Day 884
Nobody picks on a strongman
Charles Gaines and George Butler once described Angelo Siciliano as “the most masculine man in America.1” When I read this, my eyes teared up, popped from my head and exploded like avocado met with a baseball bat. It seemed exactly wrong. Large muscles generate more dynamic tension and can make daily activities easier, straighten your spine and bolster your ego. But they are heavy, gobble up oxygen and, if too bulky, are difficult to lug around, especially when the temperature soars above 35C and you have 10 kilometers left on a long run.
Those mired in the anerobic stage of puzzling out our order of battle mess along umpteen axis on a 700-kilometer frontline might consider increasing their VO₂ max, learning Ukrainian and tuning in once every couple of weeks to Yuriy’s podcast dedicated to our 10-plus year catastrophe2.
The latest review of our unenviable predicament includes a call out to Deepstate, which provides updated war maps daily. Vasyl Pekhno also does regular YouTube situps.
If you don’t want to learn Ukrainian, then you are stuck with big-muscled English-speaking war-adjacent military content bloggers, such as Phillips Newsletter, Stefan Korshak, Tim Mak, Sarcastosaurus, Michael Koffman, RUSI, Frontinelligence Insight, et cetera. I don’t read their stuff because tactical jargon puts me to sleep, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t.
It is best practice to keep in touch with friends actually doing the fighting or documenting it. Those with limited bandwidth for Ukraine-related content should just stick with pictures. Follow Serhiy, who has been bouncing up and down the front for the past two and one half years. Or Libkos or Natasha Kravchuk, et al.
To date, and since 2014, Team USA has both been giving Ukraine enough support to prevent being overrun and not enough to drive Russian invaders out of the country. This is the flawed policy engineered by Uncle Joe, Jake Sullivan, and especially William Burns that has lengthened the war and resulted in unnecessary suffering and death.
The US administration has not been able to keep track of much during the war, including how much taxpayers have and still are forking out, for what, how, exactly when and why.
The Pentagon has found $2 billion worth of additional errors in its calculations for ammunition, missiles and other equipment sent to Ukraine, increasing the improperly valued material to a total of $8.2 billion, a U.S. government report revealed on Thursday. — Reuters
DoD advisors and platoons of CIA freightfowarders are obvi spending too much time at the gym and Tootsie Club.
The so-called peace process is not, at least until it is, and it isn’t, so ignore it. All the recent talk about ceasing fire, negotiating with Russia, bringing in UN peacekeepers, unilateral or bilateral withdrawal, convincing China to dissuade Putin from further invasions, preparing NATO to confront Russia after the war, ad nauseum, is a distraction. The crap from Sam Charap at Rand and can be either ridiculed or ignored. Ignore David Sanger at The New York Times and David Ignatius at The Washington Post (which owes the world an update on their exclusive accusing Colonel Roman Chervinsky of blowing up Nord Stream underneath the Baltic Sea).
On the US political jacket, these recommendations from big men strong men Westpointers David J. Urban and Mike Pompeo, former CIA director, secretary of state and heat seeking missile for Trump’s ass appearing in The Wall Street Journal.
• Unleash America’s energy potential. This will fire up the U.S. economy, drive down prices and shrink Mr. Putin’s war-crimes budget.
• Rebuild ties with Saudi Arabia and Israel and work together against Iran. This will stabilize the Middle East, ease the Gaza crisis, and create an opening for the Saudis to join the U.S. in squeezing Russia out of global energy markets.
• Impose real sanctions on Russia. The Biden administration’s sanctions sound good on paper but are hollow. The Treasury, for example, exempts Russian banks from U.S. sanctions if their transactions are related to energy production—the most important revenue source for the Kremlin’s war machine.
• Bulk up America’s defense industry. We must show our adversaries, especially Russia and China, that they can’t compete with U.S. defense capabilities. Russia’s economy is smaller than Texas’. We can’t allow China to match and surpass the U.S.
• Revitalize the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. This includes making Europeans pay their fair share. It is time to raise the bar on spending to 3% of member countries’ gross domestic product.
• Create a $500 billion “lend-lease” program for Ukraine. Instead of saddling U.S. taxpayers with more bills, let Ukraine borrow as much as it needs to buy American weapons to defeat Russia. This is how we helped Britain in World War II before Pearl Harbor. It’s how we can send a clear signal to Mr. Putin that he will never win.
• Lift all restrictions on the type of weapons Ukraine can obtain and use. This will re-establish a position of strength, which Mr. Putin will understand means the war must end. He will face rising costs and no chance of further gain.
And, finally, this:
Have a wonderful weekend!
The Life and Times of Charles Atlas (Gaines, Charles., Roman, Charles P.. The Life and Times of Charles Atlas. Australia: Angus & Robertson, 1982.)
VO₂ max is given in two ways: absolute and relative. Absolute is given in liters of O₂ per minute. Relative is in relation to weight and is given in ml/kg/min. In general, those with the highest in relative VO₂ are fairly light in weight and not especially muscular, especially compared with muscley people who eat a lot of meat. The athletes with the highest VO₂ max are distance runners and cyclists.
---this is a plan that should have been initiated months ago......but at least it appeals to concerns of all parties except for Russia... Pompeo was a flop as a candidate but this is some serious thinking here.
A Trump Peace Plan for Ukraine
Among the essentials are a lend-lease program, real sanctions on Russia, and a revitalized NATO.
By
David J. Urban
and
Mike Pompeo
July 25, 2024 5:14 pm ET
244
Volodymyr Zelensky during an interview in Kyiv, July 3. Photo: Julia Kochetova/Bloomberg News
Pundits claim that if Donald Trump is re-elected, he will cut off aid to Ukraine, give away its territory, and deal directly with Vladimir Putin to impose an ignominious “peace” on the country.
There’s no evidence that such capitulation will be part of President Trump’s policy and much evidence to the contrary. It was Mr. Trump who in 2017 lifted the Obama administration’s arms embargo on Ukraine, providing it with the Javelin missiles that helped save Kyiv in the earliest days of Russia’s invasion. More recently, Mr. Trump gave political cover to House Speaker Mike Johnson when he maneuvered to pass additional military aid. Helping Ukraine while revitalizing the American defense industrial base in Alabama, Pennsylvania and Virginia is good policy—and good politics.
The Biden administration’s weakness has left Ukraine where it is today: two years into a full-scale war, with cities destroyed, hundreds of thousands killed, and millions of refugees, and without the means to win. The White House has no strategy for victory, and Americans are rightly concerned.
While Mr. Biden stumbled into war through weakness, Mr. Trump could re-establish peace through strength. Here’s how a successful plan for Ukraine might look:
• Unleash America’s energy potential. This will fire up the U.S. economy, drive down prices and shrink Mr. Putin’s war-crimes budget.
• Rebuild ties with Saudi Arabia and Israel and work together against Iran. This will stabilize the Middle East, ease the Gaza crisis, and create an opening for the Saudis to join the U.S. in squeezing Russia out of global energy markets.
• Impose real sanctions on Russia. The Biden administration’s sanctions sound good on paper but are hollow. The Treasury, for example, exempts Russian banks from U.S. sanctions if their transactions are related to energy production—the most important revenue source for the Kremlin’s war machine.
• Bulk up America’s defense industry. We must show our adversaries, especially Russia and China, that they can’t compete with U.S. defense capabilities. Russia’s economy is smaller than Texas’. We can’t allow China to match and surpass the U.S.
• Revitalize the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. This includes making Europeans pay their fair share. It is time to raise the bar on spending to 3% of member countries’ gross domestic product.
• Create a $500 billion “lend-lease” program for Ukraine. Instead of saddling U.S. taxpayers with more bills, let Ukraine borrow as much as it needs to buy American weapons to defeat Russia. This is how we helped Britain in World War II before Pearl Harbor. It’s how we can send a clear signal to Mr. Putin that he will never win.
• Lift all restrictions on the type of weapons Ukraine can obtain and use. This will re-establish a position of strength, which Mr. Putin will understand means the war must end. He will face rising costs and no chance of further gain.
These steps would position Mr. Trump to set the terms of a deal: The war stops immediately. Ukraine builds up substantial defense forces so Russia never attacks again. No one recognizes Russia’s occupation and claimed annexation of any Ukrainian territories—just as we never recognized the Soviet incorporation of the Baltic states and withheld recognition from East Germany until 1974. Crimea is demilitarized. Ukraine rebuilds with reparations from Russia’s frozen central-bank reserves, not U.S. taxpayer dollars.
Ukraine joins NATO as soon as possible so all European allies assume the burden of protecting it. NATO should establish a $100 billion fund for arming Ukraine, with the U.S. share capped at 20%, as is the case with other alliance common budgets. The European Union should swiftly admit Ukraine and help it modernize and develop its economy.
If Russia complies with these terms, the West will gradually lift sanctions. They will be fully removed once Ukraine is in both NATO and the EU.
These steps, and not the half-measures of the Biden administration, will end the war, establish a lasting peace, ensure Europe bears the burden of maintaining it, and re-establish freedom and security on the Continent.
To those who doubt: The last thing Mr. Trump wants in a second term is a foreign-policy failure that distracts from his domestic agenda and makes Mr. Biden’s botched withdrawal from Afghanistan look like a success in comparison.
Mr. Urban is managing director at the BGR Group and of counsel at Torridon Law. Mr. Pompeo served as secretary of state, 2018-21.
hi, mark.
yes.
were david and mike were in the same west point class?
mike wasn't just a flop as a candidate. he was also a flop as cia director and secretary of state.
but the "plan" does sound better than anything uncle joe & co have come up with so far.