Tag Archives: Europe

RUSSIA AND THE BLANK CHECK

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RUSSIA

Russia has shown how inept, incompetent and feeble it is. Supposedly, it has an army, brave men and women who have always been the backbone of Russia’s forces. But the army is neither trained nor supplied. Its generals are old and decrepit. Look at the guys in military uniforms standing behind Putin. They are not faces of experience, but of the elderly. Those old guys have neither the gumption to tell Put the real state of the Russian Army, nor have the capability to say anything. They appear to have dementia.

America toyed with elderly generals. General Marshall fired many of them before World War Two. Winfield Scott admitted he was too old to command Union forces during the Civil War. But Doug MacArthur never admitted anything for his blunders. He lied to troops under him; he lied to politicians. In 1944 MacArthur insisted on invading and “liberating” the Philippines, accomplished by the end of World War Two. How far were MacArthur’s forces in the Philippines from Japan? Three to Six thousand miles.

So the Russians have the slows in Ukraine. Democracies are united against Russia. Rich Russians are persona non-grata, and targets for many methods of mischief – from governments, or more likely criminals. Russia has the loyalty of puppet states like Cuba. Its failure on the battlefield shows how incapable Russia is. Russia is now about ready to follow a policy considered by Americans in Vietnam: We had to destroy Ukraine to save it.

BLANK CHECK

Before the Ukrainian invasion, Putin went to China to confer with the Bigs there. It is possible that the Chinese gave the Russians a blank check, meaning the Russians could do whatever they wanted in Ukraine. Putin is trying to do whatever he wants.

However, the Ukrainians have show the Russians are paper tigers. That’s the first take away the Chinese have learned. How difficult will it be and how long will it take for the Chinese to reverse the Nineteenth Century Treaties imposed by the Russian Tsars on the government of China. The Chinese were forced to give away millions of acres in Asia.

But a bigger blank check: In The Sleepwalkers, Christopher Clark, the story is told how the French gave the Russians a blank check before World War One. The Russians gave a blank check to the Serbians. The British were oblivious. How well did that War turn out for Europe – Russia, France and Britain?

With their blank check from the Chinese, the Russians are threatening Nuclear War. Did the Chinese give the Russians a blank check to do that, because Putin’s army has the slows in Ukraine? The Chinese must tell the Russians – no blank check. Stop the nuclear threats.

That is in the Chinese interests. It is said the Chinese think about problems, years and decades in advance. If there is a nuclear war, that planning is gone. The future might be four hours. Time to break out those 100 year old bottles of wine. Everything that the Chinese have accomplished toward their goals will be gone: Whether the Chinese want it or not, that nation will be part of a general nuclear exchange. However many bomb shelters the Chinese have, no human being wants to live through decades of nuclear winter.

So China, stop the Russians from cashing your blank check.

ART HEIST – Review

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This movie stars Ellen Pompeo and Steven Baldwin.

Theft of El Greco in Madrid. Ellen, a high-powered art dealer, might lose her most lucrative client. She advised him to loan the painting to the Madrid museum which was robbed.

At home in America she loves her daughter and husband (Baldwin-cop) recently separated. They live in New Jersey.

To protect her relations with her client, Ellen goes to Madrid to help the investigation. Who are the suspects? Pompeo is not convincing in the role. Her New Jersey house looks like a set from a Doris Day movie in 1958, not the digs of a dealer/one time aspiring painter. She says nothing smart about painting or the market for stolen art. Her role in the movie is pathetically clear.

She’s driving in the first chase scene, after the same art culprits steal a painting from an art auction. She rips along the streets of Madrid, across plazas and around circles. She crashes into a coffee shop, but is too injured to order. Baldwin and daughter fly the Atlantic to comfort her.

If I had seen this movie before the tragedy in Paris, I would have been incredulous about the lack of local police activity to violent crimes within the city: Boots on the ground, investigators looking into high value thefts, electronic resources. In California when someone boasts a car or just doesn’t want to stop for a traffic ticket, there are at least five cop cars trailing him along with the police and media helicopters. Within the last decade when Eastern Europeans robbed a bank in the San Fernando Valley, cops stopped them. The bad guys were wearing full body armor; at least 100 cops including SWAT were on scene within ten minutes. End of bank robbers.

In Paris this year twelve people were murdered; 11 were wounded; police officers were killed or wounded. The bad guys drove 12-15 miles and were located on the second day and killed. Meanwhile, that festering situation allowed the attack on the grocery store. A question arises, and the answer is not, C’est la vie. If the murdering bad guys had been stopped immediately, would have the attack on the grocery store have ensued?

in Art Heist people are murdered during the art theft. Paintings worth $100 million are stolen. There are no cops anywhere. Ellen has to chase the bad guys herself. A week later (a few minutes of film time) Ellen is threatened (knife to throat). Baldwin intercepts and chases the two bad guys. Three minutes of motorcycles through Barcelona, making old people jump, young people watch and children cry. Baldin catches up with them, fights, loses (two against one). There’s not a cop closer than 20 miles.

WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON? TAKE WHAT YOU WANT. EUROPE IS UP FOR GRABS!

Art Heist becomes preposterous: Baldwin tells Ellen the situation is dangerous. He knows of the people accused of the thefts. He advises return to New Jersey. She gives him every illogical, unrealistic, unreasonable, unfathomable explanation why she will stay, be insensate and endanger herself. About this time in the movie, Baldwin, doing real police work (his character is the only credible one in the flick), meets a promising babe-informant (seen her but don’t know her name). She has a day job in a sporting goods store. It’s time for abandon Ellen to the wilds of Spain, take his daughter and the sporting good woman home to mother in New Jersey.

NOPE, and I can neither write more nor recommend the final 20 minutes of this movie, any more than I can the beginning.

Background

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I read a lot of history; I read it in sprees. For a year twentieth century history has been my nut, primarily the two European wars and Germany and the Soviet Union. There are times I’ll find an author, and buy books from Amazon or Bookfinder (and others), but most of my reading comes from used books, stuff bought at library bookstores or library sales.

Why read history? To understand more completely. In Barrons today, Jack A. Ablin of BMO Private Bank, is quoted (M16): “It is hard to conceptualize from our Western point of view, but roughly 80% of Russians surveyed believe that economic growth and jobs are more important than their form of government.” I agree. That has been an issue many books I’ve read over the last year, decade, scores of years.

However, I went to read three volumes by Richard J. Evans, the first being, The Coming of the Third Reich (borrowed from the library). In total the three volumes are about 1500 pages. I read the Preface, and Evans discusses other survey books telling of the Third Reich. He notes William L. Shirer’s books, The Rise and Fall and says it is weak, but he fails to mention it is the first. It is unusual for a historian to criticize, outside critical literature, books. He is complimentary to everyone he mentions, English and German historians. He finally, and has to mention Gordon Craig, an American, but only one of Craig’s books: The Politics of the Germany Army 1640-1945.

I finished the Preface and wondered why it was incomplete: Gordon Craig has a book, Germany: 1866-1945 (1978). It seemed spot onto Richard Evans’ topic, but it wasn’t referenced. A German who became an American wrote three volumes, the last covering 1840-1945. Hojo Holborn was a brilliant historian; he died in 1967. Reading about the Weimar Republic (1919-1933) and its culture, one finds Hajo Holborn mentioned. He was part of German academia and participated in the culture before the Nazis came to power. He left Germany in 1933 after losing his university position.

I wondered why Hajo Holborn and Gordon Craig’s other books were not in the Preface. I looked at the bibliography where they were also absent, saving Craig’s German Army book.

I turned the page to Chapter 1, page 1, line 1 or Evans’ The Coming of the Third Reich:

       “Is it wrong to begin with Bismarck?”

Richard Evans book was published in 2003, almost forty years after Gordon Craig’s book. I realized I had read this book before. I stopped reading. Indeed, Germany: 1866-1945 by Gordon Craig, Chapter 1, Page 1, line 1 reads: 

       “Is it a mistake to begin with Bismarck?”

WHY SPY?

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America has a right to listen to Angela Merkel, and must do so for its own interests and for the interests of Europe. This opening sentence comes as a reply to a blog, my comment, a reply, my reply (incomplete).

The first observation is Angela Merkel looks completely Prussian. She never smiles; she is incapable of it. She sneers, but she hasn’t sneered for ten days.

What could dear sweet Angela Merkel, what could the Europeans be talking about that would interest Americans and make our decisions and lives better (and their lives better) if we knew what they were saying?

The Germans and their economy has benefitted more than any other country from the existence of the Euro, the Euro Zone and the European Community. Year 2010 intensified the Euro crisis in the PIGS: Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece, Spain. The European Community tried to resolve all the problems themselves. They could not. The United States of America got involved with support, advice and lots of money, before 2010 and during those years.

The biggest obstacles to the European effective action were the Germans led by sweet Angela and to a lesser extent the French. The Germans wanted to pay no money to any other nation for any purpose whatsoever. Yet the Germans were benefitting the most because the Euro-zone existed.

What was at stake? If Europe went into a deep rescission and possibly a Depression – lack of confidence, no economic activity, no way forward – the American economy would follow as well as the remainder of the world. Furthermore, all the nations of Europe as well as the USA know how the Germans react to end Depressions.

Listening into sweet Angela allowed the United States of America to advise, to cajole and to convince the European Community to go forward. We countered, blocked or tempered German and French arguments and proposals for inactivity, for conditional loans and for harsh policies that could never be implemented, that would prolong the Euro-crisis and that would end in Depression. Finally, the Germans had to put up much more money and agree to terms they did not like.

Amazingly, today, Halloween Week, 2013, France is protesting American actions and acting as the German lap-dogs. Meanwhile, in that country there have been protests and talk about France leaving the Euro currency, and resuming the French Franc [like the British have maintained the pound to good effect]. The French should reject the Euro. The French had beautiful banknotes, much better than the dour austere paper from the European Community. The French may not other choice but to leave. Requirements from the German-led European Community are onerous and detrimental to current conditions in the French economy. The French do not have the flexibility to react to local conditions to improve their economy and the lives of the French people.

Sour-puss, bad sport Angela wants payback because the Americans knew how to overcome German resistance. Current conditions now allow Germany to continue to screw all the other countries of the European community, just like it was doing before the Euro-crisis. Obama’s reaction to European protests should be to tell Angela and the other protesting clowns to cram it. The United States was correct. The Germans were wrong. Most of the European Community has an improving economy.

But Obama is weak and forgetful. He acts like someone wanting to be the popular Student Body President of his high school. This was a success of his administration. He is now willing to give all the credit to the Germans, apologize and promise, so he can call that Kraut, “Sweet Angela,” and Merkel can give her Prussian sneer again.