Disintegration: Indicators of the Coming American Collapse by Andrei Martyanov, Clarity, 2021, 286 pages
The focus of this article is on deployment of real resources with respect to national capability.
American Affairs Journal
How Russia Views America
Philip Pilkington
This article originally appeared in American Affairs Volume VI, Number 3 (Fall 2022): 102–12.
American Affairs Journal
How Russia Views America
Philip Pilkington
This article originally appeared in American Affairs Volume VI, Number 3 (Fall 2022): 102–12.
https://americanaffairsjournal.org/2022/08/how-russia-views-america/
Philip Pilkington is an economist (M.A. in Economics from Kingston University) working in investment finance. He is MMT savvy.
See also
Phil sure got this one right, while our fearless leaders didn't think things through and made decision based on faulty assumptions.
Sanctions Could Harm Us and Bolster Russia on the World Stage | Opinion
Philip Pilkington
https://www.newsweek.com/sanctions-could-harm-us-bolster-russia-world-stage-opinion-1687703
12 comments:
Andrei Martyanov is not MMT savvy and should stick to military affairs.
Philip Pilkington doesn't realize that the US is not Europe in terms of energy self-sufficiency. He fails to mention Canada, which is located to the north of the US.
But Trudeau too is a full blown climate nutter….
"Andrei Martyanov is not MMT savvy and should stick to military affairs."
Agreed. I've said this over and over.
And while Russia's view of America (and more importantly, itself) is changing, it still cannot compete militarily and economically with the U.S. and collective west. The Ukraine war is clear evidence of Russian incompetence and corruption. They are getting their asses kicked, and the U.S. and NATO are fighting with their hands tied behind their backs. Russia cannot even secure the Donbass, which was their primary objective and only a slice of Ukraine itself.
But Trudeau too is a full blown climate nutter...
That may be, but Canadians remain among the world's largest energy hogs.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/per-capita-energy-use
"And while Russia's view of America (and more importantly, itself) is changing, it still cannot compete militarily and economically with the U.S. and collective west."
It can Mike.
The problem is that the West will not deploy manpower to the theatre. Nobody is prepared to commit sons, brothers and fathers to die in Ukraine.
That's where the West falls over. Therefore you put the Ukraine's numbers and Russia's numbers (including all those Russians in Ukraine who are fighting for their homeland too) into the Battle Simulator and Russia comes out on top. Five minutes with Epic Battle Simulator shows how it goes.
This is World War One redux. The line doesn't move until one side or the other runs out of manpower or materials. It would seem Russia is more than able to supply sufficient things that go boom to the theatre to keep things going.
Therefore this ends when the body count gets high enough.
Or when somebody sees sense, holds their nose and does a deal with Putin
This argument is going to be resolved in real time, and those young enough will live to see it and the aftermath.
Martyanov makes the point that it is not possible to guess what has happened, is happening, and may happen for lack of information. The people that have the information are not telling, for two reasons. First, they are not going to give up information useful to others, and secondly, to protect sources and conceal methods.
In addition, this conflict is as much an information war as a hot war, so the level of disinformation is extremely high. Moreover, most "analysts are not qualified in the relevant fields and most are not systematic in their approach, basing their analysis on too few assumptions and almost no relevant information or evidence. Worse, a lot of analysis is based on "mind-reading," biased by wishful thinking, and even infected with magical thinking—"Wunderwaffen" being a case in point. As Martyanov observes the criterion of a real Wunderwaffe is the ability to change the situation strategically, and only use of nuclear weapons can do that, which makes contemporary conflict so dangerous. Staring at defeat or even heavy losses, what leaders having nukes will not use them.
He also makes the point that economic analysis in the West is based on nominal values, whereas what counts with respect to national capability and therefore national power is real goods production, especially heavy industry, which runs on energy supply and materials. Basically it is a matter of materials science and only those qualified can speak intelligently about it. Military science is a subset of this and requires its own expertise.
This criticism is based on approaching economics in terms of M-C-M' versus C-M-C'. (In the C-M-C' approach, commodity production results in money used to increase future commodity production. Using M=C-M', investment to produce commodities that increase profits is the focus. National capability and power are based on the production-distribution-consumption (real goods) instead of on "the bottom line" (profits) to increase stock price.
Moreover, a country focused on national capability and power will have an economic policy (plan) and industrial policy to accomplish this. Market-based economies don't necessarily lead to this outcome, which is a reason that the West is facing near peer competition with Russia and China, both of which do have this kind of organization.
The Romans demonstrated that national power is a matter of organization, understanding organization objectives, and policy, strategy, and operations based on this. They intuited what Peter F. Drucker was saying today.al
Being persuaded of this view, I am wondering why I am posting all these links, since even the people I think are qualified to speak based on their training and experience admit that they are out of the loop wrt information.
So I guess we can only wait and see how this all unfolds.
Washington is not going to push the US into a wartime footing. The last war effort involved rationing, re-tooling of industry to produce armaments, and the draft.
Bleed Russia, destroy Europe, and provoke China.
A 3-point plan that won't change a thing domestically.
Consider how events would have played out, had Europe acted in its interests. Sanctions on Russia would be gone, gas would be flowing, and Kiev forced to sue for peace.
The EU have been the enablers of Washington's malfeasance.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwjNzLXk_vX5AhWihIkEHWb3DPQQFnoECAgQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.rferl.org%2Fa%2Fus-restrictions-birth-tourism-travel-ban-russia-belarus-kyrgyzstan%2F30392356.html&usg=AOvVaw0DA3PoG-JHnzYTSOkAwsIS
Shouldn’t these people be going to Wang Dang China instead?
Russians living the far east sometimes visit China, South Korea and Japan.
Because geography...
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