’s biggest and most influential economic alliance, composed of the United States, Japan, Germany, France, the UK, Italy, and, for some reason I will never understand, that economic powerhouse, Canada.

The “Group of Seven” used to be the world’s biggest economies. (Plus Canada.) Not anymore. Bloomberg said that in just the last six months, BRICS has surged ahead of the stumbling G-7 group in IMF forecasts:

Surpassing the G-7 is happening even without whatever the BRICS are doing with their collective financial system. But once that comes online, the G-7 will  become even less relevant, and the BRICS even farther ahead.

This woeful result proceeds directly from Joe Biden’s hysterical, anti-Russia sanctions. In Putin’s own words, quoted by Business Insider, BRICS isn’t anti-dollar, but all the sanctioning by the (smaller) G-7 countries is pushing the larger BRICS economic group to necessarily develop some kind of alternative:

Yesteday BRICS released a comprehensive plan to which its members and applicant members agreed. BRICS is not, in fact, creating any new global currency. Instead, it’s creating an alternative international payments platform, for people buying and selling things across borders, or for when nations trade with each other (to buy weapons, grain, or oil, for three examples).

Right now, everyone must use a common payment settlement system called SWIFT. SWIFT is U.S. created and effectively controlled, even though it is ostensibly privately owned and supposedly located in Belgium. The thought that SWIFT is at all independent is a great gag that everyone at the State Department always guffaws about making them cough champagne up their noses.

For many countries, SWIFT has at least two huge problems. When I say the platform is effectively U.S.-controlled, you can imagine all the implications. Users’ data is supposed to be private, but for some reason everybody thinks the U.S. constantly snoops on where all the money is going to and coming from. (One possibility for why they think that is because Edward Snowden exposed it all in 2013, but I digress again.)

The second, even bigger problem is that the U.S. acts like the spoiled kid at his birthday party, refusing to let the kids he doesn’t like ride the rented pony. In other words, the U.S. forces countries to do things they hate, like teach their kids trans techniques, by threatening to cut them off from SWIFT, or snatching their money as it travels through the collected SWIFT system.

Russia, for example, is cut off from SWIFT under U.S. sanctions. And $300 billion of its money was seized while sitting in a SWIFT clearinghouse bank. The implacable Russians are great poker players, you can never tell if they’re at all mad about Biden snatching their $300 billion or exploding their undersea pipelines.

But you can imagine how mad the Russians must be.

The Russians are mad enough to spend their time and money leading a world movement to replace the G-7 and its captive SWIFT system. Which would be horrible for us.

Once BRICS has its own interbanking system, they won’t need to trade in dollars anymore, not unless they need something from the U.S. or from a G-7 country. For complicated reasons, the reduced demand for dollars just from those lost transfers will drastically worsen our debt problem. And maybe more important for BRICS countries, the U.S. won’t be able threaten sanctions to force them to swallow every lunatic social experiment that comes down the liberal U.S. pike.

The BRICS pitched their interbanking system yesterday as a non-threatening “alternative” to SWIFT, rather than any kind of direct competitor. Having choices, they stressed, just improves everyone’s outcomes. But that logic is like claiming that when you parked your taco truck right next to Jose’s taco truck, it is actually better for Jose’s taco trade since diners like different choices of tacos.

Jose is not likely to agree. Jose is likely to go loco.

BRICS is not yet ready to switch the new platform on. But this week’s Summit was so significant that many articles, while not drawing a direct comparison, mentioned “Bretton Woods.”

Bretton Woods was the famous (or infamous) 1945 meeting where the winning countries after World War II created the international banking system, the IMF, and the World Bank. Yesterday, BRICS argued that things have changed since 1945. It’s like the G-7 is a seasoned citizen still using an iPhone 7. You can’t install any new apps. The international monetary system needs an upgrade.

The U.S. could shut this BRICS initiative down easily and immediately. All we need to do is reform SWIFT. If the U.S. stopped using SWIFT to sanction other countries, and SWIFT opened up its system transparently, and the U.S. stopped using SWIFT for spying, then BRICS would be unnecessary.

And everyone would keep trading in dollars.

In other words, we could rescue the dollar. We only need to give up the ‘dirty tricks’ tool we use to force other countries to make their kids sit through drag queen happy hours. But Biden’s neocons won’t try that simple remedy, will they? They’ll let the dollar be destroyed before they give up their economic wonder weapon.

By Ted Snider, Responsible Statecraft, 10/8/24

It is said that Henry Kissinger asserted that little can be won at the negotiating table that isn’t earned on the battlefield.

In several wars in recent weeks, U.S. officials have echoed that approach. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller recently said that the U.S. “supports[s] a ceasefire” in Lebanon while simultaneously recognizing that “military pressure can at times enable diplomacy.” Meanwhile, Secretary of State Antony Blinken has expressed the doctrine as doing “all that we can to strengthen Ukraine’s position on the battlefield so it has the strongest possible position at the negotiating table.”

But during the Biden administration, the iteration of Kissinger’s doctrine has gone well beyond the generals supporting the diplomats. The diplomats are now outpacing and pushing the generals. In the Biden administration, despite the promise to open “a new era of relentless diplomacy,” the State Department has metamorphosized into the hawkish arm of the Pentagon.

In the debate within the Biden administration over whether permission should be granted for Ukraine to fire Western supplied long-range missiles deeper into Russian territory, it is the diplomats who have pushed for escalation, and the Pentagon and intelligence community who have argued for caution.

Blinken has promised that “from day one… as what Russia is doing has changed, as the battlefield has changed, we’ve adapted… And I can tell you that as we go forward, we will do exactly what we have already done, which is we will adjust, we’ll adapt as necessary, including with regard to the means that are at Ukraine’s disposal to effectively defend against the Russian aggression.”

It is the Pentagon that has counseled restraint. They have argued that the uncertain benefits of longer range strikes do not outweigh the risk of escalation. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has maintained that “long-range strikes into Russia would not turn the tide of the war in Ukraine’s favor,” and agrees with the intelligence community that Russia is capable of quickly moving most of its assets out of range.

This is not the first time the debate on escalation has featured unexpected sides. While, soon after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the State Department argued that “real diplomacy” does not take place at times of aggression, it was General Mark Milley, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who advocated for diplomacy and said that the goal of a sovereign Ukraine with its territory intact would require “a long, very difficult, high casualty-producing war.”

Milley further argued that “You can achieve those objectives through military means…. but you can also achieve those objectives maybe possibly, through some sort of diplomatic means.” Once again, it was the top general who advocated for diplomacy while the top diplomat argued for more war.

It is also not the first debate on long-range missiles. On May 15, before the U.S. had approved even limited longer-range strikes into Russia, it was the State Department that first floated giving the green light. Asked about the U.S. ban on Ukraine’s use of American equipment to strike into Russian territory, Blinken replied that, “We have not encouraged or enabled strikes outside of Ukraine,” before adding, “but ultimately Ukraine has to make decisions for itself about how it’s going to conduct this war…. these are decisions that Ukraine has to make, Ukraine will make for itself.”

The State Department has from the start abdicated diplomacy. We know that on December 17, 2021, Putin proposed security guarantees to the United States with a key demand of no NATO expansion to Ukraine. But rather than negotiate, Derek Chollet, counselor to Secretary Blinken, later revealed that the U.S. at the time did not consider NATO expansion to be on the bargaining table.

At the end of a full term in office, the Blinken State Department does not have a single diplomatic victory to boast about. At the start of his term, Biden promised to “offer Tehran a credible path back to diplomacy.” He promised he would “promptly reverse the failed Trump policies that have inflicted harm on the Cuban people and done nothing to advance democracy and human rights.” He promised a different foreign policy than Trump’s “abject failure” in Venezuela. And he promised a new approach to North Korea that “is open to and will explore diplomacy.”

The Blinken State Department has delivered on none of these promises and has failed to attain a ceasefire in Gaza or in Ukraine. Instead, it has availed itself of a one tool tool box of coercion, be it sanctions or military force. It has fallen to the Pentagon to suggest diplomacy and to question unrestricted use of force.

Meanwhile, it was General Charles Q. Brown Jr., the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and other senior Pentagon officials who recently raised the question at the White House of whether over-reliance on military force has emboldened America’s partners to be increasingly aggressive and cross American red lines.

Diplomacy has often in the past partnered with military force. But in the Biden administration, the State Department has abdicated diplomacy and reduced itself to the hawkish arm of the Pentagon which has, paradoxically, been the louder voice for diplomacy.

Russia Matters, 10/25/24

Russia in Review, Oct. 18-25, 2024

5 Things to Know

1. Russia hosted the first BRICS summit since the group’s expansion to nine members with leaders from 32 countries, including China and India, as well as the U.N. General Secretary, participating in the event that took place in Kazan this week. The Oct. 22–24 summit, which has become the largest geopolitical event hosted by Russia since the invasion of Ukraine, symbolized Kremlin’s efforts to promote a multipolar world order as an alternative to U.S. dominance. One key item on the summit’s agenda was discussion of Russia’s “BRICS Bridge” proposal, aiming to create a blockchain-based payment system to bypass the U.S. dollar. However, practical progress on implementing Russia’s financial proposals was reportedly limited, as countries face U.S. pressure not to collaborate with Russia’s financial system. Putin, Xi and some other leaders of the BRICS countries’ would like this group to become a competitor to Western-led international organizations, while others, such as Modi, are careful to avoid turning the group into an alternative to global organizations. Lack of consensus on the issue is reflected in the Kazan summit’s declaration. It contains 20 references to multipolarity and multilateralism, calling for a more just world order. The declaration’s signatories also offer some implicit criticism of the West by asserting that “we are deeply concerned about the disruptive effect of unlawful unilateral coercive measures, including illegal sanctions, on the world economy, international trade and the achievement of the sustainable development goals.” However, while shaming, the declaration doesn’t name any particular group of countries.* 
2. Some 1,500 servicemen of North Korea’s Eleventh Army, an elite unit known as the “Storm Corps,” are undergoing training in Russia as part of a 10,000–12,000-strong unit that will be tasked with helping Russia to re-take parts of its Kursk region held by Ukrainian armed forces, according to South Korean intelligence as cited by Bloomberg and FT. The balance of forces in this region, where the Ukrainian army has already had to cede up to half of its gains, is already reportedly tilting slowly in Russia’s favor. U.S. officials have earlier this week acknowledged the presence of North Korean servicemen in Russia, but have not given any hints on whether and how Ukraine’s allies may respond if the DPRK personnel are employed to fight on Russia’s side. Meanwhile, Putin has appeared to acknowledge that North Korean troops had been deployed to his country, according to NYT. Alluding to the DPRK-RF treaty, which has a mutual assistance clause, Putin said on Oct. 24 that he “never doubted at all that the North Korean leadership takes our agreements seriously.”¹
3. A U.S. official told Fox News that America’s Intelligence Committee (IC) and Department of Defense (DOD) have recommended against modifying a U.S. policy that would allow Ukraine to strike targets deep within Russia using U.S.-made long-range missiles. According to the IC and DOD analysis, a change in policy would not have a strategic impact nor would it change the course of the war. In addition, “[i]t would be irresponsible if we didn’t take into account what Russia would do,” the official said. Russia is a “nuclear power capable of doing very bad things both to Ukraine and to the U.S.,” Fox News quoted the U.S. official as saying shortly after the Biden administration had announced a new $400 million shipment of arms to Ukraine. The new package includes ammunition for missile and artillery systems, armored personnel carriers, and satellite communication equipment, according to ISW.
4. Russia is open to a “reasonable compromise” but won’t make any concessions to end its war in Ukraine, Putin said in a TV interview that aired after he completed hosting the BRICS summit in Kazan. “We are ready to make reasonable compromises, but I don’t want to go into details right now because there are no substantive negotiations,” Putin was quoted by Bloomberg as saying in this TV interview broadcast Oct. 25. One day prior to the broadcast, Putin had told a BRICS summit press conference that “We are ready to consider any options for peace agreements, based on the realities that are developing on the ground,” repeating his earlier demands that Ukraine accept Russia’s land grabs. Last week, Putin said Russia is ready to hold a dialogue on a peaceful settlement, but only based on draft agreements Russian and Ukrainian negotiations discussed in Istanbul in spring 2022.
5. Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that if Russia and Ukraine can agree to refrain from attacking each others’ energy infrastructure, it could lead to the cessation of hostilities and peace talks, FT reported. “We saw during the first [peace] summit that there could be a decision on energy security. In other words: we do not attack their energy infrastructures, they don’t attack ours. Could this lead to the end of the war’s hot phase? I think so,” the Ukrainian leader was quoted by this U.K. newspaper as saying.