> At least one middling positive of the invasion has been a litmus test for the levels of integrity of various countries. Russia annexed Crimea almost a decade ago. If you haven't read the writing on the wall and maneuvered independence you're incompetent or immoral. I can’t really parse this. Why should Japan care about Crimea or Ukraine?
Doing business with russia is directly sponsoring terrorism. Why should Japan care about it? For obvious reasons.
Doing business with the USA is also directly sponsoring terrorism. I don't see a big moral difference.
The next few weeks/months are going to be very interesting. Saudi Arabia has doubled down on its new direction. Japan/EU seems at edge with the war in Ukraine. China is making new moves in the global financial scene. The US has accumulated significant political debt in the recent years. They have significantly abused their position with the US dollars hegemony. In this recent conflict, the cost burdened Europe and th…
Maybe the US can finally invade Saudi Arabia, lol Edit: Was just making a joke. I’m not a warmonger.
The US has significant military presence in the whole middle-east. I think the Saudis know that, now, the US does really not want to open a new front. Especially with the Taiwan/China situation.
Invading Saudi Arabia is really complex because there is more oil coming from there than Saudi Arabia itself. Expect oil prices over $500 overnight.
On the contrary this looks like the beginning of the end of USA global hegemony. The dollar relevance is degrading and while the west is siding closer with the USA, the rest of the world is distancing itself from them. > On the other hand, the US has shored up massive support from all of Europe ex Belarus, Japan Regarding Japan this very news article contradicts you somehow. > Finland joins NATO tomorrow. Finland is…
There is a shocking reality of how short-sighted and strategically shallow the opinions of people may be, even very literate ones with unlimited access to information. There are very long tensions between Japan and Russia about the Kuril Islands, that both countries have a claim on. It is very possible, that the same vague claims used on annexing Crimea today, or Donbas, would be used against Japan, and may not stop…
US-NATO/EU relations, in contrast, have rarely been stronger, and a long-standing US goal of increasing European defense spending has now become feasible. China and the Saudis are unlikely to somehow turn into genuine friends, and in China's case specifically the unified stance in Ukraine (as well as the "it's harder to invade than you might think" message) sends a bit of a message in the case of Taiwan. The trade-of…
> China and the Saudis are unlikely to somehow turn into genuine friends China and the Saudis are the perfect match. Both are authoritarian regimes that do business. China needs liquid energy and the Saudi needs access to stuff and capital markets. The Chinese can now provide an alternative.
For clarity, I'm saying they're unlikely to turn into genuine friends of the US and US foreign policy. Wasn't talking about relations between China and Saudi. Ukraine hasn't really changed anything in that calculus.
The next few weeks/months are going to be very interesting. Saudi Arabia has doubled down on its new direction. Japan/EU seems at edge with the war in Ukraine. China is making new moves in the global financial scene. The US has accumulated significant political debt in the recent years. They have significantly abused their position with the US dollars hegemony. In this recent conflict, the cost burdened Europe and th…
Can you describe why you think the US has "significantly abused their position with the US dollars hegemony."
The next few weeks/months are going to be very interesting. Saudi Arabia has doubled down on its new direction. Japan/EU seems at edge with the war in Ukraine. China is making new moves in the global financial scene. The US has accumulated significant political debt in the recent years. They have significantly abused their position with the US dollars hegemony. In this recent conflict, the cost burdened Europe and th…
Can you describe why you think the US has "significantly abused their position with the US dollars hegemony."
The next few weeks/months are going to be very interesting. Saudi Arabia has doubled down on its new direction. Japan/EU seems at edge with the war in Ukraine. China is making new moves in the global financial scene. The US has accumulated significant political debt in the recent years. They have significantly abused their position with the US dollars hegemony. In this recent conflict, the cost burdened Europe and th…
The US is the largest oil producer in the world, one of the largest producers of food, one of the top innovators, has relatively healthy demographics, is surround by allies (one of which produces oil and fertilizer), and has the most dominant military on the planet.
Your outlook is significantly more gloomy than reality
In related news; backstory [1]: Australia is the biggest supplier of energy and key minerals to Japan, reflecting Australia’s position as a reliable, safe and competitive producer of raw resources. Australia provides around two-thirds of Japan’s coal, and a third of Japan’s LNG imports. Australia also provides about 60 per cent of Japan’s iron ore imports. and, just the other day [2]: The head of Japan's biggest oil…
Takayuki Ueda is just trying to bully the ALP into making sure nothing rocks the boat for the LNG companies. It's worked in the past with the mining sector and the carbon tax. But after the 2020 bushfires and then the flooding. Most people in Australia are pretty happy to see movement on CC. It's just bluster from him, but it's bad that japanese resolve is breaking away from Ukraine.
I recognise the bluster tactic and have seen it before, I'm surprised that Japan broke from the general resolve to not trade in oil with Russia and I'm wondering how much that is bargaining strategy also.
Japan is oil and resource poor and is looking to have a more stable energy future pushing for more "next gen" nuclear reactors, etc.
In the meantime they have high energy demands that need to be met somehow.
The next few weeks/months are going to be very interesting. Saudi Arabia has doubled down on its new direction. Japan/EU seems at edge with the war in Ukraine. China is making new moves in the global financial scene. The US has accumulated significant political debt in the recent years. They have significantly abused their position with the US dollars hegemony. In this recent conflict, the cost burdened Europe and th…
As long as China and Russia remain peaceful and don’t threaten their neighbors with aggression, they can absolutely win the war for hearts and minds and thus assemble a broad coalition to buck the US’s interests. The problem here is that Russia has already invaded its neighbors and proven to be a security risk for Europe, while China is doing everything it can to signal to its own population that war with Taiwan is imminent and to its neighbors that it’s a major threat. Maybe they’re all joking (well, except for Russia) but the very real security threat posed by China and Russia to their neighbors puts an upper “cap” on the effectiveness of a broad anti-US alliance. The backstop of US dominance isn’t feelings, it’s the global desire for survival.