بهمن شفیق

28 تیر 1402

19 ژوئیه 2023

Nato Summit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGoNNbnQmjg

NATO Force Model

https://www.german-foreign-policy.com/news/detail/9295

https://www.pressenza.com/de/2023/07/der-gipfel-von-vilnius/

Bekräftigt hat die NATO auf ihrem Gipfel in Vilnius ihr neues Streitkräftemodell (NATO Force Model), das bereits auf dem NATO-Gipfel vom 28. bis zum 30. Juni 2022 in Madrid beschlossen worden war. Demnach sollen 300.000 Soldaten aus NATO-Mitgliedstaaten stets in hoher Bereitschaft gehalten werden; 100.000 von ihnen sollen binnen zehn, 200.000 binnen 30 Tagen eingesetzt werden können. Die Bundesregierung hatte damals zugesagt, die Bundeswehr werde rund 30.000 Soldaten in hoher Bereitschaft halten, die über 85 Schiffe und Flugzeuge verfügten.

Ukraine

https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/official_texts_217320.htm

8. Russia must immediately stop this illegal war of aggression, cease its use of force against Ukraine, and completely and unconditionally withdraw all of its forces and equipment from the territory of Ukraine within its internationally recognised borders, extending to its territorial waters. We urge all countries not to provide any kind of assistance to Russia’s aggression and condemn all those who are actively facilitating Russia’s war.

11. We fully support Ukraine’s right to choose its own security arrangements. Ukraine’s future is in NATO. We reaffirm the commitment we made at the 2008 Summit in Bucharest that Ukraine will become a member of NATO, and today we recognise that Ukraine’s path to full Euro-Atlantic integration has moved beyond the need for the Membership Action Plan. Ukraine has become increasingly interoperable and politically integrated with the Alliance, and has made substantial progress on its reform path. In line with the 1997 Charter on a Distinctive Partnership between NATO and Ukraine and the 2009 Complement, Allies will continue to support and review Ukraine’s progress on interoperability as well as additional democratic and security sector reforms that are required. NATO Foreign Ministers will regularly assess progress through the adapted Annual National Programme. The Alliance will support Ukraine in making these reforms on its path towards future membership. We will be in a position to extend an invitation to Ukraine to join the Alliance when Allies agree and conditions are met.

https://boosty.to/cluborlov/posts/a59b2ec4-25d0-4e7f-8d54-0e35c5f74462

• "The circumstances in which NATO might have to use nuclear weapons are extremely remote."

• "Russia’s deepening military integration with Belarus, including the deployment of advanced Russian military capabilities and military personnel in Belarus, has implications for regional stability and the defence of the Alliance."

15. Russia’s deepening military integration with Belarus, including the deployment of advanced Russian military capabilities and military personnel in Belarus, has implications for regional stability and the defence of the Alliance. NATO will remain vigilant and further monitor developments closely, in particular the potential deployment of so-called private military companies to Belarus. We call on Belarus to stop its malign activities against its neighbours, to respect human rights and fundamental freedoms, and to abide by international law.

• "We remain willing to keep open channels of communication with Moscow to manage and mitigate risks, prevent escalation, and increase transparency."

https://de.rt.com/meinung/175018-vilnius-2023-wohl-letzte-nato/

Wladislaw Sankin

Stoltenberg

"Die wichtigste Aufgabe besteht jetzt darin, den Sieg der Ukraine sicherzustellen. Wenn die Ukraine nicht gewinnt, wird die Frage der Garantien und der NATO-Mitgliedschaft überhaupt kein Thema mehr sein."

Scott Ritter

https://consortiumnews.com/2023/07/10/scott-ritter-nato-summit-a-theater-of-the-absurd/

Madrid 2022

Since the Wales Summit of 2014, when NATO made Russia a top priority in the aftermath of the Russian annexation of Crimea, and the Warsaw Summit of 2016, when NATO agreed to deploy “battlegroups” on the soil of four NATO members (Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania and Poland) in response to perceived Russian “aggression” in the region, Russia has dominated the NATO agenda and, by extension, its identity.

One of the major issues confronting the NATO leadership is that the Vilnius summit operates under the shadow of last year’s Madrid summit, convened in late June in the aftermath of Russia’s initiation of military operations against Ukraine.

The Madrid summit came on the heels of Boris Johnson’s deliberate sabotage of a Ukrainian-Russian peace agreement that was supposed to be signed on April 1, 2023, in Istanbul, and the decision by the United States in May 2023 to extend to Ukraine military assistance exceeding $45 billion as part of a new “lend lease” agreement.

Confidently Seeking a ‘Strategic Defeat’

https://sputnikglobe.com/20230713/scott-ritter-nato-summit-serves-up-cringe-nothing-burger--1111854432.html

https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/nato-ukraine-not-defending-stabbing-back

Johnathan Cook

The White House was all too ready to denounce the use of cluster bombs as a war crime last year - when it was Russia that stood accused of using them. Now it is Washington enabling Kyiv to commit those very same war crimes.

More than 110 states - not including the US, of course - have ratified a 2008 international convention outlawing cluster munitions. Many are in Nato.

In short, Nato is now using the very war it has done everything to fuel as a pretext to stop Ukraine from joining the alliance.

Seen another way, the message Nato has sent Moscow is that Russia made exactly the right decision to invade - if the goal, as Putin has always maintained, is to ensure Kyiv remains neutral.

https://www.politico.eu/article/ukraine-protectorate-russia-war-nato/

Make Ukraine a porcupine rather than a protectorate

Extending security guarantees to Ukraine would thus create the worst of all worlds: The country might think it has protection while actually lacking it, and it would remain a Russian target precisely because of this phony protection. This would make a future war more likely, endangering both Ukraine and the U.S.

The U.S. and its NATO allies have thus far avoided fighting directly for Ukraine precisely because they lack an interest vital enough to risk nuclear war, and this fact makes it implausible that the U.S. will come to Ukraine’s defense in a future scenario. As a result, there is little the U.S. and its NATO allies can, or will, do to actually guarantee its security — whatever they may say. Such threats, even if offered in the form of NATO membership, will lack credibility. And though they may give Russia pause, they will ultimately be unconvincing and unlikely to act as a deterrent.

Moreover, holding out the prospect of Ukraine joining NATO, or getting future security guarantees of another sort, would encourage Russia to keep the war going. In fact, providing security guarantees now would be even worse, forcing the U.S. to either ignore its commitment and undermine other alliances, or fight for Ukraine and spark an immediate nuclear crisis.

A more durable solution, instead, would be to make Ukraine a porcupine rather than a protectorate.

Despite the fact that it is unwilling to fight for Ukraine, the U.S. has shown great eagerness to arm it. Washington should continue this form of military support while agreeing to take Ukraine’s accession to NATO off the table, making Ukraine a heavily armed neutral.

https://ria.ru/20230714/ukraina-1884086679.html

Back in the Cold War era, the public regularly discussed the question "would the United States sacrifice New York for Berlin?" if there was a war with the USSR. Now this question is once again raised to its full height. No one has any doubts about Riga, Vilnius, or Tallinn. But the residents of Berlin have something to think about.

Deutschland-Poland

https://www.indianpunchline.com/germany-creates-equity-in-western-ukraine/

Germany is actually Ukraine’s second largest arms supplier, after the United States….

In an interview in the weekend, the CDU’s leading foreign and defence expert Roderich Kiesewetter (an ex-colonel who headed the Association of Reservists of the Bundeswehr from 2011 to 2016) suggested that if conditions warrant in the Ukraine situation, the Nato should consider to “cut off Kaliningrad from the Russian supply lines. We see how Putin reacts when he is under pressure.” Berlin is still smarting under the surrender of the ancient Prussian city of Königsberg in April 1945.

Cluster Bombs

President Frank-Walter Steinmeier remarked, “In the current situation, one should not obstruct the USA.” Indeed, the top CDU figure Kiesewetter suggested in an interview with the Green Party-affiliated daily “taz” that not only should Ukraine be given “guarantees, and if necessary, even provided with nuclear assistance, as an intermediary step to NATO membership.”

Coinciding with the NATO summit in Vilnius (July 11-12), Rheinmetal, the great 135-year old German arms manufacturing company, has disclosed that it is opening an armoured vehicle plant in western Ukraine at an undisclosed location in the next twelve weeks. To begin with, German Fuchs armoured personnel carriers will be built and repaired while there are plans afoot to manufacture ammunition and possibly even air defence systems and tanks.

Rheinmetall’s CEO told CNN on Monday that like other Ukrainian arms factories, the new plant could be protected from Russian air attack. Germany has more than doubled the 2022 allocation of €2 billion for upgrading Ukraine’s armed forces. It now touches around €5.4 billion with further plans to increase to €10.5 billion.

Perhaps, it was in anticipation of turbulence ahead that last October, eight months after the Russian intervention began in in February, Warsaw demanded WWII reparations from Berlin — an issue which Germany says was settled in 1990 — to the tune of €1.3 trillion.

Under the Potsdam Conference (1945), the “former eastern territories of Germany” comprising nearly one quarter (23.8 percent) of the Weimar Republic with the majority ceded to Poland. The remainder, consisting of northern East Prussia including the German city of Königsberg (renamed Kaliningrad), was allocated to the Soviet Union.

https://www.rt.com/news/579713-nato-poland-nuclear-option/

the request by Poland that it enter a nuclear-arms-sharing arrangement with the US that would see Washington’s B61 nuclear bombs deployed on Polish soil – NATO remained silent.

According to the request from the government of Prime Minister Mateus Morawiecki, these weapons would be turned over to specially trained Polish air-force crews for use in any future NATO conflict with Russia

Cox’s plans did not call for the deployment of nuclear weapons onto the soil of these nations, but rather the use of their aircraft in a nuclear role. Morawiecki’s request was linked to Poland’s future acquisition of F-35A aircraft, leading to the possibility that a compromise could be agreed-to that would see US nuclear bombs remain on German soil but turned over to Polish aircrews in time of war. Poland recently inked a $6.5 billion deal with the US for the purchase of 32 of its F-35A fighters, the delivery of which is scheduled to begin in 2024.

The US is trying to use foreign mercenaries to plug gaps in Ukraine – they are in for a rude awakening

Read more The US is trying to use foreign mercenaries to plug gaps in Ukraine – they are in for a rude awakening

While the Polish request to enter the NATO nuclear sharing arrangement was not publicly addressed during the Vilnius Summit, the NATO communique issued at its conclusion hinted at what the future may look like for both Poland and the NATO nuclear deterrent. NATO, the communique noted, “will take all necessary steps to ensure the credibility, effectiveness, safety and security of the nuclear deterrent mission. This includes continuing to modernize NATO’s nuclear capability and updating planning to increase flexibility and adaptability of the Alliance’s nuclear forces, while exercising strong political control at all times. The Alliance reaffirms the imperative to ensure the broadest possible participation by Allies concerned in NATO’s nuclear burden-sharing arrangements to demonstrate Alliance unity and resolve.”

France India Peace Pool

https://www.azerbaycan24.com/en/france-and-india-pool-efforts-to-reach-peace-in-ukraine-le-monde/

Macron met with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Paris earlier this week.

During the meeting, Macron signaled that he wanted the two countries to work together to address “global challenges” while also citing shared concerns about the “fragmentation of the international community” over Ukraine.

According to Le Monde, France considers India, which has refrained from condemning Russia over its military campaign in the neighboring country, as “an essential partner in the search for a lasting solution.”

While Modi has so far refrained from following the lead of Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva by portraying himself as a mediator, he has instructed his subordinates to work with their French counterparts to find a way out of the current diplomatic impasse, the report says.

US Industrial Production

https://www.zerohedge.com/economics/us-industrial-production-posts-first-annual-decline-28-months

US Industrial Production Posts First Annual Decline In 28 Months

The consecutive declines pushed Industrial Production down 0.4% YoY - its first annual decline since Feb 2021.

The Manufacturing sector also saw a decline, down 0.3% MoM vs unch expected.

That is the fourth straight month of YoY declines in Manufacturing output.

Brics Currency India

https://ria.ru/20230713/dollar-1883845402.html

So, the Indian media broadcast a statement by Foreign Minister Subramanyam Jaishankar, who announced that the country has no plans for the BRICS single currency. India is focused on strengthening its national currency, the rupee, and this will be a top priority for the Indian government. Moreover, he said that the association of five states at the summit in August does not plan to discuss "ideas about the BRICS currency."

A recent example: when the Indians were happy to open a semiconductor manufacturing enterprise on their territory with an investment of almost $ 20 billion from Foxconn. This was perceived as part of the withdrawal of American business from China. But investors this week announced that they had changed their minds a lot. And Chinese analysts, hiding their schadenfreude, explain to their neighbor: did you think it was so fast and so easy? Yes, it took us decades to build the infrastructure, including training many people for such work.