You are completely missing the part where Germany has already been running on Russian gas for decades, from land based pipelines. I think that you might be unaware of how permeable to natural gas the iron curtain had been.
The power Russia gains from Nordstream isn't the power to stop supplying Germany (they could already do that and then go broke), the power they gain is the power to keep supplying Germany while playing with the off-switch for their dearly loved "Slavic brother nations". The geopolitical relevance of Nordstream is not Russia selling more gas, it's about Russia deriving more influence per unit of gas.
Ever wondered why Poland is refusing so hard to switch from dirty lignite to cleaner gas? It's not just money and miners, far from that.
If it is not clear, the US for the last two decades is not moving forward, but backwards in international politics. Trump has exposed this even more.
Trying as a strategy to contain Russia is simply not going to work and the US really needs a massive upgrade in political brains, and not more weapons.
This is in the book that forecasts that Japan will attack the US in 2050 except that it'll be all space-borne battlestars and lasers and hypersonic weapons. Among other preposterous scenarios. Riiiight.
> It is advantageous to them to have Western Europe dependent on its oil and natural gas supplies.
Loaded language. Don't you think Western Europe has thought of this? And hey, if Russia turns off the tap they turn off their revenue stream. Besides, Europe, like the US, keeps strategic fossil fuel reserves.
> The United States' main geopolitical imperative is to maintain global hegemony.
> Not saying this is a good or bad thing. Depends on your perspective and what country you live in.
Seems to me that if the US keeps sanctioning foes and allies alike every country bar the US will consider this a bad thing.
It all boils down to what they believe NATO's response would be.
Anywhere that Russia has "annexed" has had a majority ethnic Russian population and historical ties to Russia. Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania are not majority ethnic Russian, do not speak Russian, and are part of the EU (and NATO) so they're clearly not aligned geopolitically with Russia and it would cause major regional ramifications, undoubtedly triggering a war with NATO, and/or the EU (both nuclear entities). It would be wholly unprecedented in modern times.
Baltics and Crimea are not comparable. - Crimea has Russia's only warm water port and would never be given up - Russia already has Baltic access (Kaliningrad and StPetersburg) - Crimea has been majority ethnic Russian for centuries and welcomes Russia - Baltics hate Russia
In summary, there is absolutely no logical reason Russia would annex Baltic state.
However, there are plenty reasons why non-Russian interests always repeat this narrative.
Why would Russia need several bankrupt dying states? To feed and develop them like in Soviet times getting nothing but hatred in response? Ditto for Ukraine BTW.
Germany should build some HVDC or regular long-distance transmission lines so they can use their wind electricity without routing through neighbors and build more wind farms.
That would be less inconceivable than what they've already done in Ukraine.
Why? They rolled tanks into a chunk of balkanised land already and nobody lifted a finger. I think anyone that spends some time considering that shudders to imagine how bad it could get with absolutely nothing happening.
I once have heard this position from US ambassador in Kazakhstan on a private reception event.
The guy told people he expected a visit to a *stan country to be like a visit to a warzone.
He was learning martial arts, hostage negotiation, and been mentored by multiple self proclaimed experts on "warlord politics" of the region.
There was no end to his disappointment when he came to understanding that all that geopolitical BS he learned was for nothing, and he came to station the most boring post-Soviet hillbilly town.
I think most Americans, even the most educated ones tend to greatly overthink "geopolitical conspiracies"
Ex-USSR fiefdoms, Russia included, are ran by very simple people, without any geopolitical ambitions.
For them, blackmailing Germany and other wealth nations in Europe by threatening to close the tap has no political story to it at all, just plainly a way to extort some extra bucks, and show the world how big their balls are.
The people of Georgia, Crimea, and the rest of Ukraine would beg to differ.
This is either a typo or some next-level tinfoil hattery...
- Crimea became part of Russia before Texas became part of US
- Crimea became part of Russia before (around the time) US independence
- Kievan Rus' is older than Aztec Empire
- Before the US, the colonies were English, French, Dutch, Swedish, etc.
- Before the colonies, it was of course Native American land.
- Before the Anglosaxons, Britain was Celtic.
- Kievans are much older than Russians. Russia was created by a few Swedes forking the local Slav tribes.
- Before Moscow, there were Poles Bulgarians and Mongols.
Shall we go on?
Should British demand their colonies back?
Should Indians demand their land?
Crimea was part of Russia, true. Give Italy what it had first and then we will give Crimea to Russia (and let's have a WW3 and all be dead me give the planet the break it deserves (from human stupidity))
Similar thing can be said about disputed teritorries in the east, around Donbas.
Of course that's still not the excuse for what Russia did, taking both places by force, however, this makes fixing this more complicated.
Let's stick to the borders we got, and in the future let's rener them useless (e.g. European Union).
I believe in a Star Trek society. Not "we kicked butts back then so let's get back those lands".
There is no bigger "grand plan" to them than to an 8th century Viking raid: more subjects, loot, and territories to use to stage further invasions.
Danes cared more for how tasty the British were, before they started to care about the British throne and court politics in the bigger Post-Roman world.
And now Russia spend enormous amount of money to develop Crimea. Where's the looting?
That sounds like a geopolitical ambition to me.
(to be even more specic, Crimean events were mostly about regaining the control of the Black Sea Fleet naval base, while Donbass events were about reacting to a hostile coup, but the two things are closely related)
It was also an object lesson to all the minor powers in the region: you cannot take US money to have a small victorious colour revolution anymore. Not in Russia's backyard.
edit: oh wow downvotes, I am so surprised /s
Which is in stark contradiction to the sophisticated goals of the West to control as much of the world's market as possible in order for mega multinationals to be able to exploit cheap labor and maintain their insane margins, so that they're able to pay their executives an ex-politicians millions of dollars per year.
Very unlike the goals of Russian oligarchs indeed and much more sophisticated.
This is not just faux news either, the experts are on all channels. No wonder the public has low trust of news these days.
Sucks to know that even a person who is such a high ranking official like an ambassador gets such shitty advice.
As a counter-example (one of many), Russia has been for a long time losing money by subsidizing Belarusian economy with cheap oil.
Today's Russia seems more assertive again with their geopolitical interests.
Are you sure about that?
https://www.news.com.au/world/europe/1990s-manifesto-outlini...
If readers are ok cherry picking from his work, and go on, they should also argue his points that there be a stealthy Russian amphibious landing on US soil, and Russian agents flooding US with "psychotronic agent" to steer US elections...
The guy just puts a shopping list of all obvious nasty things that could happen to the West, and call it a strategy. Few things from that coming true, does not mean them acting on this as a guiding policy.
Continuing the parallel with Danish: yes, Vikings main interest with British Islands was loot and plunder, but they were not dumb to the level where they make invading the British harder for themselves. When given a chance, they would thoroughly mess up British political arrangements with all means available to them.
Not sure how this benefits Russia. Each country has stategic reserves. Gas / oil is the only thing Russia can sell to the Western Europe in order to finance their own system. Russians have to sell it. Blackmailing countries is not in their business.
Russian doctrine is that the satellite countries are buffers to be used as needed, like Kleenex.
It's 100% certain Russia will annex Baltic countries whenever it pleases. To say otherwise just makes you "a useful idiot", as Lenin is credited with saying.
Neither side with nukes would be fighting for survival and would not jump to nuclear threats or exchange until or unless their own existing territory was at risk of annexation / loss.
Russia would shift to a nuclear warning posture if pushed back to their borders. If NATO pursued and threatened territory taking, Russia would threaten nuclear response at that point, especially if it was in a particularly weakened condition or believed it couldn't hold its ground.
On the NATO side, there's practically no threat of the US, France or the UK losing territory to Russia in a Baltic-focused conflict (or in Eastern Europe for that matter). To draw a nuclear threat from NATO would similarly require the nuclear powers to be under threat of losing their own territory (and they'd probably have to believe they can't hold their ground). The UK isn't killing ten plus million of its people in a nuclear exchange with Russia for the sake of Estonia, Latvia or Lithuania's territorial integrity as nation-states.
I think the only way that gets nuclear is if Russia plays the crazy card and proclaims that it now regards the annexed Baltic territory as its own and puts up the nuclear warning then and there (move in, take territory, immediately raise the crazy nuclear flag, test the resolve & risk aversion of the other side to respond militarily once the nuclear flag is out of the box). Then NATO has to decide if it believes Russia will actually act crazy.
The baltic states can not be defended militarily. If Ukraine were in the EU, would be a different thing.
"No way the EU would let that slide." They EU has no ability in military things if the UK is out. The Nato would not let it slide but they also would not fight back to win it back. It would be cold war II.
The entire thing reminds of this[1] Futurama bit. "You won't be needing Harriers anymore, will you? I take Harriers now, F35 come next decade".
One of the signatories was the invader, the rest found obtuse reasons why they didn't have to defend Ukraine.
The next annexation will be the same.
It was a conflict initiated by Georgia but actually they were asked by US to start it.
It is a fundamental rule of Geopolitics that every country assert itself to the best of its abilities with the strengths they have. One of Russia's biggest strengths is natural resources. It is advantageous to them to have Western Europe dependent on its oil and natural gas supplies.
George Friedman explains in this book [1] that Russia may attempt to assert itself to a greater extent in the next few decades, possibly going so far as to annex a Baltic country or two. Today this would be inconceivable, but if Russia has the off switch for Germany's economy, NATO's response is drastically weakened.
Whatever scenario may come to pass, European reliance on Russian natural resources disrupts the US's containment strategy which it needs in order to maintain its dominant position in the region. So yes, it will say something if it feels like that is under threat.
Not saying this is a good or bad thing. Depends on your perspective and what country you live in.
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Next-100-Years-Forecast-Century/dp/07...