Volte-Facing: How Much Influence Does a $400m Boeing 847-8 Buy?
Many Shades of Yellow Goblins
Are Goblins necessarily evil? And can’t goblins sometimes, from certain angles, be indistinguishable from the uglier sort of angel or fairy?
Yes, I am having to pose these challenging questions in the light of statements from Jeffrey Sachs yesterday, and Chas Freeman this morning, in interviews on Judging Freedom, that invite optimism with respect to Trump’s foreign policy on multiple fronts.
Optimism is an unusual frame of mind in these quarters, quite unfamiliar in fact, even disturbing to the psyche.
On what does it rest? Let me pick up on the list of those developments that seem most to excite Jeffrey and Chas:
Ukraine in Istanbul
Hope that Putin might meet with Zelenskiy and even Trump in Istanbul on Thursday? Wow, that is almost one step too high even for this highly caffeinated mind.
I worry that Putin may have erred on Sunday when challenging Zelenskiy to resume the peace negotiations of Spring 2022 in Istanbul. Why? Because Putin surely intended this to be an opportunity for delegations from the adversaries to meet, not for it to be a showdown at the OK Corral between gunfighters Vladimir and Volodomyr. That is to say, if he expected for anyone from Kiev to show up, least of all Zelenskiy. After all, didn’t Zelenskiy say Russia would first have to agree a ceasefire? And didn’t Zelenskiy pass a degree in October 2022 that made it illegal for any Ukrainian to negotiate anything with Putin? A decree that Zelenskiy has not since rescrinded.
I suspect what Putin had in mind was he would send along a Russian delegation that would get to hang out in a conference room at a plush hotel for an hour or so somewhere in Istanbul, drinking Arabic coffee (of the kind Trump reportedly did not drink in Riyadh) while they waited for a Ukrainian delegation that would not show up.
Did Putin foresee that Zelenskiy would assert that he, Zelenskiy, would show up, while leaving unresolved for the moment whether this would be conditional on Putin agreeing first to a ceasefire - which of course Putin will not do - or that Trump would float the possibility that he might show up as well?
I suspect not. And besides, had Putin really thought through the dangers at this juncture of putting any trust in Erdogan, president of a NATO power, to provide sufficient safety guarantees? I suspect not. Resuming the Istanbul negotiations is one thing, but actually resuming these negotiations in Istanbul is another.
What Does a Qatari gift of a Boeing 847-8 Get You?
Riyadh, Not Tel Aviv
Hope that Trump, who seems NOT to have included Israel on his itinerary through West Asia (he is today in Riyadh) has fed speculation of a wider rift between Trump and Netanyahu, bolstered by a statement in Hebrew made yesterday in the Knesset by Netanyahu to the effect that Isreal must wean itself off of US military aid, or even of something more dramatic by way of US recognition of Palestinian nationhood (finally!) as a measure that would allow for normalization of relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel.
OK, well, perhaps, yes, yes but what we most of all need, right away, is total cessation of arms for Israel, and immediate relief for the starving millions in Palestine. Could you do that, fairy-goblin Trump?
Caitlin Johnstone yesterday called our attention to a very sudden shift even in mainstream media to openness to criticisms of Israeli genocide, a sure sign of a significant, widening unease among Western elites as to the wisdom of continuing to support Israel thick and thin. Even on Ukraine, something similar may be happening, as indicated by Peter Hitchens’ most recent article in the Daily Mail that tells the British people that they have been totally suckered, to a degree far worse, even, than the WMD garbage lies twenty years ago, by their leaders’ anti-Russian propaganda campaign over Ukraine, and that the war that they have been told over and over again was “unprovoked” was indeed very much provoked.
UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in Palestinian Territories, Francesca Albanese, has called for the prosecution of leading EU officials for complicity in war crimes in Israel. Should they also be lined up for their complicity in promoting and abetting a needless war in Ukraine? Are European elites beginning to worry?
China
There is hope that Trump is backing away from the most dismal of his trade tariff machinations, especially over China, by allowing both parties a 90-day respite in which the new tariff on most Chinese exports to the US would be “only” 30%, and the new tariff that China will impose on US exports to China would be “only” 10%.
I don’t think we should succumb to the manufactured sense of relief that occurs momentarily when someone lowers the gun to your head while unsheathing his knife. Either way we are talking about (1) a staggering blow to international trade; (2) measures that almost certainly hurt the US more than China because 56% of US imports are for goods that are components for US manufactures; and (3) a manner of negotiation that defies sanity, predictability, certainty, all the things most needed in durable business relations.
In Japan, meantime, the New York Times reports that the country is reeling from auto sector tariffs and a threat from Washington to impose an across-the-board 24% tariff on all Japanese exports to the US. Japan’s top automakers are suffering billions of dollars in losses. At what point will this kind of treatment of Japan lead to a shift of Japanese position somewhat more favorable to China, a question that may also arise in the Philippines where the pro-China Duterte faction has gained influence over the governing pro-Washington Marcos faction in recent mid-term elections
Kashmir
Relief that the US has helped mediate the crisis of the conflict between India and Pakistan? I don’t find much comfort here. The Kashmir crisis is of decades’ duration. The fact that it still threatens the world with nuclear war is not to be defined remotely as an “achievement,” but as just one more gross failure in a long history of gross failures in the US Superpower’s inability to solve anything, pretty much, the Palestinian issue included. And the region, and therefore the world, is clearly still on a knife’s edge.
Iran
Expectation of a “peace” with Iran? I have made my contempt for the entire basis of this invented cause of hostility against Iran (Iran as “nuclear threat” = “WMD” in Iraq) for the benefit of Israel very clear in numerous posts. Trump’s demand that Iran give up its sovereign right to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, and its sovereign right to national defense, far from being something clever is a mindless perpetuation of what is perhaps the single most egregiously absurd and hypocritical of all Washington’s absurdities and hypocrisies. In the meantime there is evidence of a British build up of RAF fighter planes in Diego Garcia, signalling a potential, imminent Western strike on Iran.
Yemen
A “peace” settlement with the Houthis? Only an agreement that the US will not bomb Yemen, in return for the Houthis not attacking US ships. The Houthi campaign against Israel, and ships engaging in trade with Israel, are not impacted by this truce.
Syria
Steps by Trump towards dialog with Syria? Trump to talk to the terrorist and illegal head of Syria, Jolani, over whose head there is still a US $10 million bountry? Why isn’t he talking to Israel about Israel’s illegal invasion of Syria, and with Lebanon about Israel’s illegal invasion of Lebanon, and with Turkey about Turkey’s illegal support for the invasion of Syria by Jolani and his HTS jihadists?
Will Trump be talking to Jolani about his regime’s massacres of Alawites, Christians and Druze? And why does he now talk of lifting the notorious and notoriously cruel Caessar sanctions on Israel, when he didn’t do this after Assad’s successful repression, with the assistance of Russia and of Hezbollah, of the Obama-initiated illegal war to destabilize Syria with the help of Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE?
Given that Qatar is talking about being a significant source of funding for the Jolani regime, what may be the significance of Qatar’s gift of a Boeing 847-8 to Trump?
A subject for discussion with Jolani might touch on the issue of Kurdistan since this situation is undergoing considerable change in the light of the call in February by imprisoned PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party) leader Abdullah Ocalan for the disarmament of the movement.
Ocalan’s call appears to have been supported by a congress earlier this month that may lead to the announcement very soon of the end of Kurdish armed struggle against Turkey. The measure is expected to include PKK affiliates in Syria and Iran, together with an umbrella organization, the Group of Communities in Kurdistan, that also operates in Iraq and Turkey. A recent agreement with Jolani in Syria gives Damascus full control over State institutions in northeast Syria previously regarded as “Kurdish,” although I had understood previously that in return for the integration of the Kurdish SDF army into the ranks of the Syrian army, the Kurds would continue to enjoy considerable autonomy. All this may follow on Turkey’s apparent military success in isolating the PKK in Iraq’s Qandil mountains.
Russian Armament Production
This in the Economist today:
“According to NATO’s top commander, Russia is replacing troops, tanks and munitions at an unprecedented pace. This year Russian factories will roll out 1,500 tanks (America will make just 135). A production pipeline of 250,000 shells per month is putting it “on track to build a stockpile three times greater than the United States and Europe combined”. To understand the scale of this expansion, The Economist consulted a company that counts the number of electronic devices, such as mobile phones, present at industrial sites as a proxy for production. Across tank facilities, artillery factories and drone plants, activity is rising.”
I note the news in today’s Economist that Germany’s weapons manufacturer, Rheinmetsall, is registering a 46% overall increase in sales volume in the wake of a $111 billion “off-budget” defense fund set up under former Chancellor Scholz. So the lure of profits is buzzing for European arms manufacturers. This has been accentuated by chatter about the US “walking away” from Ukrine and even from Europe/NATO. These fears seem less well founded now that the US has signed the minerals deal with Ukraine that will suck it further into the Ukrainian quagmire, and as European/Ukrainian determination persists in efforts to scotch progress towards a settlement with Russia (that they think will buy them more time to rearm Ukraine amidst claims to have “frozen” the conflict along current front lines) so as to keep the US stuck in Europe and the inevitable global marginalization of Europe delayed just a little longer.
Re-Istanbul
My good friend Ray McGovern, just safely returned from the Victory Day celebration in Moscow, seems to enjoy my description of the Coalition of the Willing as the Coalition of the Brain Dead; see this informative discussion with Alkhorshid and Helmer:
Is that Boeing a Trojan horse? Would the president of the USA be allowed to fly in a Boeing? I myself have not traveled by air for many years, but I'm always much relieved when I learn that my friends and relatives are NOT flying in a Boeing.
Joe R