If Russia doesn't surrender. Don't put the responsibility of global food prices on the people being repressed and killed in their own homes. Do it on the aggressors and war criminals.
I’m stating what I see as facts. Russia will not surrender. The longer the Ukraine is in the war, the higher likelihood the people of Ukraine starve.
We can make an argument that they shouldn’t surrender. That’s a moral position.
I’m pointing out if we don’t figure it out within the next few months you’re not going to get the food from the region, as people are fighting over it. I don’t care who’s fault it is. We should recognize the situation so we can try to mitigate the issue.
Nobody disagrees that until it ends the situation will create further instability; but it can end with Russia giving up or surrendering as well. There is no global objective truth that Russia will not surrender; so by saying "I'm just stating facts" you're actually making a normative claim instead of a descriptive one; which can be viewed as problematic.
They are just claiming that Russian concession is much less likely than a Ukrainian one, which I think many would agree with.
If the war in Ukraine continues, we can expect less food production and potential oil disruption to center Europe.
No need to comment on how to get to this outcome, or thoughts about who will make a concession leading to a big conversation away from the main point of what you were trying to say.
Keep the if statement about exactly matters, not a secondary effect/cause.
Here’s one: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KILAY2miQdI
Here’s another: https://m.youtube.com/c/AlexanderMercourisReal
In short, for Russia to lose would be the end of Russia. They have to be seen as hitting their objectives (they’ve hit a few so far). Ukraine is massively out gunned, but has more manpower active. That said, I don’t see an outcome where Ukraine can regain any territory and will likely only lose more. That will further embolden Russia and will keep them from surrendering at the very least.
You have picked a 1. random unpopular youtube channel (which might be good, I couldn't verify anything from it, as I couldn't find who ran it, if you know I am happy to be proved wrong) and 2. A disbarred barrister https://twitter.com/markgaleotti/status/927087181532991489?l.... There is much better information to pick than this! Any information will have a bias, and if they claim to be neutral I personally get suspicious of what that bias is.
Your assertion that you can't see anyway for Ukraine to win is based on "If Russia loses, it would be the end of Russia". Well, if Ukraine loses it will be the end of Ukraine, so I guess by your logic Russia can't win either? (TBF, everyone losing to some degree is right with war).
I won't get drawn into a discussion about how the war will go. People qualified to make a guess have been wrong and wont make prediction. Neither of us is qualified, so I will not be weighing in on this except to say that unexpected things happen all the time in conflict.
"Ukrainian forces could wipe out all of 'exhausted' Russian troops' territorial gains, retired US general says" https://www.businessinsider.com/ukraine-exhausted-russian-tr...
There was also an interesting take on the business before the war even started by Mikhail Khodarenok - ex-head ... of the Main Operational Directorate of the General Staff of the RF Armed Forces, Colonel https://nvo.ng.ru/realty/2022-02-03/3_1175_donbass.html In Russian but Google translate works well. It points out a lot of difficulties that seem to have come to pass including:
>It is also worth recalling that the mighty Stalinist NKVD and the multi-million Soviet army fought the nationalist underground in Western Ukraine for more than 10 years. And now there is an option that the whole of Ukraine can easily go into the partisans. In addition, these formations can easily begin to operate already on the territory of Russia.
which seems to be playing out just now with stuff blowing up in Crimea and Belarus.
One big difference here is that Russia has nuclear weapons and Ukraine does not.
There's zero indication that nuclear weapons are relevant.
80,000 casualties in 140 days is shocking and unsustainable for Russia.
If western accounts are correct, western military support is increasing the weapons imbalance, leading to greater Russian losses and fewer Ukrainian losses.
Finally, I'll point out that pundits have been calling doom for Ukraine from the start, and have all been wrong. So, the onus is on you at this point to "dive in and debate."
Or don't, and accept your downvotes lol. It's just social media.
Unfortunately this will have some bad effects for the rest of the world in terms of food supplies, but it's a price worth paying to eliminate Russia as an effective geopolitical player for years to come. Remember that it's not just about Ukraine. If the rest of the civilized world pressures Ukraine into ceding territory to Russia as part of a peace settlement then next year Russia will try to take a little slice of Poland, a little slice of Estonia, etc.
It's not such a far-fetched idea. Russia (the empire) has been falling apart since 1991 (possibly even 1917, but that's a scale that doesn't matter much for the outcome of this war).
> I believe -- and this is a personal belief here at MFAN [the channel name] -- that the United States is actively flying both F-22s and F-35s -- stealth aircraft -- over the combat area. And now, are they dropping ordnance on Russian targets? Difficult to say
According to the Western media they were running out of ammo in March, April, May and June. Meanwhile, with an incompetent army running out of supplies, they were apparently able to occupy 20% of Ukraine's territory.
The conclusion as far as food goes is that globally, plans should be made that do not count on any food from Ukraine, or Russia entering global markets.
I just took umbrage that OP was seemingly (and probably unintentionally) putting the blame for the situation on Ukraine and not Russia.
Maxwell Taylor quoted here: https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/ADA486290.pdf
the problem you're alluding to isn't new: political leaders aren't likely to make the clear statement of aims you want them to make (see the quote). You should consider the fact that they might not make a clear statement, but 100% could still could be the goal.
My view is that the original ground scheme of maneuver (a strike at kyiv) points to a goal of replacing the ukrainian government with a russian puppet government, essentially a "100%" or unlimited war aim.
But in the post I was replying to it was stated as a certainty rather than a possibility.
> "To this end, we will seek to demilitarise and denazify Ukraine, as well as bring to trial those who perpetrated numerous bloody crimes against civilians, including against citizens of the Russian Federation."
How do you demilitarize a nation by taking only 20% of it? The only way to do this would be to capture the entirety of the country.
> How do you demilitarize a nation by taking only 20% of it? The only way to do this would be to capture the entirety of the country.
Really? What if Ukraine surrenders and negotiates sovereignty over the remaining 80% of their territory while dismantling (or at least greatly reducing) the capabilities of their armed forces?
That's just one of the possibilities that comes to mind which does not involve occupying the entire territory.
On the other hand, if Russia is able to make significant advances in the coming months, and Ukraine is at a point where it cannot meaningfully defend anymore, it seems the rational choice would be to negotiate and accept a reduction in their armed forces (while maybe retaining what territories they still have under control) instead of falling for the sunken cost fallacy and trying to defend a lost position just to avoid "wasting" 8 years of NATO training.
On the other hand, they only took one big city in/since February and that's only because it wasn't defended by Ukraine.
Where is this happening? The US sent another $Billion three days ago: https://www.defense.gov/News/Releases/Release/Article/312005...
Western leaders have stopped visiting because they just did a few months ago, they don't need some official state visit merry-go-round to show support.
Also we do not "all know Ukraine is going to lose". In the real world, this is looking like a complete embarrassment for the Russian military. Hell we all knew the Taliban lost in Afghanistan in 2002 as well, and this is going much much better for Ukraine than it was for them.
Putin won't live forever. So the goal is just containment until he's replaced by someone less aggressive.
I doubt that Russia would prioritize food production if they win the war, considering the huge list of "enemies" they've added to their list.
Most likely, they send food production to allies and they'll attack the next neighboring country in a few years by keeping exports (Gas/food) towards "enemies" at a minimum.
I'm in no way anti-meat, but a lot of people have normalized eating a huge amount of meat per day at ultra low cost, and internalized this as some basic right. Natural consumption of meat is to eat meat sporadically, not 3 times per day.
I'm not questioning whether one likes meat, I do too. I'm saying you don't need it in these amounts nor should you expect it to be this cheap forever.
This is just an appeal to the way things were 70 years ago in the US. Much further back you had Native Americans absolutely eating tons of bison meat in the western US. Other tribes easily got fish for every meal. Others have been heavily vegetarian.
There is no “natural consumption of meat”.
Yes. As you point out the consumption of meat varies greatly across cultures.
Overconsumption of meat can lead to bodily issues as does a lack of particular plant foods. Particular meats are processed/digested in different ways, and have different pros and cons on what it does to your body and health.
So there very much is a "natural" way to consume meat that is most compatible with the capabilities and constraints of our body.
What is recommended/natural is an entirely different concept from what people actually do, which was entirely my point.
I'm imagining a farm household hundreds of years ago, growing their own crops and having a herd of 4 cows, killing one or two a year for lots and lots of meat.
Google says hunter-gatherers got most of their food from meat.
And are crops not unnaturally cheap with modern mechanized farms?
Not judging on the value of thaat diet though. "Natural" doesn't necessarily mean "good"
But increase fertilizer 3-10x and fuel 3-5x and you’re going to adjust in prices. And you’re going to get a new sustainable level.
Btw when I say “sustainable” I mean market conditions, not environment. The environment can likely handle far more cattle, but it requires input (fuel, fertilizer, etc) for us to produce said cattle.
Recall, there used to be millions (probably tens of millions) of bison roaming the Americas. We basically replaced them with cattle. Cattle are constrained to a region and fed food from farms. Environmental wise, I don’t see much issue with cattle (when comparing to other pollutants)
No one wants to accept the push to start eating bugs. Don’t give into the WEF propaganda
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/mar/18/cows-sea...
There’s also an industry emerging, with big pushes from organizations like WEF, to normalize eating bugs [2]. Investors are getting in on this trend too [3]
1. https://www.mdpi.com/2075-4450/12/6/557
2. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2021/07/why-we-need-to-give-i...
3. https://fortune.com/2022/05/24/war-ukraine-big-ag-insect-fee...
For comparison, it would be silly to say we shouldn't normalize eating peanuts because of the allergy risk.
At this point I'll keep an eye out but insects are such a broad and mostly unexplored category that I'm not convinced there's an unavoidable and crippling allergen risk.
From a quick search it appears eating of bugs specifically refers to the WEF push:
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/07/good-grub-why-we-migh...
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2021/07/why-we-need-to-give-i...
don’t know about the catch phrase or how it’s “anti-woke” but interesting
We don't need to eat bugs. We can just eat less meat, like our ancestors did.
> The researchers studied ten other comparable food lists from southern England and discovered a remarkably similar pattern: a modest amount of bread, a huge amount of meat, a decent but not excessive quantity of ale, and no mention of vegetables (although some probably were served).
https://www.medievalists.net/2022/04/who-was-eating-meat-in-...
Simply put, you have an animal who eats a bunch of veggies. It’s gathering the calories for you. Then when you kill it, you harvest those calories. There are other means of collecting calories (farming grains, milk & honey, etc) but for most of human history (even now) meat was necessary as it contained the calories to survive.
“The scale and proportions of these food lists strongly suggests that they were provisions for occasional grand feasts, and not general food supplies sustaining royal households on a daily basis,” says Lambert. “These were not blueprints for everyday elite diets as historians have assumed.”
“I’ve been to plenty of barbecues where friends have cooked ludicrous amounts of meat so we shouldn’t be too surprised. The guests probably ate the best bits and then leftovers might have been stewed up for later.”
Leggett adds,: “I’ve found no evidence of people eating anything like this much animal protein on a regular basis. If they were, we would find isotopic evidence of excess protein and signs of diseases like gout from the bones. But we’re just not finding that. The isotopic evidence suggests that diets in this period were much more similar across social groups than we’ve been led to believe. We should imagine a wide range of people livening up bread with small quantities of meat and cheese, or eating pottages of leeks and whole grains with a little meat thrown in.”
The researchers believe that even royals would have eaten a cereal-based diet and that these occasional feasts would have been a treat for them too.
I don't personally think rising beef prices are an issue, though. Nobody is going to starve because they're being priced out of a steak. I will be more concerned if we eventually begin to run short of beef-alternatives, though.
I think you mean if Russia doesn't surrender. If Ukraine was to surrender, we'd have bigger problems than an increase in beef costs. I don't see any universe where Russia wins this war.
The RUSI - Royal United Services Institute - is a leading UK military institute that had boots on the ground assessing the situation. Here is their assessment. https://rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/special-r...
"At present, however, several Russian advantages and Ukrainian weaknesses are leading to an attritional conflict that risks a protracted war, eventually favouring Russia."
And here's the companion podcast https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/a-turning-point-in-ukr...
It will tell you a lot of things, including that Ukraine's losses are far higher than the general public estimates, as Ukraine successfully hid/minimized the awareness of its losses from phase 1 of the war.
I also recommend the War on the Rocks podcast with Michael Kofman, whose assessment of the situation is also not too rosy.
I am extremely pro ukraine. But that's the reality. At the moment Russia is winning and Ukraine is losing, just very slowly.
Russia is quite ready to sell on the following conditions:
- Remove sanctions which forbid (or make it difficult) the Russian export in the first place.
- Pay in rubles (i.e. you have to "sterilize" your cache through the Moscow stock exchange) like was done with the gas export to Europe.
- Remove sanctions which forbid export to Russia. It has no interest in selling stuff to the West, if it can not buy the stuff it needs in exchange. We already can see that its export-oriented economy sectors suffer from the strong ruble.
Russia has answered to the frozen reserves by freezing financial assets owned by foreigners. Interestingly enough, both numbers are quite comparable to each other.
Next year food will be far higher, largely due to
- people skipping fertilizer a second year in a row
- the feed price increases from year prior will impact next years meat
- much of the cow herds have been reduced due to hay prices skyrocketing (but beef rates staying far lower, due to sell offs)
- if Ukraine doesn’t surrender, we can expect less food production and potential oil disruption to center Europe
- Russia is not likely to renew trade relationships baring a reparations for seizing assets. They produce much of the fertilizer and oil
- 10% reduction in nitrogen targets for EU countries and Canada will further reduce food production
Yeah, a drop here or there isn’t indicative of a major change in inflation. I don’t see how we can get lower general inflation in the next 3+ years. FED has said as much.
In way of an explanation, hay prices have tripled. It’s expected they’ll at least double again tin the next 12 months. That’s one of the feed for cattle. That’s a 6x expected increase to feed cattle (the largest expense). To put it in perspective, that’s likely going to mean $12-20/lb ground beef; $25-$30/lb steak in 18 months.