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Japan Breaks with U.S. Allies, Buys Russian Oil at Prices Above Cap

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Re: Japan Breaks with U.S. Allies, Buys Russian Oil at Prices Above Cap

#181

Post by bilekas »

pastacacioepepe wrote: post #95
bilekas wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Finland is insignificant from a geopolitical point of view. Its joining NATO only makes NATO less secure as a whole, rather than strenghtening it. This makes zero sense. Please elaborate. > The dollar relevance is degrading Can you give some facts and figures to support this ? Because as I understand then the world would be tradin in multiple currencies for Oil&Gas.

> This makes zero sense. Please elaborate. I did in another comment under this one. Would you elaborate on why the opposite would be true?

Lets keep thing simple : NATO ensures support from other members if your sovereignty is attacked.

Meaning you don't need to only depend on your own Military capabilities in order to protect your borders.

Finland joining makes Finland's borders a FAR more expensive attack than was previously.

> joining NATO only makes NATO less secure as a whole

NATO is not an offensive/invading force. It's a defensive force. If NATO had what you're referring to as a level of security, it has only increased due to more forces available to respond.

It's that simple.

Re: Japan Breaks with U.S. Allies, Buys Russian Oil at Prices Above Cap

#182

Post by corbulo »

John23832 wrote: post #98

Everyone here is missing the obvious. OPEC+ just cut. Japan is a massive energy consumer. They need to shore up their supply. This also gives Russia a good will gesture. The agreement to buy Russian oil was Ok'd by the US. This isn't a break, is coordination.

Japan is also geographically not in the best place for non-Russian energy.

Re: Japan Breaks with U.S. Allies, Buys Russian Oil at Prices Above Cap

#183

Post by simonh »

rayiner wrote: post #141
simonh wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that there's a major land war in Ukraine, which the US did not start and had no power to prevent, has come at a huge cost. This is true. Given that Ukraine patently was not just going to roll over, and even if the US hadn't supported them, much of Europe absolutely would. I think it's petty plain the war would still be raging fiercely anyway. Most likely Russia would be on the skirts of or in Kyiv and Odessa…

Lots of countries aren’t being affected by the land war, but are being affected by the US/EU sanctions on Russia. For example it’s exacerbating a major foreign currency shortage in Bangladesh: https://www.cnbc.com/2023/03/02/bangladesh-foreign-minister-... > Meanwhile US relations with Europe would be at the lowest level since WW2, it would be seen as an utter abandonment and betrayal of our shared values, including…

> Lots of countries aren’t being affected by the land war, but are being affected by the US/EU sanctions on Russia.

That is being affected by the land war. As soon as the first tank went over the line into Ukraine there were going to be harmful global consequences whatever any other country did.

As for presidential commitments. Taiwans existential security is based entirely on verbal presidential commitments going back to George W.

Re: Japan Breaks with U.S. Allies, Buys Russian Oil at Prices Above Cap

#184

Post by defrost »

John23832 wrote: post #92
defrost wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't made any claim, I've reported two factoids and backed them with solid references to allow readers to verify and pursue that angle for themselves. FWiW I was part of a mineral and energy intelligence group started decades ago that was sold onto S&P a decade ago ( mineral arm at [1] ) and the protocol there was to report solid factoids backed by solid references and where applicable create GIS links. That was…

> I haven't made any claim, I've reported two factoids and backed them with solid references to allow readers to verify and pursue that angle for themselves. And for what reason? The world is full of infinite factoids, but you chose to post this? It's not unreasonable for someone to ask what you intend to purport.

In a story about Japan and energy it's reasonable to post a brief summary of where Japan gets a large chunk of energy from and recent energy news.

I'm Australian so I chose snippets relevant to Australia.

Professionally we trawled, linked, and posted everything in minerals (or energy) relavant to exploration and development and put that up for subscribers to helicopter over and dig into as they saw fit.

Unfortuneatly this HN comment is too short to post the entire history of Japans energy imports|exports, companies, boards, shares, etc.

Re: Japan Breaks with U.S. Allies, Buys Russian Oil at Prices Above Cap

#185

Post by simonh »

user3939382 wrote: post #168
simonh wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>we just backed a coup to overthrow Ukraine's pro-Russian government in 2014 You have been misinformed. The sovereign institution in Ukraine is the Verkhovna Rada, the parliament, which overwhelmingly approved an association agreement with the European Union. Yanukovych refused to sign it, and after extensive popular protests in favour of the association agreement, on 22 February 2010 the parliament voted overwhelmin…

> You have been misinformed > popular protests in favour of the association agreement, on 22 February 2010 the parliament voted overwhelmingly to remove Yanukovych These "popular protests" were violent. The vote was at gunpoint, that's what makes it a coup. > the military industrial complex in the USA have been pushing for Vladimir Putin to invade Ukraine. I'm not sure I understand how that works. Could you explain?…

As I’ve already pointed out all the countries that joined NATO did so with overwhelming popular support. The vote in the Ukrainian parliament was entirely free. Bear in mind until then Yanukovych was party to the negotiations with the EU. His decision to refuse to ratify it came as a total shock, hence the protests in support of the parliament.

The idea the parliament voted for the EU accord at gun point is absurd to the point of fantastical. Whose guns? The president was in charge of the army and police and he was pro Moscow. If there were any guns pointed, and there were, it was to try to prevent the pro western tide.

Re: Japan Breaks with U.S. Allies, Buys Russian Oil at Prices Above Cap

#186

Post by simonh »

user3939382 wrote: post #172
ceejayoz wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US had a preferred candidate and used their influence? Absolutely shocking, ground-shattering news. I sure hope no one else does that sort of thing in Ukraine.

It goes beyond "preference" we have State Dept officials on tape having a conversation where they're hand picking the Ukrainian cabinet. Again, imagine what the US would do if we had a tape of Chinese officials picking out the top officials of Mexico. There is no way to paint the US as innocent here.

There was no coercion, no bribery, no extortion, they were giving advice to friendly politicians and offering support. What do you think diplomats do?

Re: Japan Breaks with U.S. Allies, Buys Russian Oil at Prices Above Cap

#187

Post by DLA »

neotrope wrote: post #165
DLA wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All true! It's too easy to focus on the downsides, but there are significant upsides as this comment points out. There's an excellent discussion by Geopolitical strategist Peter Zeihan here [1]; he talks about China vis a vis the US with respect the geographic, demographic, and economic advantages/disadvantages. Worth a watch in this context. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uS4Vw6cuW4M

FYI, Peter is a bit of a sensationalist (he’s been predicting China will collapse within 10 years since 2005).

So very true, but that does not change the geographical, economic, and demographic factors he speaks about.

Re: Japan Breaks with U.S. Allies, Buys Russian Oil at Prices Above Cap

#188

Post by yosito »

defrost wrote: post #27
yosito wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is your unspoken claim that Japan bought Russian gas because Australia just suddenly refused to sell gas anymore?

I haven't made any claim, I've reported two factoids and backed them with solid references to allow readers to verify and pursue that angle for themselves. FWiW I was part of a mineral and energy intelligence group started decades ago that was sold onto S&P a decade ago ( mineral arm at [1] ) and the protocol there was to report solid factoids backed by solid references and where applicable create GIS links. That was…

Sorry, I was asking you to connect the dots because I didn't understand your comment.

Re: Japan Breaks with U.S. Allies, Buys Russian Oil at Prices Above Cap

#189

Post by yucky »

simonh wrote: post #186
user3939382 wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It goes beyond "preference" we have State Dept officials on tape having a conversation where they're hand picking the Ukrainian cabinet. Again, imagine what the US would do if we had a tape of Chinese officials picking out the top officials of Mexico. There is no way to paint the US as innocent here.

There was no coercion, no bribery, no extortion, they were giving advice to friendly politicians and offering support. What do you think diplomats do?

  > What do you think diplomats do?
Well, large parts of our diplomatic corps tend to foment and finance coup's around the world. We're pretty smart about it though, first we bring in the NGO's like The National Endowment for Democracy (and many others) which act as an outsourced part of our CIA, then we apply pressure from within. Our playbook is pretty well known by now.

Or wait, how many coups do you think the US has actually been involved in since WWII?

Then again, the fact that you claim the US uses no coercion means you're probably trolling and I fell for it, so well played.

Re: Japan Breaks with U.S. Allies, Buys Russian Oil at Prices Above Cap

#190

Post by defrost »

yosito wrote: post #188
defrost wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't made any claim, I've reported two factoids and backed them with solid references to allow readers to verify and pursue that angle for themselves. FWiW I was part of a mineral and energy intelligence group started decades ago that was sold onto S&P a decade ago ( mineral arm at [1] ) and the protocol there was to report solid factoids backed by solid references and where applicable create GIS links. That was…

Sorry, I was asking you to connect the dots because I didn't understand your comment.

Fair enough.

I've been in the intelligence game (gathering data) long enough that I habitually defer connecting dots as long as possible.

What is known is that Japan is facing a future energy shortage, they're addressing (some?) of that with new nuclear reactors (which take time), that Australia is making noise about keeping more of its gas reserves to itself or off the board altogether (fossil fuel aversion), and that energy decisions take timeframes of five to ten years to swing about.

Now we have Japan sourcing Russian oil.

Is this a long tem thing (unknown to me), is this a strategic move signaling that if Japan cannot get cheap enough short term energy from elsewhere then it'll go to Russia (probably).

I know nothing for certain, I'm interested in comment or input from others, and I threw out the little nuggets above as they add to the understanding of the bigger picture in which this is taking place.

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