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Comment by hunglee2 | Hacker News Reader

US must coerce allies into accepting anti-China strategy - sieges do not work unless it is complete. Depriving China of the ability to advance technologically, economically and militarily will ensure supremacy and the maintenance of the rule based order

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Always the promotion of abstraction over concrete identification of interests and power. Who is in charge? "The rules, the rules are in charge". No, it is US world domination and hegemony, plain and simple.

Which is fine, but it's always couched in layers of bs because it allows for the propaganda of "liberal democracy" values of US to obscure good old power and dominance and maintain moral superiority.

The US had the power to conquer much of the world at the end of WW2, but instead promoted self-determination and a global security framework based on rules that are applied to all countries, weak and strong, equally.

South and Central America would like a word about that.

They did conquer much of the world and Europe as a result of WW2, and then the rest of the world post cold-war. It doesn't have to imply a draconian or complete absence of benevolence in their conquest.

They have military bases all over Europe, and rest of world, they control the global financial system especially amongst their "allies" and have dominant world reserve currency. They sanction and invade countries and leaders that go against their interests.

NATO: "To keep the Americans in, the Russians out, and the Germans down". Always they are suppressing and sowing conflict amongst rival powers especially on "world island" / Eurasia. And this makes perfect sense, but to not call it a conquest is silly.

>self-determination

Just to take a recent example, they absolutely did not allow Germany and Russia to make an alliance over energy trade through Nord Stream pipelines, sanctioning all involved players and companies for many years, and making dozens of promises to destroy the project.

They also banned Huawei and demanded Western allies comply, not permit self-determination to do business of their own regard.

You'll say something to the effect of "well when the rules are broken..". Yes being able to write your own rules and have your vassals comply is called conquest.

Wading a tiny bit into this discussion, which country or clique would you prefer to occupy the slot that the US currently does?

There's almost always been some hegemon. When the world wasn't as connected, they were regional, then continental, and now world-wide. The US is the current one for a large portion of the world, but in the past you had Britain, France, Spain, HRE, Mongols, Rome..etc. Asia has seen its fair share of regional hegemonies, so has Africa and the pre-contact Americas. So it seems like that's a power void that needs to be filled by _some_ entity, and if left empty it doesn't remain so for long.

I like clarity and honesty about what's going on, not the layers of nonsense that obscure power politics. Notice, the thread here goes "the US is not a world dominating conqueror, and if they are that's a good thing". I know you weren't the one denying it, but my original point was to disagree with the characterization that they are not. If you think they are and that it is good, certainly you must think it is weird how much it is denied that they are, or that western liberal morality requires that it is denied? Cognitive dissonance, no?

Personally, what bothers me more than the US being in charge, given that I'm American, is the way the US regime runs things in the homeland. The values, ideology and culture which is cultivated at home is not consistent with the type of foreign conquest/hegemony/will to power externally. One can see this with the way military recruiting for example is suffering. I would prefer, like empires of the past, that a warrior culture and values promoting power and vitality were encouraged at home. That they are not, and woke culture is ascendant makes some like me not very motivated to "fight" for the nation's interest overseas or support a more aggressive heavy handed "hegemony". There are big contradictions, in other words. (I'm a military vet who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan, so these issues are meaningful to me... I see the country I fought for not representing my interests, so I have less will to fight for it or support it's fight. Make sense?).

If one is not American, and say, European. They should want Europe to be powerful, not the US. I can't tell you how many Europeans I get in conversation with online that for some reason don't even support their own continent or countries to be powerful on the world state. To assert their own interests. To have a military that can enforce their will, or do whatever is necessary to oppose US meddling in their affairs. As if it is some unquestionable fact that the US should dictate to them or that it is better the US have power over them than Europe rivaling US for global power.

I do largely agree with you, especially on the topic of the US being a world hegemon. I am not sure how much I track with your beliefs in the warrior culture, because I think that the US arose to their current position by downplaying their hard power. In a way, it is the most advanced experiment in world hegemony using the carrot more than the stick, but much as that simile says, the stick is always an option. Just think of how many more countries would be going 'blech, USA' if instead of coming in with Micky Mouse and Coca Cola, they came with guns and bombs. So far it's worked well enough seeing as how the US is at about a century of world dominance.

> To assert their own interests.

Who's to say their current interests aren't "Let's let the US play world police and take care of the military stuff." Perhaps it's just that I've played too many 4x games, but it seems to me that sometimes the best strategy is to be buddy buddy with the big bad dude on the block, rather than try to be the big bad dude himself.

I think they US rose to their power almost completely because of isolation between 2 oceans away from the rival powers, who themselves were next to each other, along with an abundance of space and natural resources unprecidented in comparison with their rivals, and this also protects this dominance (probably along with nuclear weapons) unlike any other empire/power in history. We could probably get away with bad internal culture and politics for far longer than others before external pressures assert a more vitalist reality. To me this is a pessimistic and depressing outlook.

And these advantages allowed them to get away with this fake soft power narrative. In other words their advantages in materials and geography enabled what I see as a disadvantage in ideological frame that will eventually lead to weakness in my opinion. Most Americans, and American society at large are shielded from the harsh realities of power politics, empire, and conflict that their nation cultivates far away from them to weaken rest of world. European civilization benefited from rotating powers and repeated conflict among themselves which was a selection pressure to further power, technological development, civilizational advancement etc. "Hard times make strong men".

>who's to say

Yes for a while. But now I see that power directed at them to suppress their own interests which I view were a closer alignment with Russia, purchase of their cheap resources to fuel European industrial power, and a rise of Euro as additional reserve currency which they could print for cheap Russian commodities. Now they've sanctioned Russian reserves at the behest of US interests (crushing the idea of Euro as something energy exporters will want to stockpile in reserve, eliminating the Euro as a "petro"-currency), and they've self-sanctioned out of cheap Russian energy, Nord Stream etc and potential alliance and close relations with their neighbor (relative peace in western hemisphere benefits US, chaos on "world island"/Eurasia benefits US, hurts Europe). Relatively speaking European industry will get crushed compared to US who has cheaper input costs and can print money for energy (for now).

Europe arguably would have been better building long ago their independence from US, and some sort of alliance with Russia since they are neighbors, and built their own military strength so they could oppose these developments and assert their power on the European continent, instead of fade into irrelevance if the energy issues lead to industrial decline, companies/citizens leaving to US etc.

I think one big thing has changed. In the past hegemony was enforceable. If two nations both wanted to declare themselves rulers of the world, that was solved through war. But nukes changed the game. Now outright war between "developed" (nuclear) nations has become impossible.

I'd argue that this is only coming to the front (some 80 years the development of nukes) due to historical nuance. The US and USSR kept each other, more or less, in check. When the USSR collapsed the US not only had immense soft power, but also lacked any any remotely viable competitor. But that's all changed rapidly. Russia largely rebuilt, China is becoming the dominant world power, India is coming into their own, the Mideast is no longer content just being a lapdog, and even much of Europe is increasingly being coerced into agreement rather than genuinely seeing eye to eye with the US.

So the US wants to stay the dominant world power, but has no viable claims to such, let alone means to enforce that. We're headed to a multipolar world, or nuclear war and then a multipolar world. Once choice is clearly optimal.

..and all on top of decades of ideological propaganda that liberal democracies don't enforce will-to-power against each other, follow some supposed mutually agreed upon rules based order etc. Just when they have to project power even against supposed allies, they are at peak "glorious liberal democracy" against illiberalism rhetoric. And seeing rising economic pain in West..which is one of the pillars that they stand on. "say what you want about liberal democracy at least it provides material comfort"

If that starts to wane, much of the other aspects of liberal culture might not be able to fill the gap in "hard times" like atomisation, declining social cohesion, increasing polarization, declining military recruiting numbers and disillusion within much of veteran community of past few years. Much of the legitimacy of our institutions and leaders is predicated upon certain narratives. If they fail..

> he US had the power to conquer much of the world at the end of WW2

And it did. FDR administration calculated that the US would end up in de facto control of 75% of the world, and drafted a 'world' in which every country would function as a colony of the US with a certain good or resource to produce for the US industry. Indonesia, for example, were tasked with producing rubber. When they got a socialist administration and tried 'independent development', trying to manufacture things that they shouldnt, voila - they got a coup, NYT celebrated as 'a great win for democracy' even as the coup government proceeded to bury 300,000 intellectuals, left wingers, trade union leaders, communists etc alive. And Indonesia went back to 'knowing its place' and doing what its master wanted.

Same situation with China - they became way more than a slave labor shop for the US business. And 'the master' is trying to 'put them in their place' right now. Like it did to Japan with the Plaza Accords.

Indonesia and China are hardly comparable here.

The US lost grip on China once the civil war ended, and it could be argued that one of the reasons why the KMT lost was, in fact, the lack of military support by the US.

Indonesia was just an example of how FDR admn. allocated 'responsibilities' to the new 'colonies'. China is a different case.

why are you getting down-voted lol

Thinly veiled nationalism still dominates Angloamerica. The proposition of any evildoing except the most blatant and undeniable one (like the Iraqi WMD case), triggers their self-defense instincts that make them defend their group cohesion and the social group they identify with.

The (post ww2) world is dived up for the US to take over and Africa is bread crumbs for the then lesser imperial Europeans is well documented.

That seems a little idealistic and even naive. The US acted in its own interests, it just happened that said interests took the shape that they did. Its rules absolutely do not apply equally to all countries; Its rules rarely even apply equally to their own citizens.

It's fallen far short of this ideal many times, and perhaps it promoted a rules based global security architecture for its own long term interest, but the fact remains, its behavior has been very different from other global hegemons, in not extracting maximum advantage from other states nearly as much past hegemons did.

The US's foreign policy - in all its aspects including trade - has generally been extraordinarily mutually-beneficial / positive-sum. The biggest exceptions to this have been US policy in the Middle East and with respect to state-level adversaries.

> The US's foreign policy - in all its aspects including trade - has generally been extraordinarily mutually-beneficial / positive-sum. The biggest exceptions to this have been US policy in the Middle East and with respect to state-level adversaries.

Yes, but that does not at all preclude that said actions would be largely ones of self-interest. Is it not possible that the US realized that by not maximizing their benefit all the time, they could ensure a much more stable environment for their own growth and power gain? Grease the squeaky wheel and it'll work for you longer than if you just force it to keep going until it completely breaks.

>>Yes, but that does not at all preclude that said actions would be largely ones of self-interest.

Yes, it's entirely possible. Regardless, this strategy that the US has-pursued/pursues makes it preferrable to most other comparable historical states as a global hegemonic power.

Well it makes it preferable to some, and really distasteful to others. It's rarely a good idea to make moral judgements on history or international politics. They don't really operate in the realm of morality. To those of us in the USA or west Europe, we have benefited a lot from the US' global power over the last near-century. On the other hand, I am sure China could argue that if the US wasn't as dominant, they could have benefited more. Considering that those two cliques have similar populations, we can't even go with what the majority thinks -- there isn't one.

> It's rarely a good idea to make moral judgements on history or international politics

Ultimately, you are forced to make rational decisions based on history and international politics. What hegemony is more aligned with your interests?

It is blatantly obvious that the chinese governance is immoral, and that it is not even controlled by the chinese people. Say what you will about the US, the bigger picture is that one nation is a free-democracy-with-exceptions and the other is a dictatorship that murders political dissidents and harvests their organs. There is no reasonable moral judgement that can be made that considers US dominance to be comparable to Chinese dominance.

In the same sense that there is an asymmetry in the freedom of US/Chinese markets, there is an asymmetry in the freedom of US/Chinese marketplaces of ideas. Just consider the preconditions of this argument: There is simply no equivalent chinese forum where they openly discuss the misdeeds of their own nation, so the anti-American argument is globally over-represented.

Agreed, but I think we also have to consider where we come from and where we're going.

As a citizen of a Western nation, living in a liberal democracy, wouldn't it be logical to wish for a nation of similar values to maintain high global influence? Wouldn't it be reasonable to be against the rise in influence of an authoritarian nation that wants the rest of the world to allow it to dictate their cultural norms?

I frankly do not give a damn whether or not China could have benefited more over the past several decades if it would have meant the spread of the Chinese government's values to other nations.

You don't give a damn, probably most of your countrymen (assuming you're from the US) also don't give a damn. And there's probably over a billion Chinese that don't give a damn that you don't give a damn.

I don't wish for the US to lose their global influence either, I rather like what I get out of that. But I am under no delusion that this is a lucky happenstance and that the interests of the US could change to ones that I am not happy with, and that China, and any other nation will have their own interests that they pursue; Within their moral codes, within their systems of values, interests that we here may judge as wrong or counter to our beliefs, may well be the opposite and acceptable in their origin nations.

So if you want to interact with those nations in any fashion, you need to throw away some of these notions of morality, or at least reify them to things that are relatively universal, of which there aren't as many as one would think on a geopolitical scale. You say that we need to consider where we come from and where we're going. I say that we cannot do that in a vacuum, so if you want to really understand, you have to understand the other side too.

You're saying that the US has taken a "a rising tide lifts all boats" approach and apparently that's a bad thing for people not in the US?

Nope, not at all. A rising tide lifts all boats, but the tide spends more energy lifting the bigger boats.

Does it really matter why? I would much rather be under the soft control of a nation whose self interest largely consists of things that benefit me and increase my independence, rather than one that favors subjugation and domination.

To a degree, yes, it does matter, because you might need to also understand the context and motivations the other side operates on. If for nothing else, than just so you understand the risks and dangers to your position. And from a more individual standpoint, you might also want to understand the motivations that your government has because they are very unlikely to factor you at all.

Ah yes, self-determination is what they say to all those countries they illegally invaded.

I would much rather continued US world domination than cede that power to China. Yes, that's easy for me to say as an American, but I can't help but think that other Western nations would suffer as well under China's dominance.

Yes, the US's liberal democracy isn't in the best of shape (to put it mildly), but China is an isolationist, authoritarian nation where state censorship and human-rights abuses are the norm, not the exception.

US routinely target and kill people inside other sovereign nations borders during peacetime, with scant regards for any "rules-based-order".

Not to mention not being a signatory to major treaties and conventions that are are part of that "rules based order", like UNCLoS, ICJ, ICC and also hasn't ratified significant components of the Geneva Convention.

Routinely?

US like to talk about "rule-based order" but ignores those rules when it's not convenient. United Nations Security Council voted against invasions of Yugoslavia and Iraq.

It would have worked if China didn't have deep pool of engineers and fundings to backup multi decade R&D projects. We are going to look back at this and realize it's a strategic mistake.

I find it hilarious they still call us allies.

The US is pushing Europe into complete destitution. it's the furthest from an ally imaginable, just by subtle economic warfare.

"To be an enemy of the US is dangerous, but to be a friend is fatal"

Henry Kissinger, Nobel Peace Prize recipient, United States Secretary of State, war criminal.

"The US is pushing Europe into complete destitution"

How so?

blowing up the norstrom, decoupling russia from gas, maintaining USD hegemony, selling natural gas for 5x the price, forcing EU to join them in war, forcing EU to sanction China...

remember the EUR was envisioned when the gold standard was dropped by USD because the Europeans knew the USD would become the defacto global standard which is bad for their economy.

EU is a beautiful concept. Unfortunately they are unable to make their own independent decision and will always be a gutless spineless laptop to American military industrial complex.

Only this time taking on Russia and China at same time is going to be a bigger bite than they can chew. EU is already getting closer to China and US doesnt like this one bit.

Colonization finally coming home to roost.

"blowing up the norstrom"

Russia did that. The US would never risk getting caught doing that but Putin doesn't give a fuck.

"forcing EU to join them in war"

Actually they are sensibly opposing Putin to prevent future threats. It would be insane to just let Putin do whatever he wants, it would just embolden him.

Historically the US hasn't been that big on Colonization.

Then how is EU able to curb US big tech?

Whose rules?

the international community's

Is that what blowing up Nord Stream 2 was for, the benefit of "the community"? Sounds like a load of crap. Doesn't sound very rules based or orderly.

Russia did that. They've damaged/destroyed their own pipelines before in order to avoid penalty clauses in contracts or to get out of a bad deal after the price changed out of their favor, and that's why they did it this time, too.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/arielcohen/2022/09/29/russian-s...

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-turkmenistan-gas-s...

No. The US (or some deputized vassal at the direction of US) did it to destroy German/European industrial power and sever any potential alliance of European industry and cheap Russian commodities/energy flowing through Euro denominated trade outside $ system, along with the massive geopolitical alignment changes this would bring threatening US power/hegemony.

Peeling Europe away from a US alliance through energy partnership and trade, especially trade denominated in Euros which greatly benefited Europeans, was such a powerful lever to play in Russian geopolitical strategy that people claiming Russia blew up their own pipelines and threw this lever away have worms in their brain and simply haven't paid attention to the long term dynamics.

Having Germany/Europe on your side, vs them being on your biggest adversary's side is such an order of magnitude net benefit than saving money on contracts, this is just ridiculous.

Additionally, even if consideration of blowing up the pipelines ever made any sense whatsoever for Russia, blowing them up right now before winter, before further deterioration of Germany/European industrial economy, and before potential financial/energy crisis really bites right around the corner or next year is absurd. If this was a few years from now we could entertain theories of why not having the pipes and trade with Europe is better than having them (it still wouldn't make sense).

But Russia "panic bombing" their own pipelines right before pressure on Europe is about to increase which would potentially get them to capitulate on their sanctions is silly.

This is US propaganda and you bought it. Many different political leaders in congress, the white house, and the administrative state like Victoria Nuland, Ron Johnson, Ted Cruz, Joe Biden, Trump, Marco Rubio, Condoleeza Rice, Lindsey Graham just to name a few have for years attacked the project and promised destruction of Nord Stream.

Anthony Blinken wrote a book in 1988 called "Ally vs Ally" that speculated about blowing up Soviet gas pipelines flowing into Europe, and discussed the Reagan administrations deep opposition to expanding energy trade between Europe and Russia. This is a long term existential threat to US hegemony and dominance of European affairs.

If Russia maybe having to pay a few fees, which I'm sure they could just avoid if they wanted to, was more important than potential energy alliance between Russia and Europe, then multiple US administrations would not have talked and acted to end the project so intensely.

This is another example of the all to common delusional thinking that for some reason, the world hegemon that controls financial system, trade lanes, has massive military power and spending advantage, whose empire is very dependent upon global reserve currency and influence of energy trade, won't actually act like a hegemon and apply their power to suit their interests and thwart rivals building their own power.

What makes you think the US who promised Nord Stream would be stopped, wouldn't stop it with kinetic force and sabotage? This is the Occam's razor, "cui bono" explanation.

Your article claims Russia hasn't called the attacks attacks. They have. Also, it correctly states that destruction of the pipelines "signals a point of no return". Yes, exactly, which is why it makes 0 sense for Russia to do it, and complete sense for US (either directly or through deputized vassals like UK) to do it.

Why would Russia want to reach a point of no return on potential alliance with Germany/Europe against the US?

See Mackinder's heartland theory on potential global power emanating from control of the "world island"/Eurasia:

Who rules East Europe commands the Heartland;

who rules the Heartland commands the World-Island;

who rules the World-Island commands the world

A particular path to this goal that he and many others leading US/NATO/UK security strategy saw was a German/Russia alliance, something US has wanted to prevent for over 100 years. Putin would never throw away potential for this, something he was building towards for decades, in a matter of weeks before circumstances could lead to its realization.

You got issues man.

Empty, vacuous statement with no substance betraying complete ignorance of the issue being discussed.

This also describes your rant.

You're going to have to do better than these 1 sentence low effort posts. Tell us what you know

Your original rant makes you sound completely insane.

This is a very long list of your unsourced "opinions" when all nations that have inspected the damage and assessed the intelligence have pointed the blame at Russia. Everyone but Russia.

What are you talking about?

Denmark, Sweden, and Germany have begun investigations but have not blamed Russia [0] and in particular are having issues coordinating the investigation and are individually maintaining secrecy about their findings.

Sweden has elected to have a partial separate investigation apart from Germany and Denmark citing national security concerns [1]. The point here is the issue is not resolved and there is confusion on all sides; aside from US media elements or US politicians, the investigators themselves have not said Russia was responsible and you won't find a European official at center of investigation making claims of Russian responsibility.

[0] https://archive.ph/erz77

[1] https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/sweden-shuns-formal-joi...

In reference to sources for original comment:

- Ron Johnson & Victoria Nuland https://youtu.be/rBUIlHM9WSo

- Ted Cruz years of comments attacking Nord Stream https://twitter.com/search?q=from%3Atedcruz%20%22nord%20stre...

- Condoleezza Rice https://youtu.be/aF0uYIjaTNE

- referencing Antony Blinken's book "Ally vs Ally" about US opposing Russian/European pipeline gas from 1988, and hypothetical bombing of pipelines to stop gas trade https://twitter.com/frankoz95967943/status/15767507942667141...

- link to book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0275924106/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_dp_GB2BX...

- Victoria Nuland again: "Nord Stream 2 will not move forward" https://twitter.com/ricwe123/status/1586101294334443520

- Biden: "there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it...I promise you we will do that" https://twitter.com/YoThatsCrazyyy/status/157741285229332480...

You are correct that the issue is not yet resolved. However, throughout the course of Russia's illegal war, US credibility has improved and Russia's has plummeted. They lied about the fact that they were preparing for war, they lied about their reasons for launching the war, they've pillaged and looted like medieval barbarians, and they've committed innumerable war crimes against both civilians and Ukrainian POWs.

In the absence of evidence and with only finger-pointing at this stage, I am inclined to believe that Russia is responsible since they have damaged their own pipelines several times in the past and lied about those instances, too. If Russia had any credibility before, they have essentially none now, and they do not deserve the benefit of the doubt.

As for their motives, there are several: to avoid paying the "force majeure" penalty, to give an unambiguous signal that no more gas is forthcoming in the immediate future, to threaten Europe's own energy infrastructure with a demonstration, to weaken the alliance by making some EU countries suspect the US, and for Putin to warn Russia's oligarchs that they can't just depose him and resume gas shipments - Russia is now all-in and can't go back to normal anytime soon even after a regime change.

As for Biden saying he would "stop" the pipeline earlier this year, he was talking about a different pipeline, Nord Stream 2 (which had not yet started operation at the time he made that remark), not Nord Stream 1. He was threatening to work with US allies to block it from opening in the first place.

The US has forbidden Ukraine from attacking Russian territory with US weapons, why would we take the escalatory step of attacking Russian infrastructure ourselves? We could have just let Ukraine do whatever they wanted with US weapons and denied responsibility, but the US was careful to avoid provoking Russia too much. It makes no sense that after all that tip-toeing around we would say "to hell with it" and launch a direct attack.

>he was talking about a different pipeline, Nord Stream 2

No. It is it not "different" seeing as that very pipeline was attacked and damaged, along with the other one. Nord Stream 1 and 2 were both attacked and damaged. They run parallel for much of their path except at certain parts.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Nord_Stream_gas_leaks

>block it from opening.

Yes, and given the energy crisis now affecting Europe and Germany, inflation, and potential shortages of gas when winter comes and/or next year plus industrial needs for natural gas as input, it is exceedingly ridiculous that Russia would preempt these immanent crises and throw away their leverage for potential alliance with Europe in opposition to US right as the mounting pressures incentivize Europe to abandon sanctions and push for rapprochement.

You bring up war crimes and war decisions. First of all all wars involved war crimes, including the current one on the Ukrainian side. But put morality aside for a second, I'm addressing interests and realpolitik. That Russia saw it in there interest to attack is one thing. I dispute that they saw it in their interest to blow up their own pipeline and their primary point of leverage and economic strength towards an alliance with Europe in opposition to their primary enemy. No benefit of the doubt is required here to see this reality.

Biden was saying "we'll make sure Nord Stream 2 never opens" while you were using that statement to insinuate that he was threatening both pipelines. Yes, both pipelines were damaged, but he was not threatening an attack with that statement and he was not threatening Nord Stream 1, either.

It's actually in the US's interest for the Nord Stream 1 to remain operational for at least a few more months so that Europe can fill its reserves. The extra money Russia/Gazprom pulls in from that is not going to make much of a difference to the war effort, while the extra gas will help ensure that Europe's resolve doesn't break this winter. Next winter hopefully they'll have further transitioned to green energy and LNG. So just looking it at that way, the US should not attack the pipeline at this time. Maybe next string, but not now!

I presented numerous possible motives for Russia to damage its own pipelines at this time, as well as a record of similar past behavior. I think I made a compelling case. I can see where you are coming from, but I disagree with your conclusions. If you don't agree with any of my points and won't budge on this at all then that's fine, but there's nothing more to debate here.

America is more than component enough to blow up a gas pipeline, so why was one of the pipes of Nord Stream 2 spared? Pressuring Germany to certify it giving Russia a huge win.

The obvious answer is because regardless of how much text people write, it was clearly Russia who had the most to gain and the easiest ability to do it.

Gazprom has maintenance robots that can be sent down the pipes and could be used to cause an internal explosion.

Much more likely and reasonable than some sort of fanciful special operations mission.

Russia obviously blew up Nord Stream 2. They are the only country that wouldn't care if they got caught. For anyone else the risk is just too great.

> Russia obviously blew up Nord Stream 2

Why? Why after pausing Nord 1? Please enlighten us if you are going to use "obvious" without any source.

There is disadvantage to Russia from every perspective if they blew Nord Stream. To me it doesn't make any sense to commit suicide.

The US, the UK and a dozen satellites of the US. Not even 20% of the world.

But 80% of the money.

Fake money that is created and kept over the inflated stocks and financal sector. A house of cards that is pending crashing at any point if any Jenga block that holds it up is pulled out. Like how we seen in the recent months, after various countries stopped using dollar as foreign exchange currency for international trade, sending inflation skyrocketing in the US and other countries.

In contrast, that other side of the world has actual products, resources and services backing their money and wealth. They dont allow shenanigans like how Wall Street does to invent new 'derivatives' to bloat the financial sector even more and increase its disconnect from the actual physical economy.

As of this moment, the US government is busy pumping dollars into Ukraine to take them out of circulation to combat inflation by getting it channeled back to the US defense sector to be racked up as profit and stock value. The wealth that was generated in the Angloamerican West is so weakly supported by the physical sectors of the economy that it requires such things to keep it from crashing down.

I intentionally singled out the Angloamerican countries. Because these countries are the ones who allow practically unregulated financial sectors to bloat their economy. The regulations are more strict everywhere including Europe, and neither stock values nor the financial economy are so bloated like in the US.

The rest of the world thinks the money is real enough

https://www.wita.org/ustrade/us-trade-trends/the-us-trade-de...

That should be why the US is unable to get the inflation under control.

China + Russia + other pariah countries >= 25% of the world's population. Are they inside or outside this international community?

I think it's hard to use population numbers here, as in many of those countries, the population has little meaningful control over their government.

The US. The "international community" that is against China is the same noxious lineup that we put together to attack Iraq.

So, the US, Australia, NZ, Britain, the EU, and Japan (whose constitution was written by the US.) Also of course the Saudis, but amusingly, not Israel. India's support will be dependent on us ignoring when they start to put Muslims into concentration camps, which we will be happy to do.

"The good guys"

“Our guys” is more appropriate.

You sound like a comic book bad guy.

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