Lt. Col. (Ret.) Daniel Davis, Military.com, 8/25/25

Earlier this year, speaking at a press conference in Qatar, President Donald Trump categorically declared that “nobody can beat us.” He continued, “We have the strongest military in the world, by far. Not China, not Russia, not anybody!”

We do have a strong military, but we are woefully unprepared to fight a modern war. That’s because, despite all of the major technological advances in warfighting in recent years, manpower is still absolutely critical, and understanding how those boots on the ground interact with emerging drone warfare is still in its infancy in the U.S. military.

Ground warfare has evolved over the past three and a half years since Russia invaded Ukraine. I’ve spent considerable time studying this conflict from strategic, operational and tactical angles, and I’ve conducted multiple interviews with combatants on both the Russian and Ukrainian sides. The picture that emerges explains not only why Russia’s progress is slow and Ukraine is gradually losing ground, but also why the U.S. would face serious challenges if forced into a similar fight today.

Some have argued that Russia has failed to completely conquer Ukraine because Russian generals and soldiers are of poor quality. That conclusion ignores the genuinely game-changing nature of drones on the conduct of land warfare.

There isn’t one category or type of drone that is game-changing by itself, but rather the categories of drones and the ways they can be employed in concert with other drones and legacy platforms and soldiers. There are primarily four main classes of drones: first-person view (FPV) drones that fly explosive charges directly into vehicles or soldiers, bomber drones that fly over a target and release bombs, missile-carrying drones, and reconnaissance drones.

Despite endless talk about game-changing weapons, only the widespread deployment of drones has truly altered the nature of this war. Armored vehicles remain essential for transporting infantry to the front, but they can’t move in large numbers without suffering catastrophic losses. Traditional armored charges – such as the type I participated in during Desert Storm’s Battle of 73 Easting – are deadly in today’s battlefield conditions. Russia has increasingly turned to motorcycles to improve frontline mobility – not because they offer protection, but because their speed and maneuverability improve their chances of defeating drone attacks. No armored vehicle can dodge an FPV or fiber optic-guided drone, but a motorcycle might.

As a result, every inch of ground in modern war is contested: by various types of drones, artillery strikes, missiles, rockets, air attacks, armored vehicle cannons, and infantry attacks. Both sides in the Russia-Ukraine War have suffered high vehicle losses. Fighters from both Russia and Ukraine have told me that stepping out of a trench – for any reason, even to eat or relieve themselves – is extraordinarily dangerous.

Any movement above ground can be spotted and targeted by drones within minutes. Reconnaissance drones scan likely targets and guide attack drones to strike. Others simply loiter above the battlefield, waiting for an opportunity.

This is why manpower is still the decisive factor: Drones and air attacks can be devastating, but it takes boots on the ground to either take territory or hold it. This is where Russia’s biggest advantages have come into play in this war of attrition. Russia has millions more men of military age to draw from than Ukraine, and Moscow has chosen to limit its manpower losses and play up its firepower advantages.

Rather than launching costly frontal assaults, Russian forces now frequently flank Ukrainian positions and cities, saturating them first with artillery and glide bombs, then using drones to pin down defenders, and only then send in the infantry to seize territory.

This has sobering implications for the United States and NATO. We do not know how to fight this kind of war. Only recently has the Pentagon begun taking drone warfare seriously – something that should have happened after the 2020 Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict. Better late than never, perhaps, but the deeper problem is cultural and doctrinal. We still think in terms of maneuver warfare, “shock and awe,” and rapid dominance. Those concepts no longer apply in peer-on-peer conflicts like this one.

Russia needed nearly two years to discard its outdated views on modern war. It adapted. We haven’t. Earlier this month, the Ukrainian military even mocked the U.S. Army’s newly updated field manual for the “Tank Platoon,” saying flat-out that our doctrines are detached from current battlefield realities.

Today’s U.S. armed ofrces no doubt have skills, quality personnel, and good equipment. But we are far behind in understanding how to fight modern wars. It took both Russia and Ukraine the better part of a year and a half to fully recognize how all the classes of drones have changed the nature of war. Both sides paid an exorbitant price in blood to learn those lessons.

The U.S. Army has studied the conflict and just last month published a compendium on examining the changing nature of war. That’s useful and good. But intellectual knowledge alone won’t help you in the next fight. We’ve got to make profound and fundamental changes now to have a chance to avoid disaster when next we fight on the ground. If the Pentagon was taking this seriously, leaders wouldn’t have merely published a report. They would be urgently changing our fighting doctrine, systems of equipment, types of ordnance and the like to enable and equip our troops to successfully wage war in this new world of conflict.

Yet there is little evidence they’ve done any of those things.

History is filled with the wreckage of once-powerful armies that failed to change with the times and suffered avoidable defeats in subsequent wars. If we are to avoid that sad tradition, major changes must be made, immediately and with urgency. Otherwise, we will pay in blood later for what we should have done today.

By Tarik Cyril Amar, RT, 8/25/25

In some important ways that Western information warriors love to miss, Russia and the West are quite similar. Like the West, Russia has a typically modern state, even if today it functions much better than its Western counterparts.

Russia’s economy is capitalist like almost everywhere else on the planet now, even if the Russian state – because it functions better – has reasserted control over the rich, while the West, sick with neoliberalism, lets them dominate and damage national interests. This is one reason, incidentally, why Russia has withstood unprecedentedly savage Western economic warfare and has a far more effective military-industrial complex than the West.

Finally, while Russia spans Europe and Asia, it is also a major force within that specific cultural tradition whose origins we associate with Europe, or more broadly, the West, from novels to classical conservatories.

Yet, in other respects, there are principal differences between Russia and the West. Please forget, for a moment, about the usual suspects (Russian Orthodoxy versus the rest, for instance, or the usual speculations about space, climate, and mentality). Instead, let’s be concrete and very contemporary: Let’s ask what differences matter most to the issue of finding (or not) a valid peace for the Ukraine conflict. Then two things emerge, one obvious and the other a little less so.

What is easy to spot is that Russia is united and the West is not. In part, this is simply due to the fact that Moscow rules over one country, while Washington, the de facto capital of the West as a geopolitical entity, rules – and exploits ever more crudely – a complicated outer empire of formally independent nation-states that are de facto its clients, satellites, and vassals.

While the US exerts a great deal of brute power over its domain, in reality, the latter is as potentially fissiparous as every empire before. If you think that the mere assertion of unity and control is the same as reality, ask the Soviets about their luck with that idea. Except you can’t, because one day they were there and the next – as if by foul magic – they were not.

What is harder to notice – but never to be unseen once you do – is that the political establishments of Russia and the West now have fundamentally different patterns of learning.

In short, Russia’s is normal in that it has a learning curve, and one with a nice upward bend: That is why its opponents find it impossible to massively deceive it, as occurred in the late 1980s and much of the 1990s.

The current learning pattern of Western, especially the European elites, on the other hand, is highly unusual: it forms, in effect, a flat, closed circle. On that trajectory, things sort of move, but they never really change.

The current state of the attempts to end the Ukraine conflict via negotiation and compromise perfectly illustrates this difference. Indeed, both Russia and the West are displaying their respective learning or for the West, really, non-learning patterns in exemplary fashion.

On Russia’s side, the hard lessons of systematic Western bad faith – from no-NATO-expansion promises to Minsk II – have been fully absorbed. As a result, Moscow, even while open to talks and a solution by realistic agreement, does not make the mistake of being swayed by emotions, hopes, and momentary vibes (the “Alaska vibe,” for instance), as happened to Russia (and before that, the Soviet Union) around the time of the end of the Cold War, with extremely painful consequences.

Specifically, that means that the Russian leadership has made it clear that – after the Alaska summit as much as before – it will not make concessions on key aims. For instance, Moscow will not accept the idea of Ukraine getting NATO membership, even under another label. Likewise it will not tolerate troops from NATO countries in postwar Ukraine, and it will not give up on securing the rights of Russian speakers in Ukraine. Rather silly attempts to pressure the Kremlin into premature meetings with Ukraine’s past-expiration-date leader Vladimir Zelensky have also gone nowhere.

There are observers in the West who are immune to Western propaganda and assess Russia in a fair manner. Some of them have recently been worrying that Moscow might walk into Western traps, as happened at the end of the Cold War or in 2015 when Russia accepted the Minsk II agreement, which the West and Ukraine then abused. Yet the Russian leadership shows no sign of being in any danger of doing so this time.

The West, however, is stuck in its ways. At least as a whole, it has not yet learned a thing, it seems, from the ferocious crash of both its long-term post-Cold War strategy of expansion by cheating and its recent attempt to eliminate Russia as a great power through a proxy war using Ukraine. NATO kaput, really, but NATO isn’t noticing.

The most obvious sign that the West has not yet learned its lesson is its persistent habit of auto-diplomacy. The West is odd in that it does most of its intensely exciting negotiating with itself. While you may well think that that is because the West is – structurally – not united, that is, actually, not the real reason for this narcissistic habit.

In reality, the reason for this self-damaging refusal to face reality is something else. Namely, a deep, entirely misplaced, and pathologically unquestionable sense of superiority. It is as if the West were so powerful that it need not bother with what others have to say but only with its own soliloquy. A fantasy both absurd and highly detrimental.

Consider the so-called “Coalition of the Willing,” in essence, a loose ad-hoc grouping of mostly European (Canada does a Canada and can’t make up its mind) states that seem unable to stop planning – with whatever degree of sincerity – to somehow place their troops in postwar Ukraine, even if only with a US “backstop” no one can plausibly define.

Follow merely Western debates and mainstream media about this ongoing and confused effort and you will find it hard to even notice a rather important fact: Russia’s answer to any such scheme is a very hard no. And yet the West sticks with its geopolitical inner monologue: endlessly discussing a thing that – if its leaders ever actually listened to their Russian counterparts – they knew cannot be realized. Because insisting on realizing it means that Moscow will not settle but continue fighting – and winning.

That may, of course, be the real Western intention here: to produce a deal-breaker. But if that is so, then the next question is why the US tolerates this stalling and sabotage operation by its European vassals.

There are three possible answers to that question: Either the US is already secretly planning to override its European dependents and therefore does not care how they keep themselves busy with their fantasies. Or Washington is still as blind to reality as the Europeans. Or, finally, Trump and his team believe that they can use the Europeans’ ongoing chatter about their coalition-with-nowhere-to-go as some sort of leverage in negotiations with Moscow.

Of those three American postures, only one would be realistic and productive: the first. The other two would mean that Washington is as learning-incapable as Europe, because a US attempt to use the European talk as some kind of bluff to exert pressure on Russia would signal that Trump’s team has not come to terms with Russia’s resolve not to concede major war goals while winning on the battlefield.

Further examples could be added. For instance, Washington’s erratic statements and arms sales regarding Kiev either not being granted or needing a capability to strike deep within Russia. Or its latest attempt to once again operate with a deadline and vague warnings: this time, it’s two weeks and, so the US president has told us, within them he will decide what to do about Ukraine and America’s policy toward it. In essence, if there still is no progress toward a peace settlement, either double down again on confronting Russia, Biden-style, or abandon this terribly misguided proxy war to those Europeans who are too obstinate to finally drop it.

Trump’s recent decisions and actions seem to show that, with regard to the Ukraine war, the US is actually turning a corner and leaving that flat, closed circle of non-learning behind, in favor of becoming a country with a more normal foreign-policy learning curve, just like Russia. We can only hope that this saner attitude will prevail, even if Western Europe wants to stay behind in its impotent fantasy realm of splendid omnipotence.

Moon of Alabama, 8/25/25

The (former) President Zelenski of Ukraine is refusing any compromise in negotiations with Russia. He would be killed and replaced by a more right wing figure if he would consider otherwise.

In a speech on Sunday marking Ukraine’s independence Zelenski insisted of recapturing all of Ukraine including Crimea.

As the Washington Post summarizes (archived):

In Kyiv on Sunday, Ukraine’s Independence Day, Zelensky addressed the nation and vowed to restore its territorial integrity.

“Ukraine will never again be forced in history to endure the shame that the Russians call a ‘compromise,’” he said. “We need a just peace.”

He listed some of the regions occupied by Russia — including Donetsk, Luhansk and Crimea — and said “no temporary occupation” could change the fact that the land belongs to Ukraine.

Zelenski thus rejects calls by U.S. President Trump to give up Ukrainian territory in exchange for peace.

One reason why he does so may be the personal danger he is in. Any compromise about territory may well cost his life.

The London Times continues to make propaganda for Nazis. After a recent whitewashing interview with Azov Nazi leader Biletsky (archived) it yesterday published an interview with the former leader of the fascist Right Sector in Odessa Serhii Sterneneko.

‘Russia has repeatedly tried to kill me — I must be doing something right’ (archived)

Sterneneko had a leading role in the 2014 massacres in Maidan Square and at the Trade Union’s House in Odessa. The Times is whitewashing his participation in those events. It does not mind to publish his threats against Zelenski:

[A]mong Ukraine’s younger generation of soldiers and civilians, Sternenko’s brand of truth to power has wide popularity. “I say what I think, and people like what I say.”

His views on President Putin’s demand for Ukraine to cede the territory it defends in the eastern Donbas region as a precondition for possible peace are typically direct. “If [President] Zelensky were to give any unconquered land away, he would be a corpse — politically, and then for real,” Sternenko said. “It would be a bomb under our sovereignty. People would never accept it.”

Sternenko, who himself has avoided the draft, wants the war to go on forever:

Indeed, as he discussed Russian intransigence and President Trump’s efforts to end the war, Sternenko’s thoughts on the possibility of peace appeared to be absent of any compromise over Ukrainian soil.

“At the end there will only be one victor, Russia or Ukraine,” he said. “If the Russian empire continues to exist in this present form then it will always want to expand. Compromise is impossible. The struggle will be eternal until the moment Russia leaves Ukrainian land.”

Other British media continue to promote the rise of Nazi affiliated figures in Ukraine. The Guardian adds by promoting the presidential campaign of the former Ukrainian general and now ambassador to the UK Valeri Zaluzhny:

In private conversations, Zaluzhnyi has not confirmed he plans to go into politics, but he has allowed himself to speculate on what kind of platform he could propose if he does make the decision. Those close to him say he sees Israel as a model, despite its current bloody actions in Gaza, viewing it as a small country surrounded by enemies and fully focused on defence.

He would style himself as a tough, wartime leader who would promise “blood, sweat and tears” to the Ukrainian people in return for saving the nation, channelling Winston Churchill. In one private conversation, he said: “I don’t know if the Ukrainian people will be ready for that, ready for these tough policies.”

A day before being fired as the commander of the Ukrainian army Zaluzhny took a selfie with the leader of the fascist Right Sector and commander of Right Sector brigade of Ukrainian military in front of a portrait of Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera and the fascist OUN flag.

The picture was already part of his campaign to become the leader of a Bandera-ized Ukraine.

It seems that the British deep-state does its best to support him in that.

This article is from June but it explains some of the legal debate and political implications surrounding whether to seize Russia’s frozen assets to use for Ukraine. – Natylie

International Crisis Group, 6/17/25

What is happening?

Following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, countries that decided to impose sanctions on Moscow also froze Russian assets held in their banks or other financial institutions. On 28 February 2022, just days after the invasion, the European Union, the U.S., Canada, Britain and Japan blocked the transfer or use of bonds, deposits and cash owned by the Russian Central Bank and denominated in the currencies of the sanctioning countries. Switzerland and Australia did the same soon thereafter. Western supporters of Ukraine have also frozen privately owned Russian assets totalling more than €70 billion ($79.9 billion).

Estimates of the value of Russia’s frozen sovereign, or state, assets vary. In September 2023, officials from sanctioning countries assessed the total at around $280 billion (€262 billion), with approximately €210 billion ($224 billion) held in EU member states. Russian estimates are slightly higher. 

Either way, by some distance the largest share, €183 billion ($192 billion), sits with the Belgium-based central securities depository, Euroclear, a financial services company that acts as an intermediary between buyers and sellers of securities, such as stocks and bonds, and which has total assets under management of €40 trillion. Japan has the next largest share, with $33 billion (€30 billion), mostly held in cash in Japanese banks. France has frozen approximately €19 billion ($21 billion), Switzerland 7.7 billion francs ($8.8 billion, or €7.9 million), the U.S. $5 billion (€4.6 billion) and Germany €210 million ($229 million). Some countries do not report separately on the sovereign assets or privately held assets that they hold, instead providing a combined total. These include the UK (£25 billion, or $34 billion), Canada ($316 million, or €288 million) and Australia ($64.5 million, or €56 million). 

The range and size of these holdings reflect that Russia has an export-oriented economy; it has long deposited assets in other countries and in multiple currencies as a standard practice and risk-hedging strategy. Because dollars and euros were the primary currencies for Russian foreign trade before February 2022, Russia’s Central Bank held dollar and euro-denominated accounts abroad to make dealings easier. Dollars and euros were also important for payments inside Russia, where firms and individuals used them for numerous transactions. As of 1 February 2022, Russian households had $257.9 billion (€230 billion) in foreign currency savings.

As war drags on in Ukraine, a range of experts and officials in Europe, the U.S. and Canada, as well as the government in Kyiv, have argued that Russia’s frozen assets should be seized and used to support Ukraine. These funds could cover the Ukrainian government’s current public and military spending, now being paid for in large part by U.S. and European backers, as well as underwrite the gargantuan rebuilding effort that will eventually come. Kyiv argues that confiscation of Russian assets would be justified, productive and practicable. It would punish Russia for launching the war, compensate Ukraine for the huge material damage caused by Russian aggression and ensure that the Ukrainian state can balance its books, thereby serving the cause of justice in the face of an illegal invasion. Critics of the proposed measure, however, say it would violate international and national laws, might unsettle European sovereign bond markets and would weaken the euro’s status as a reserve currency.

Why have calls to confiscate Russian frozen assets intensified?

Reconstruction of Ukraine after the war is likely to come with a massive price tag. Russia’s initial attack, the fighting that followed and the continued occupation have inflicted enormous damage on Ukrainian infrastructure and destroyed dozens of small and medium-sized settlements in the country’s east. As of December 2024, the Ukrainian government, the World Bank Group, the European Commission and the UN estimated the cost of rebuilding Ukraine at $524 billion (€506 billion), 2.8 times higher than Ukraine’s gross domestic product. The previous month, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had projected an even higher figure of $800 billion (€741 billion).

Meanwhile, Ukraine faces ever greater difficulties in covering its rising day-to-day spending. Ukraine’s 2025 defence budget alone is $10 billion larger than it was in 2024. Recent shifts in U.S. policy have only exacerbated concerns about how Ukraine can balance its books. Since the Trump administration took office, the U.S. Congress has not approved any new financial or military aid for Ukraine, and it looks unlikely to do so any time soon. Its inaction poses a major challenge for Ukrainian finances, since the U.S. has provided $53.8 billion (€47 billion) in direct budget support to Kyiv over the war’s three years. Responsibility for supplying Ukraine with arms and funding its budget may now fall entirely upon Kyiv’s European backers, which are hamstrung by their own budgetary constraints.

Mindful of the economic pressures they are under, Ukraine’s leaders have repeatedly pressed the issue of confiscating Russian assets.

Mindful of the economic pressures they are under, Ukraine’s leaders have repeatedly pressed the issue of confiscating Russian assets. In May 2022, Zelenskyy proposed that an international treaty allow for seizing Russian assets and transferring them to a special fund to compensate Ukraine for damages. Ukrainians involved in negotiations with Moscow have also proposed that frozen Russian assets could serve as reparations, though Moscow has not been amenable to this idea. In February 2024, Zelenskyy said he aimed to see Russian assets held in EU member states confiscated within the year. When that did not happen, he proposed in December 2024 that $30 billion (€28 billion) from Russia’s frozen funds be used to buy ten to twelve Patriot air defence systems for his country. Asset transfer also came up in U.S.-Ukraine talks in early 2025, with Zelenskyy advocating confiscation as a way to guarantee his nation’s defence spending over the long term. 

Several EU countries, including the Baltic states, Sweden, Poland and the Czech Republic, have backed Ukraine’s push to use frozen Russian assets. With Washington making clear that its support for Ukraine will soon dwindle, if not disappear entirely, the clamour for rapid confiscation has intensified. One fear voiced among officials in EU capitals and London is that if the money is not cleared for use soon, it may be lost. The EU must renew its decision to freeze Russian assets by 31 July. If a member state like Hungary, which has pushed back against EU policy toward Moscow, vetoes the renewal, Russia could have access to the funds once again. To prevent that from happening, the UK has floated the idea of transferring all Russian sovereign assets to a special purpose vehicle authorised to make riskier investments for higher returns. Consolidating the assets in this fashion could also be seen as a step toward seizing them, as it would simplify any eventual takeover of the funds. 

What does the law say regarding confiscation of Russian sovereign assets?

Whether international or domestic laws allow Russian Central Bank assets to be confiscated by states other than Ukraine, and which are not direct victims of aggression, is a matter of dispute among officials and legal experts in the West. While the idea is supported by many politicians in the U.S., Canada and Europe, most specialists in international law argue that confiscation of Russian state assets would be unlawful expropriation. Some prominent legal scholars, such as Harold Koh, have nonetheless staked out an opposing view, insisting that expropriation would be lawful as a response to Russian aggression and if Russia failed to pay war reparations. 

Under international law, the doctrine of countermeasures maintains that the injured state, may respond to a violation of international law by seeking to induce the offending state to comply with the law. Countermeasures must be proportionate, temporary and, as far as possible, reversible. They must also meet certain procedural requirements, including proper notice to the state that has violated laws. But those are not the only legal hurdles that the case for confiscation must clear. Because assets of the Russian Central Bank are held not by Ukraine, but in third countries, the legal argument for seizure leans on the contested concept of “collective countermeasures”. If third-party states wish to apply collective countermeasures, they would likely have to depend for legitimacy upon the intervention of an international court, such as the International Court of Justice or European Court of Human Rights, which would first have to demand that Russia pay reparations and then permit its assets to be seized if it refused to do so. To date, there has been no international court decision that is binding for Russia and requires it to pay reparations to Ukraine. In theory, the UN Security Council could also impose measures like these, though as a permanent member Russia could simply veto any such proposal.

Confiscation of private or public foreign assets may … be unlawful under the domestic laws of some states.

Confiscation of private or public foreign assets may also be unlawful under the domestic laws of some states. In such cases, confiscation, as opposed to simply freezing Russian state assets, might require that states pass new legislation or amend existing laws to allow a greater margin for asset seizure (though this step would not remove the international legal hurdles mentioned above).

Some countries have already gone down that path. Canada and the U.S. have changed their laws, taking steps to legalise confiscation of Russian Central Bank assets held abroad. In June 2022, the Canadian Parliament amended the Special Economic Measures Act, which grants the executive branch broad powers to confiscate assets owned by governments or individuals, although the Senate has not yet passed the legislation allowing Ottawa to seize Russian state assets. The U.S., on the other hand, has given itself authorisation to seize Russian assets directly. In April 2024, the U.S. Congress passed the Rebuilding Prosperity and Opportunity for Ukrainians Act (REPO). This act grants the president permission to “seize, confiscate, transfer or vest” Russian sovereign assets under U.S. jurisdiction, subject to certain conditions. So far, however, the U.S. government has taken no action under the new legislation.

In Europe, views on beefing up powers of expropriation are mixed, and there is no consensus among states. Leaders in the UK, Poland, the Nordic countries and the Baltic states have tasked legal officials with looking into the options. But the largest holders of Russian assets in the EU – Belgium, France, Luxembourg and Germany – continue to oppose seizure, as do several other states in the eurozone such as Italy and Spain. Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever warned that confiscating Russian sovereign funds would amount to an act of war, while French President Emmanuel Macron has held that international law clearly prohibits seizure of these assets. Others in France disagree. In March, the French parliament passed a non-binding resolution urging the EU to appropriate frozen Russian assets and use them to support Ukraine.

Beyond the West, on the other hand, official support for asset confiscation is scarce. Japan, the second-largest holder of Russian assets after Europe, has stressed that these assets must be treated according to international law. China, Indonesia and Saudi Arabia have also let the EU know that they oppose confiscation, while at a 2024 Swiss peace summit, Kenyan President William Ruto condemned “the unilateral appropriation of Russian assets” as “unlawful, unacceptable and a violation of the UN Charter”. 

What are the practical challenges to confiscating the assets?

Legal concerns aside, critics argue that seizing sovereign assets would threaten the fundaments of financial stability by making foreign investors nervous about the security of their holdings. Belgium and France, which hold a 13 per cent stake and 11 per cent stake in Euroclear, respectively, are determined to remain attractive, trustworthy destinations for foreign capital, especially in the face of growing competition from Asia and the Gulf. If spooked, holders of European sovereign debt such as China and Saudi Arabia could conceivably sell off their bonds, driving up borrowing costs for already indebted European governments. In early 2024, Saudi Arabia reportedly suggested that it might offload some European debt if the G7 decided to confiscate Russian sovereign assets.

The European Central Bank has also cautioned against confiscation on the grounds of the harm it might do to the euro’s status as a global reserve currency. A general loss of faith in European markets could also have knock-on effects for the region’s security, increasing borrowing costs for governments in the eurozone just when they are seeking to raise defence spending. A European member state official told Crisis Group that risks to euro stability are the main argument militating against asset confiscation.

Are there other ways to use the frozen assets to help Ukraine?

While debate rages over whether or not Russia’s frozen assets could be seized to help Ukraine, EU officials have determined that nothing prevents them from redirecting so-called windfall profits to Ukraine.

Russia’s frozen sovereign assets originally included short-term U.S., European, Canadian and Asian government bonds, government-guaranteed securities, and cash held on account and in fixed-term deposits. In time, most of the bonds matured and, with coupon payments, were converted into cash, which remained blocked. The fixed-term deposits also expired. But the returns from interest payments on cash held on account and matured bonds, known as windfall profits, were reinvested under the holding financial institutions’ rules and remained out of the Russian Central Bank’s reach.

In accordance with its conservative guidelines, Euroclear invested the windfall profits with the Belgian Central Bank, which offers the lowest risk-free rate of return available. Euroclear reported earnings of €4.4 billion on frozen Russian holdings in 2023 and €6.9 billion in 2024. These were also taxed by Belgium, whose state coffers received over a billion euros each year as a result. The Belgian government uses those taxes to provide military aid to Ukraine.

Legal experts and financial specialists have differing opinions as to the use of these profits. Some believe that these earnings stem from asset management and do not constitute sovereign holdings, meaning that seizing the funds does not violate property rights – so long as the frozen capital itself remains untouched. Others believe that generating interest is an inherent part of capital management and that transferring these profits (eg, to Ukraine) constitutes a violation of property rights. Constant extraction of profits prevents the growth of these assets, this argument goes, and as a result of inflation, reduces the real value of capital over time.

With the first argument in mind, the European Council, which brings together the governments of all EU member states, ruled in February 2o24 that institutions holding Russian sovereign assets worth more than one million euros should manage the profits from those funds separately from the assets themselves. 

Months later, the European Council ruled that these same institutions are now obliged to transfer at least 99.7 per cent of annual net (post-tax) profits from frozen Russian state assets to the EU biannually. As the largest holder of Russian assets, Euroclear was immediately affected. The EU is now supposed to direct 90 per cent of these funds into its European Peace Facility, which finances military aid to Ukraine; the remaining 10 per cent is to help pay for other Ukraine-related programs through the EU budget. In July 2024, the EU made its first transfer of €1.5 billion of these funds to support the military effort and reconstruction in Ukraine. In April 2025, the EU received another €2.1 billion, which will be gradually channelled to Ukraine. By the end of 2027, the EU expects, his scheme will have generated €15-20 billion.

Future revenue streams from the interest on Russian assets at Euroclear and other institutions have … been deployed to secure a major loan package for Ukraine from the G7.

Future revenue streams from the interest on Russian assets at Euroclear and other institutions have also been deployed to secure a major loan package for Ukraine from the G7, which approved a $50 billion credit line on June 2024. This mechanism is called the Extraordinary Revenue Acceleration initiative. Under the plan, the U.S. is due to lend $20 billion to Ukraine and the EU a similar amount, while the UK, Japan and Canada provide the remaining $10 billion. Funds started to be disbursed in late 2024, when the Biden administration transferred its $20 billion to Ukraine. The EU has sent €6 billion since the start of 2025. As a result, windfall profits from sovereign assets will repay these lenders rather than fund Ukraine directly. Building on the success of this approach, some experts have suggested pooling all Russian sovereign assets into a single fund and issuing long-term bonds on the basis of the total amount, with the proceeds then funnelled toward Ukraine.

These funding schemes are inventive. But they also create their own obstacles to any plan either to seize Russia’s frozen assets or to thaw them. Because the G7 stipulates that its loan will take a long time to mature, extending up to 45 years in the EU and over 30 years in other countries, it means the assets will have to stay put and generate profit over that entire period, absent another plan to repay the loan. Indeed, countries like France have opposed any new decision on sovereign assets, arguing that the G7 loan create major obstacles to consolidating, seizing or unfreezing these assets in the near future. 

How has Russia responded to the freezing of its assets?

Reacting to the block on Russia’s sovereign assets, Moscow undertook its own asset freeze in March 2022. The Kremlin and Russia’s Central Bank established restrictions on individuals and bodies from “unfriendly” countries holding assets in Russian financial institutions, prohibiting them from withdrawing the money from Russia without government permission. A total of 47 countries are counted as “unfriendly”, including the U.S., Canada, the UK, Japan, Australia and all the EU member states that have imposed sanctions on Russia. Russian companies are also required to transfer funds from any dealings with businesses in those countries into special accounts that can be converted into foreign currency and taken out of Russia only with permission from the state. Russian officials declared that these restrictions would remain in effect until sanctions are lifted and the Central Bank’s foreign assets are unfrozen.

Officials have not revealed the value of foreign assets blocked in Russia. Some, including Finance Minister Anton Siluanov, have claimed that Russia has blocked foreign assets roughly equivalent in value to Russian assets frozen abroad. But some Russian experts dismiss these estimates, arguing that the total is far lower. One indicator of the size of foreign economic interests in Russia comes from a study by the Kyiv School of Economics and B4Ukraine, which estimated that, in 2023 alone, 1,600 multinational corporations generated more than $196.9 billion in revenue and $16.8 billion in profit in Russia through their subsidiaries. Companies from EU member states produced $81.4 billion of this revenue and U.S. companies $30.5 billion. Austrian Raiffeisen Bank, the largest Western bank still operating in Russia, has amassed €4.4 billion in blocked profit. Finally, it appears that investors from “unfriendly” countries continue to hold more than half of all stock traded in Russia. Norway’s sovereign wealth fund may hold assets in Russia worth $448 million.

How might Russia respond to the confiscation of its sovereign assets?

Russia considers Western sanctions to be illegal, and it says it will never renounce its rights to frozen assets. Moscow has also warned that any confiscation of sovereign assets would be met by retaliatory seizures of Western assets in Russia – and maybe by legal action as well.

The Kremlin’s first move has been to threaten to respond to confiscation of its sovereign assets by seizing private holdings inside Russia belonging to individuals and firms. A precedent already exists. In response to the U.S. REPO Act, Putin signed a decree in May 2024 allowing the Russian Central Bank to respond to any U.S. seizure of its assets by imposing the forfeiture of U.S. private and state assets in Russia. These assets can include property, shares in companies, securities and any property belonging to U.S. residents. Russia has also reportedly seized €3 billion in cash held by Euroclear and blocked in Russian financial institutions.

Secondly, Russian officials have suggested they might challenge the confiscation of Russia’s sovereign assets in court. Private investors from Russia have already filed more than 170 lawsuits against Euroclear in Russian courts. Some experts have suggested that the Russian state could take Euroclear to court in other jurisdictions, too, such as in Asian countries. The Russian state is likely to sue not in an effort to regain control of its holdings, which it believes would be futile, but to prevent their transfer to Ukraine. The lawsuits might succeed, and they might not, but they could prevent confiscation while they continue, perhaps for years.

As for using windfall profits from sovereign assets to help Ukraine, Moscow’s threats to prevent it largely ring hollow. Russia has threatened to impose sanctions and block the property of individuals or funds that purchase bonds issued against the collateral of Russian assets, but it has taken no concrete action.

How does Moscow see the role of sovereign assets in negotiations to end the Ukraine war?

Moscow sees the unblocking of Russian sovereign assets and lifting of sanctions on its Central Bank as critical to the peace deal it seeks – one that covers more than Ukraine, cementing Russia’s status as a powerful, prestigious state with major influence throughout the post-Soviet space and around the globe. The Kremlin believes that countries backing Ukraine should be willing to make the tradeoff, returning economic and political relations with Russia back to 2014 levels (including unblocking its assets) in exchange for peace in Ukraine. It views the assets it has blocked within Russia as additional leverage, saying it will not move first to loosen its grip on them.

The Kremlin’s approach has taken shape in its engagement with the Trump administration and Ukraine. While Washington has probed for a deal and better relations with Russia, Moscow has called on it to show good-will by restoring economic ties. To take one example, in March Russian negotiators offered U.S. negotiators safe navigation in the Black Sea in exchange for reconnecting Rosselkhozbank and other financial institutions involved in the international food and fertiliser trade to the SWIFT international bank transfer network. The offer was disingenuous: Ukraine had largely forced the Russian navy out of the Black Sea, meaning that Russian guarantees of safe navigation were not a major concession. Moscow also demanded something the U.S. cannot deliver. Washington does not control SWIFT, which is a cooperative company under Belgian law and complies with EU sanctions against Russia. But the gambit did reveal that Moscow is prepared to link moves toward peace in Ukraine – on the terms it defines – with Western economic concessions. The Russian position laid out two months later in talks with Ukraine in Istanbul did the same. Russia demanded that Ukraine waive all claims to compensation for war damages, a move that would deprive Kyiv and its European partners of a critical legal argument in favour of confiscating assets.

Moscow … seems willing to end Russian sanctions on the U.S. and European states, and to unfreeze assets held in Russia, if it gets what it wants.

Sensing an opportunity, the Trump administration has offered trade with the U.S. as a sweetener for Moscow. Russian authorities, however, see the resumption of trade with Ukraine’s European backers as far more important. Even though Russia has developed new trade logistics since 2022, the Kremlin is keen to resume using European trading networks and to see restrictions on transactions through European banks removed, in order to cut costs. As a result, the Kremlin appears to want to make renewal of commercial ties with the U.S. conditional on easing or lifting not just U.S. sanctions on Russia, but also European restrictions. Moscow also seems willing to end Russian sanctions on the U.S. and European states, and to unfreeze assets held in Russia, if it gets what it wants. 

The importance of European trade and financial ties in Russian calculations means that the region will almost certainly have to play a role in future peace talks. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio noted as much in March, adding that Russia would request the lifting of European sanctions, including unfreezing its assets, in any negotiations.

How can the countries backing Ukraine use sovereign assets as leverage in talks with Russia?

For now, European countries are not considering using frozen Russian sovereign assets as leverage in peace talks, as they do not believe meaningful negotiations with the Kremlin are possible. They also doubt that such negotiations could result in fair compensation for Ukraine. Instead, they prefer to retain these assets and use the proceeds to support Ukraine. But if trust were to be built among all sides and negotiations to start, the fact that Moscow wants its sovereign assets back means they can be useful leverage for countries holding them. The prospect of unfreezing assets could be tabled in negotiations even as debates about confiscation of assets continue – though it should be said if the assets are confiscated, their value as leverage will disappear.

Countries backing Ukraine should consider various ways to use the issue of frozen assets in potential peace talks. One would be to make clear that they will release the money only once there is a comprehensive agreement between Russia and Ukraine. As part of this deal, Russia would also have to agree to repay the outstanding balance of the G7 loan to Ukraine. If Russia then reneges on this commitment, any assets still held (which would presumably be of much lesser value) could once again be frozen. To prevent Russia from quickly withdrawing all its assets and encourage it to adhere to the agreement, countries supporting Ukraine could consider phasing the unfreezing of assets, linking it to implementation of the terms of a peace deal. Alternatively, assets could be thawed gradually as peace (or a ceasefire) continues to hold over the course of years. Meanwhile, as long as some assets remain frozen, the countries holding them can continue to use the profits to support Ukraine.

If a comprehensive peace deal is too hard to achieve, a more incremental approach could be adopted, with parts of the assets unblocked in step with specific concessions from Russia. For example, some portion of the assets could be unfrozen in exchange for Russian agreement to allow deployment of a foreign stabilisation force in Ukraine, or a UN mission with a strong mandate, and/or to let a strong Ukrainian military maintain close cooperation with its trans-Atlantic backers. Some assets might also be released if Russia pays financial compensation for damage inflicted on Ukraine, perhaps through direct payment of an agreed-upon amount to a special compensation fund. Another possibility is that Russia and Ukraine could negotiate contracts for long-term supply of Russian oil and gas to Ukraine at no cost.

Lastly, sanctions could be lifted in exchange for Moscow’s acceptance that its sovereign assets would be partially or fully transferred to a special fund dedicated to Ukraine’s reconstruction. Moscow has reportedly indicated that it might consider this measure as part of a broader deal, so long as it would mean avoiding future damage claims and lawsuits. But the reported Russian proposal would see at least some of the funds used to rebuild on Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory, potentially suggesting acceptance by Kyiv, if not formal recognition, of Russian control of that land. While this condition might not be acceptable to Ukraine or its backers, the proposal does open the possibility of gaining Russian acquiescence to use the frozen assets for Ukraine’s reconstruction. 

In any event, it is impossible to negotiate the future of assets or sanctions relief more broadly without the direct engagement of the countries involved. Since the lion’s share of these funds are parked in European countries, the U.S. cannot make a peace deal on its own that would satisfy Russia. Working with the Europeans may not please everyone in the Trump administration, but if the goal is peace in Ukraine, then the financial reality indicates that there is no alternative.

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Kallas: EU can’t give back frozen assets to Russia, unless they pay reparations to Ukraine

Euronews, 8/30/25

The EU’s foreign policy chief said the bloc needs to dive deep into the issue of frozen Russian assets, to be prepared in case of an eventual ceasefire or peace deal.

The EU’s foreign affairs chief, Kaja Kallas, stated that frozen assets will not be returned to Russia unless Moscow pays reparations to Ukraine. Kallas argued at the informal meeting of foreign affairs ministers in Copenhagen that the bloc needs to be prepared in case of an eventual ceasefire or a peace deal.

“We can’t possibly imagine that, if there is ceasefire or a peace deal, that these assets are given back to Russia if they haven’t paid for the reparations,” the high representative said.

The EU’s foreign ministers meet in Copenhagen for an informal Foreign Affairs Council to discuss issues related to the war in Ukraine. In this format, ministers do not make decisions, but they discuss the issues in depth.

After the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the European Union decided to freeze state assets worth 210 billion euros. This amount is not confiscated, but the EU uses its interest to support Ukraine’s war efforts.

Earlier, experts warned that the possible confiscation and use of frozen assets is an unprecedented area and could result in a legal minefield for the EU.

The biggest chunk of assets, €183bn, is held in Belgium, a host country of the Euroclear clearinghouse for financial transactions. Those assets belong to the Russian central bank, which originally held them as short-term government bonds.

In the EU, Poland and the Baltic countries were in favour of the full confiscation of the frozen assets, while Belgium, Germany, and France had legal reservations.

Earlier this week, Hungary sued the Council of the EU over a decision to grant billions of euros of aid to Ukraine from frozen Russian assets.

Budapest argued that the European Peace Facility (EPF), a financial programme which facilitates military aid to allied countries, breached EU law by ignoring Hungary’s opposition in this matter.

Ukraine receives between €3–5 billion every year through the EPF programme, which is almost fully financed from the interest of frozen Russian assets in Europe.

By Sylvia Demarest, Substack, 8/26/25

In his inaugural address, President Donald J. Trump expressed a desire to be a “peacemaker and a unifier.” He emphasized that his administration would focus on restoring confidence and pride in the nation while aiming to “end wars and prevent new conflicts.” Trump pledged to create peace by building “the strongest military the world has ever seen,” indicating that military strength would be a key component of his approach to achieving peace. He stated, “Our power will stop all wars and bring a new spirit of unity to a world that has been angry, violent and totally unpredictable.” This is similar to past claims of “peace through strength” forced on every US president by militarism. To back up his pledge of “peace through strength”, the Big Beautiful Bill Act added $150 billion to the annual budget of the Department of Defense. This means the US has a trillion dollar defense budget, and funds an industrial weapons monopoly that produces overpriced, exceptionally complex weapons, while promoting the sale and use of these weapons around the world. By any measure, the creation of an entity this destructive, is objectively insane.

US diplomatic and military history since WW2 is a history of unbridled war and bullying. Every day, President Trump seems to issue a new threat. But the world is changing. Economic power is shifting to the east and military power may be shifting as well. In this environment, “building the strongest military the world has ever seen” may no longer be economically and technologically feasible. The old tactics of bullying and threating war could backfire. Also, the power of the national security must somehow be managed. Could this “tug of war” explain the never ending “Trumpian chaos”? Some observers think it does, I have no idea.

Every US president who has tried to promote peace has faced pressure and opposition. First from Military Keynesianism to both sell and use up the weapons the weapons manufacturers produce. Next, from a National Security State that pressures every president to promote war, sell weapons, and promote US hegemony. We are witnessing massive personnel changes in DC, both in the military hierarchy, in the intelligence community, and now even at the Federal Reserve; but the goal of these changes is unclear, and the power of the national security state cannot be discounted. Take the example of John Bolton, National Security Advisor in the first Trump administration. Formerly untouchable, Bolton’s home and office were just raided by the FBI. Bolton is typical of the deep state warmongers who populate Washington DC. His advice to President Trump during Trump’s first term serves as an example of the warmongering militarism US presidents must deal with. This is from Bolton’s book: The Room Where It Happened.

From James Carden: “In the span of just several pages, Bolton recalls that at one time or another he has counseled Trump to launch a preventive strike on Iran’s nuclear program; scrap the Paris climate agreement; tear up the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (aka the Iranian nuclear deal); pull out of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty; withdraw from the UN Human Rights Council; defund the UN Relief Works Agency; prepare a preemptive strike against North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic missile program; and consider the idea of a sinister, conspiratorial link between Iran, North Korea, and Syria.”

Carden continues: “After a litany like this, one can’t help but recall MacGeorge Bundy’s observation about the hawkish Washington columnist Joseph Alsop, that he had “never known him to go to any area where blood could be spilled that he didn’t come back and say more blood. That is his posture toward the universe.”

Taking the President’s stated goal to be a “peacemaker “at face value, this essay examines the impact of US militarism on both the national debt and our society, looks at Trump’s claim to have ended 6 wars, and briefly examines the potential for peace given the ongoing wars and the prospect for new wars.

The cost of Militarism –the impact on the US national debt

According to up-to-date data from the US Treasury on the budget shortfall, the federal deficit in the United States for 2025, is $1,628,515,019,238. This number represents how much federal spending exceeded revenue for the last budget year. I am writing down the full number arithmetically so you can see the true size. The total US national debt now exceeds $37 trillion–that’s 37 plus 12 zeros! In 2024 debt service i.e. interest paid on the national debt toped 1 trillion for the first time in our history. These annual deficit numbers are greater than the Gross Domestic Product of most countries. The US finances this deficit by selling treasury securities. The ability to sell those securities, especially to foreigners, depends heavily on the dollar’s role as a global reserve currency, and on the US maintaining a strong economy.

There are three big ticket items in the federal budget that account for most of the spending: the cost of militarism, the cost of health care and pharmaceuticals, and beginning last year, the interest paid on the national debt. As Yogie Bera is claimed to have said: “if something can’t go on forever, it will stop.” What would the end of our ability to finance these budget deficits mean for the welfare of the people of our country? At best, a serious decline in our standard of living, at worst, hyperinflation, chaos and civil war.

If annual cost of the Department of Defense, over the last 80 years, is added to the cost of the wars the US has fought over that time, our current national debt represents the accumulated cost of this history of militarism and war. As discussed in several articles on this Substack, since the end of WW2 the US has been captured by militarism and has become economically dependent on military spending i.e. on “Military Keynesianism”. The societal cost, as represented by the decline of economic fairness, along with our growing economic and social dysfunction, has been documented on this Substack. The extreme concentration of wealth and power in the US (and the West) is a direct result of the triumph of militarism, along with neoliberalism (financialization), and the monopolization of the US economy. The resulting dysfunction is manifest at every level of our society, economic, social, legal, and psychological. Yet, sadly, despite the cost, blood lust, war, and greed, continues to dominate our government.

President Trump’s first 7 months

Air strikes: In the first seven months of his second term, Donald Trump has conducted 529 airstrikes in over 240 locations across the Middle East, Central Asia, and Africa. The exact number of countries targeted is not specified, but the airstrikes have been extensive, with a significant focus on regions like Yemen including the strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites. This is almost as many air strikes as conducted by the Biden Administration in four years.

Most of these strikes targeted the “Iran-backed Houthis “known as Ansar Allah, a Zaydi Shia Islamist political and military group from Yemen that emerged in the 1990’s. Ansar Allah opposes the Yemen government; they control part of Yemen and have blocked Israeli access to the Red Sea in opposition to the Israeli genocide in Gaza. They are one of the few groups to actively oppose Israel, despite the cost.

Ending 6 wars: President Trump claims to have ended 6 wars in the last 7 months. For these efforts, he wants a Nobel Peace Prize. Trump is actively lobbying the Nobel committee. Let’s examine each claim:

Egypt-Ethiopia: This goes back to Trump’s first term when the two countries were feuding over a huge hydropower dam. There was never a war nor a peace agreement over this issue.

India-Pakistan: Trump announced that the two nuclear power countries had reached a cease fire in May. India does not credit Trump with brokering the halt in the fighting.

The Congo and Rwanda: A treaty was announced by Trump in May, including opening the door to Western and US investment including potential access to certain minerals. Secretary of State Rubio was credited with bringing the parties together.

Cambodia-Thailand: Leaders of the two countries agreed to a ceasefire on July 28 after five deadly days of fighting, Reuters reported. Trump urged them to negotiate a ceasefire or else trade deals with the governments would stall.

Armenia-Azerbaijan: This one is complicated and potentially related to a new attack on Iran. The agreement includes what is called “The Trump Route”. This route splits Armenia and Azerbaijan and terminates on the border with Iran. The treaty gives the US exclusive development rights. This is not a move that will promote peace. Iran is opposed and the agreement would provide the US/NATO/Israel with access to both the Iranian border and the Caspian Sea, potentially destabilizing the entire area. Still, the two former Soviet republics and Trump signed a peace agreement at the White House on Aug. 8, ending a decades-long war. The leaders of the countries gave Trump ample praise for his efforts at the ceremony.

The sneak attack on Iran: In the boldest claim of all, Trump took credit for ending the 12-day war with Iran, a war he helped start! Trump announced on June 23 a ceasefire between the two countries after the U.S. joined Israel in bombing Iranian nuclear sites. I doubt that hostilities against Iran are over.

Ending The Ongoing Wars

Ukraine–Ending the Ukraine war in 1 day: There is zero evidence that the positions of either Russia or Ukraine have budged since the Alaska meeting on the 15^th, or after the White House meeting with Zelensky and the 7 representatives of the EU on the 18^th. The parties are still far apart, and the war will continue so long as the US and NATO continue to provide money, weapons, and targeting support to Ukraine. In a speech last Sunday marking Ukrainian independence, Zelensky pledged not to give up land for peace, and to reclaim Crimea by force. Regarding Russia, there were suggestions that maybe Putin will relent and not insist that Ukraine withdraw its forces from Zaporizhzhia and Kherson should Ukraine Russian withdraw from the Donbass, as a prelude to a ceasefire. Unfortunately, Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, did not support this claim in a recent interview. At the White House meeting on the 18^th, Zelensky reiterated his position that all territory, including Crimea must be returned to Ukraine, and Russia be forced to pay billions in reparations. This proposal will not end the war.

On August 7^th Gallup published polling results showing that 69% of Ukrainians favored a “negotiated end to the war as soon as possible”. This is a radical change from 2022 when only 22% supported a negotiated end to the war.

For those of you interested in the history anti-Russian meddling by the CIA in Ukraine, I recommend an essay by Kit Klarenberg: “Declassified: The CIA’s Covert Ukraine Invasion Plan.” Without going into details, the article discusses the planning that went into promoting a civil war in Ukrainian, creating the conditions that forced Russia to intervene.

Perhaps the Alaska meeting was designed to defang or delay the demand by Senator Lindsey Graham that the US return to tariff and sanctions threats. These threats did not go over well with India, Brazil, and China.

Ukraine continues to be supported with money and arms. Ukraine has been promised long-range missiles from the US and NATO countries, assuming they are presently available for delivery. Ukraine has also been promised assistance in building missiles in Ukrainian. One missile factory was just destroyed by Russia. Meanwhile, Ukrainian drones and missiles have had some success in impacting oil supplies and prices within Russia with drone strikes. It is claimed that some of these drones may have been fired from Finland and/or the Balkans–dangerous if true.

Opening Communications with Russia: There are many reasons other than ending the Ukraine war for the US to reopen communications with Russia. Communications were completely cut off by the Biden Administration when the war began in February of 2022. Even in the height of the Cold War the US and Russia communicated with each other. Cutting off communications was dangerous and unnecessary.

One big reason for the US and Russia to communicate is the Artic and its resources. Remember, the US offered to buy Greenland and suggested that Canada become the 51^ststate? Look at a map–if this were to happen, the US and Russia would share a border with the Arctic of almost equal size and would dominate the region. Right now, Russia is far ahead of the US in developing the Arctic’s potential. Russia has military bases there, oil fields, and operates very effective ice breakers giving her year-round access.

Then there are other resources and expertise Russia possesses. Rosatom has perfected the nuclear fuel cycle, meaning nuclear waste can be reprocessed and reused. Rosatom also builds advanced nuclear facilities. Meanwhile, China has built and is operating a Thorium molten salt reactor that will not melt down. If the US can partner with Russia, we can greatly expand our use of nuclear power.

Otherwise, there is little evidence of concrete change in the US/Russia relationship.

Israel–The ongoing genocide and ethnic cleansing of Gaza and the West Bank: All modern wars are horribly destructive and everything possible should be done to prevent them. One of the most unbearable conflicts today is the ongoing destruction of Gaza and the ongoing starving of two million Palestinian people, if many Palestinians still survive.

This war is a prime example of what money and unaccountable power can accomplish. Both the Biden and Trump administrations have been directly involved in supporting and facilitating this genocidal war, and in helping silence those who are opposed. Congressional delegations from both political parties traveled to Israel this summer and were photographed with Netanyahu. This is despite the fact that what is happening in Gaza represents one of the most monstrous misdeeds of Western imperialism in the 21st century.

Slowly the façade of “western civilization” is being removed, and we are being forced to acknowledge that this ongoing atrocity is the result of deliberate policy–a policy supported not only by Zionism, but by the US, the UK, and much of the EU. It reflects an imperial policy that has been in effect for a long time. As Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli explicitly statedin the 19^th Century regarding the objective of the British Empire: “Gain and hold territories that possess the largest supplies of the basic raw materials. Establish naval bases around the world to control the sea and commerce lanes. Blockade and starve into submission any nation or group of nations that opposes this empire control program.”

Today, the Zionists of Israel, with the help of our government, are again using blockade and starvation as a weapon. The wealth and power of Zionist billionaires, including their ability to destroy anyone who dissents, has acted as a shield against accountability.

The destruction of the indigenous population of Palestine may be another step in recently reiterated plan for “Greater Israel”. The goal of “Greater Isreal” is to rule the Middle East and its energy resources on behalf of Zionist and Western interests. War with Iran is needed to take control of Iran’s oil as part of “the plan” to counter and control China. To achieve these goals, several million Palestinians must die or be relocated, Lebanon, Syria, and parts of Egypt, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia must be conquered, and their occupants expelled to be replaced by Zionists.

This sounds crazy but replacement is happening right now in the West Bank. 25 Jewish settlers from Canada and the U.S. arrived in the occupied Palestinian territories today, moving into homes and land taken from Palestinians. “Taken from” means that violence was used to steal Palestinian property without paying any compensation. After all, 93% of Palestine has been stolen from Palestinians since 1948 without one penny of compensation being paid to any of the Palestinians who owned the land and homes. This is what wealth and power permits–the ability to act with complete impunity.

The prospect for new wars

War with Iran: There are indications that the Israeli/US war against Iran could begin again at any time. President Trump has threatened war if Iran does not end its nuclear program. Iran has refused to do this. War with Iran is could envelope the entire Middle East.

There were recent reports of Israel wanting to launch a preemptive war against Iran–with US weapons and support, of course. Israeli Colonel Jacques Neriah, a former intelligence official and a special analyst for the Middle East, warned on Sunday of an impending “second round” of war against Iran as Tehran weighs a revenge attack on Tel Aviv. “There is a sense that a war is coming, that Iranian revenge is in the works. The Iranians will not be able to live with this humiliation for long,” Neriah told Udi Segal and Anat Davidov on 103FM.

“Israel must launch a preemptive strike against Iran in its present state, as a large part of its military capabilities is paralyzed,” he added.

Let’s recall the events of the 12-day war that Israel started. Israel launched a sneak attack, while Iran was engaged in peace negotiations with the US. The sneak attack was designed to assassinate the entire Iranian civilian and military leadership–a decapitation strike that almost succeeded. Now, Israel wants the US to go to war with Iran to finish Iran’s destruction. Given Zionist power in the US, Israel may successfully goad the US into another war. After all, the US has been fighting Israel’s wars in the Middle East since 911. These are wars of choice, based on lies, that destabilized the Middle East, killed millions, caused in thousands of US casualties, and added trillions to our national debt. Why would the US fight another war for Israel?

Wars in this hemisphere: The Trump Administration has taken 2 actions that could lead to war in this hemisphere. This includes a possible war against Venezuela, or strikes against drug cartels in countries like Mexico, Columbia, and Venezuela.

Drug cartels: President Trump has signed a directive on the use of military force against drug cartels. Here’s the New York Times: “President Trump has secretly signed a directive to the Pentagon to begin using military force against certain Latin American drug cartels that his administration has deemed terrorist organizations, according to people familiar with the matter.”

“The decision to bring the American military into the fight is the most aggressive step so far in the administration’s escalating campaign against the cartels. It signals Mr. Trump’s continued willingness to use military forces to carry out what has primarily been considered a law enforcement responsibility to curb the flow of fentanyl and other illegal drugs.”

“The order provides an official basis for the possibility of direct military operations at sea and on foreign soil against cartels.”

“U.S. military officials have started drawing up options for how the military could go after the groups, the people familiar with the conversations said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive internal deliberations.”

War with Venezuela: The Trump Administration has placed a $50 million reward for the arrest of the president of Venezuela, Nicolas Maduro, and sent a flotilla of ships to threaten the county. President Trump last week ordered at least three Arleigh Burke class guided missile destroyers, a submarine and other assets to head towards Venezuela. Earlier this week Reuters also reported that, in addition to the destroyers, 4,000 marines aboard an Amphibious Ready Group were also sent.

The US has been at odds with Venezuela for decades, and has supported coups and other regime change efforts, first against Hugo Chavez, and now against Nicholas Maduro. The cause is a wave of nationalizations of the oil industry and sanctions, resulting in defaults and the US seizing Venezuelan assets, including Citgo. The US has also supported various “governments in exile” using confiscated Venezuelan assets. One government in exile was headed by Juan Guaidó. The asset confiscation and debt defaults amount to over $18 billion. Bids are being taken now for a forced sale of Citgo.

Meanwhile, Venezuela has the largest oil reserves on earth totaling 303 billion barrels, larger that Saudi Arabia at 267 barrels. US refiners are optimized to use this heavy crude; they need and continue to buy Venezuelan crude. US refiners, working for years with Citgo and Venezuela, spent billions on refineries to process this crude. The sanctions the US imposed on Venezuela has hurt margins because alternatives from Canada and Mexico do not work as well in these refineries. Venezuelan crude is a strategic asset for US refiners. These refiners include some of the largest oil companies in the world.

It is difficult to understand why this flotilla of war ships, along with marines, are being sent to Venezuela given the success of recent diplomatic negotiations that resulted in the resumption of the oil trade. This resumption marks a significant shift in bilateral energy relations after years of sanctions and restricted trade, and has created a pathway for Venezuelan oil tankers to once again deliver their cargo to U.S. refineries. Venezuelan crude is on its way to the US–why does the US need to go to war with Venezuela?

Conclusion

So far there is no peace and not much unity. Ongoing wars have not been ended, and several countries face new threats of war. At some point the people of the United States will have to step in and impose sanity on the warmongers if we are to survive as a nation. This Substack has spent the last 5 months outlining how neoliberalism, militarism, and monopolization has so concentrated wealth and power that most people can no longer afford the cost of living. Our emphasis should be on restoring economic fairness and opportunity, not starting a world war. War is no longer a realistic option and our emphasis on militarism increasingly represents a waste of precious assets. Modern war holds the potential to destroy civilization itself. I keep saying–drive around and imagine bombs exploding all around you–this will happen unless we come to our senses as a nation.

The President of Russia, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, has discussed his dealings with 4 US Presidents since 2000. President Putin reported that while the US president changed, the foreign policy of the US did not. Worse, President Putin reported that every US president he dealt with was unable to carry out the agreements they reached after returning to the US.

Perhaps this is because the decision to go to war with Russia was made well before the Maidan coup of February 2014 and western warmongers were waiting for the opportunity to go to war with Russia? Well, they have had their opportunity. As a result of the Ukraine war, the West has forced Russia, once again, to become a great power with global reach. Unlike the US and the West, Russia has the resources and the industrial capacity to sustain a war economy.

The goal of western militarism was outlined by the Rand Corporation in 2019–to overextend and unbalance Russia. While this has yet to happen to Russia, the West now seems overextended and unbalanced. Meanwhile, Russia continues to increase her industrial capacity. This Russophobic hatred of Russia has damaged the economies of the European community, yet the leaders of Europe’s largest economies refuse to demand a peaceful solution to the war in Ukraine.

If the oil reserves of Russia, Iran, Venezuela and the arctic are added together, the outlines of a plan to control the world economy and sustain US hegemony becomes clear. Given the growing power of Russia and China, the US and the West appear to have lost the opportunity to achieve such a plan.

There are other dangerous considerations at work that demand peace. The US is running dangerously low on stockpiles of vital conventional weapons. This could limit US options for conventional war. The lack of conventional weapons could lead to the use of nuclear weapons–not by Russia, China, Iran, or Venezuela–but by the United States and/or Israel. This means that the risk of nuclear war is currently greater than most people realize. It is time for peace to prevail. Is President Trump serious about peace? Does Trump, or any US President, have the power to make peace? We are about to find out.

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