The War has begun, but only one party has declared it.
Before I get into it…
“What’s your reaction to Trump’s win in the recent US presidential election?” If only I had a dollar…
Well, I, like most of the rest of the world, couldn’t get my head around a second Trump victory. In Australia, where I live, any single instance of the countless (reprehensible? despicable? abhorrent?) things Trump has said or done over the last decade would immediately doom the aspirations of any local politician. And yet, this guy keeps on coming. Even without the criminality, just the ego eternally on show would be enough to put him to the political sword here — we Aussies don’t warm to people who have (as we say here) “tickets on themselves.”
But look, enough time has passed for me to process the election and, huzzah, I’ve come out the other side. And here’s the self-help insight I came up with: “David, you don’t get Trump’s victory because you’re an Australian who lives in Australia. You need to look at this from an American’s point of view.” Right, hardly genius level as far as insights go, but it did lead me to an epiphany, and it’s this: Trump’s election victory is merely an expression of America’s disillusionment in itself.
To expand: America has finally woken up to the fact that the unicorns-and-rainbow promises regularly trotted out by electioneering Democrats and Republicans (not the current conspiracy-hyped GOP 2.0, but the Republicans of old who were at least rational) never seem to be realized. Americans hear the froth and bubble but then look around at their cities and infrastructure, and all they see is decay, their street corners and parks commandeered by an army of the homeless, a noticeable proportion of whom are moms and dads these days, and some of them have kids in tow. Where the hell is the American Dream?
And Trump, essentially, was banging that drum. And the subtext of every dumb, hateful, stupid, misogynistic, and racist thing he was saying con the campaign trail further confirmed that “I’m not like those smarmy swamp rats who promise shine and deliver shit, and that’s why you can trust me when I say I’m gonna fix things like no president has ever fixed things in the history of fixing things.”
My problem is that even though I loathe the guy for the hundredweight of opprobrium that seems hard-wired into every fiber of his being, I do want him to fix things and, as they say, put America to rights (I just can’t bring myself to say, “make America great again”). Because I want the USA to succeed. The world needs a successful America.
So, on November 5th, Americans put their faith in Trump.
But while I can now at least rationalize Trump’s victory at the ballot box to myself, my problem is that, unlike many Americans, I have no faith in faith. There’s just too much empirical evidence against it. And what if Trump, the self-obsessed cure, turns out to be worse than the disease? My own fear is that the disillusionment will metastasize. And then to what extreme will America turn?
Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that the war in Ukraine is an existential threat to Russia and that this is a fight against the West. While not currently a world war as we’ve come to understand such a catastrophe — yet — there does seem to be a certain inevitability of such a crisis with current events gathering pace.
Just to recap, while it’s not the generally accepted view, the first European land war since the end of WWII actually probably kicks off when PRC President Xi Jinping signs a “no limits” treaty with Putin in February 2022. It’s no coincidence that the following week, on February 24:
Russian forces invade Ukraine
Western allies respond, rushing shoulder-fired anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles to Ukraine, blunting the Russian attack
The first tranche of sanctions is imposed by the West on Russia
Putin responds, raising the threat of nuclear weapons
PRC (China) and India buy Russian oil, circumventing sanctions
Western countries begin to train thousands of Ukrainian troops
The West says no to artillery pieces, then ships
Putin responds, raising the threat of nuclear weapons
The West says no to HIMARS, then ships. The Brits chip in with MLRS, followed by Storm Shadow cruise missiles. The French send Scalp cruise missiles
Putin responds, raising the threat of nuclear weapons
The PRC begins to send microchips and machinery to aid Russia’s war effort, further circumventing sanctions
The US says no to tanks
Then the British ship Challenger tanks
Then the Germans ship Leopard II tanks
Then the US ships Abrams tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles
Putin responds, raising the threat of (tactical) nuclear weapons
The US says no to ATACMS
The US says no to F-16 fighters, then agrees, and pilot training begins
Putin responds, raising the threat of nuclear weapons
The West ships cluster munitions
Iran ships thousands of drones and missiles to Russia
The US approves ATACMS (surface-to-surface missiles) but ships the (less impactful) cluster munition variant
Putin responds, raising the threat of nuclear weapons
The West says no to the more potent variant of ATACMS, then ships
Putin signs a mutual defense treaty with the Democratic People’s Republic of (North) Korea (DPRK)
The DPRK then sends Russia millions of artillery shells, artillery pieces, artillery barrels, anti-tank missiles and other weapons
Using equipment from the West, Ukraine invades the Kursk region in Russia
Putin responds, announcing a change to Russia’s nuclear doctrine — that now any nuclear-armed country that assists a non-nuclear country fighting on Russian territory is a legitimate nuclear target (ie: the US, UK, and France)
North Korea sends up to 15,000 of its soldiers to fight Ukraine in Kursk
The US responds, greenlighting the supply of anti-personnel land mines and finally lifting targeting restrictions on ATACMS (Britain and France likewise immediately lift targeting restrictions on Storm Shadow and Scalp)
Two days later, Ukraine calls up six ATACMS to hit a munitions facility on Russian soil
Putin responds, announcing that the change in its nuclear doctrine has been ratified. Then, to underline this change and ram it home, he personally announces the firing of a prototype nuclear-capable ballistic missile with a range of up to 5,500km at the Ukraine city of Dnipro. And just so there is no mistaking the intent, the Russian president further observes with undeniable smugness that the Ukraine war “provoked by the West” has taken on a global character
UK Army Chief Lieutenant General Sir Rob Magowan responds to questions during a readiness review with MPs, saying, “If the British Army was asked to fight tonight, it would fight tonight”
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenski demands a European/NATO response to the firing of the ballistic missile
Putin’s latest toy, the “Oreshnik” medium-range ballistic missile. (I have the perfect “Spy vs Spy” countermeasure — handfuls of tacks thrown on the road.)
The chances of a miscalculation throwing a lit match into this tinderbox are increasing
While the above list is not in the strictest chronological order, you get the picture. The chances of a miscalculation throwing a lit match into this tinderbox are increasing. Is World War III as we understand it — a war fought with nukes — imminent? While some observers say the conflict is certainly looking and quacking like a duck, Putin has used the nuclear threat at key moments in the conflict, but in a tactical way — to spook the US, which has then starved Ukraine of the essential warfighting materials required to expel the invaders. Or, at the very least, delayed approvals, blunting any advantage new weaponry might have provided to the defenders on the battlefield. Of course, this is exactly what Putin wanted and it has worked for the 1000 days of the war. The Russian leader has played the American president like a Stradivarius.
There is a sense that the world is standing by, waiting to see how President Trump’s randomness will alter the picture early in the new year when he arrives in the White House. As has long been reported, he believes he can end the war overnight, and the consensus is that his plan is to simply pinch off the weapons spigot at a stroke. But some experts say this will only serve to prolong the war because, with so much blood given to Ukraine’s full-throated defense, Kyiv is unlikely to roll over simply because an obese orange Putin apologist squatting in the White House like some exotic autocrat-besotted toad issues a decree (okay, the experts don’t say this last bit, but I’m sure some of them would like to).
But while almost everyone expects Trump to zig, he could well zag and instead load up Ukraine with all the lethal weaponry its heart desires
But while almost everyone expects Trump to zig, he could well zag and instead load up Ukraine with all the lethal weaponry its heart desires. This, some believe, would be the quickest way to end the bloodshed and probably should have been done back at the beginning of the war when Russian forces were busy shooting themselves in the foot rather than at the Ukrainians. (And if Trump goes this way, he should also throw in the top shelf Terminal High Altitude Defense System (THAAD) and upgraded Patriot batteries for good measure.)
Meanwhile, the European nations bordering Ukraine and in its general vicinity, the ones who have experienced the Russian boot on their necks in the past, are seriously concerned about the picture forming. Sweden, NATO’s newest member, has just issued a booklet to its people titled “What to do when crisis or war comes,” and includes advice on how to survive a nuclear attack.
Finland and Norway have also published and distributed advice along similar lines to their people. Romania, bordering Ukraine, has just placed an order for 32 F-35 Lightning II fighters, an unprecedented expenditure for the small nation. It’s only buying them because, the way things are shaping up, it feels Russia could well succeed in Ukraine. And what then? What, or rather who will be next?
The thing is, all these countries know Russia well, living as they do on its doorstep, and they are rightly nervous. A win in Ukraine will have shown Putin how to beat the West. He’ll have the playbook. And his next invasion will be with a huge, well-equipped military with around a million battle-hardened soldiers, supported by an economy geared to war production.
Outright sabotage is also being conducted, with gas pipes breached and underwater communications cables linking European countries either damaged or severed
While the epicenter of the hot war is focused within the borders of Ukraine, there is also now a high-stakes gray zone war being fought across the world to undermine the security of Kyiv’s allies. Almost every Western nation is currently fighting off cyber attacks on critical infrastructure on a daily basis, the assaults launched by one of the antagonists in the CRINK alliance — China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea. The latest, well-publicized example? The hit on America’s internal communications industry. The chief suspect? China.
Outright sabotage is also being conducted, with gas pipes breached and underwater communications cables linking European countries either damaged or severed. Assassinations are also on the table, with the United States and Germany recently foiling a plot to assassinate the CEO of Rheinmetall, a major arms manufacturer supplying weapons to Ukraine. And many other defense industry executives were reportedly with him on the hit list.
Arson attacks are on the rise, too, with Russia’s military intelligence arm, the GRU recruiting local criminal elements to carry out the operations. And while Moscow might think this tactic provides it with a level of deniability, no one is fooled. In fact, it’s becoming increasingly difficult for Russia and its allies to deny that they have indeed declared war against the West. The question is, what are we prepared to do about it because we certainly don’t seem prepared for it.
It's as if the government has asked the PRC if it could just wait until we get those SSNs.
Yes, all very well said David. Unfortunately, we in Australia are currently very complacent about our own defence and the current preparedness for war of the ADF. We are sitting on the coattails of the US and assuming they will save us if war breaks out - the US might have its own issues in a war with China. Our government needs to start communicating about our defence predicament and start spending money on defence rather than cancelling vital defence projects. The $7B military satellite project recently cancelled is just one example of our governments lack of commitment to our current defence position. Of course, the nuclear submarines come to mind, but building them in Australia is 15 years away.