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Maybe that wouldn't be so bad if Europe had built up its own military at the same time. They didn't. World War II ended 80 years ago and Europe is still expecting the US to pick up the defense bill, despite an economic machine worth trillions.
Europe are at least as guilty as the United States in creating this problem. They bankrolled Russia and refused to spend on arms.
Europe collectively spends far more on defence than Russia does.
European nations, between them, are close to parity with the US for military tech.
European nations' soldiers are fed, paid, and equipped. Russia's are not.
The abject state of the Russian army is why they failed to roll into Kyiv on day three, and why they are now bombing civilian infrastructure that they then planned to own and operate.
Clearly, Germany can import a lot more Russian gas before Russia develops martial prowess. (Not that they should.)
Russia's air superiority is disputed by a few squadrons of F-16s, and their navy is conducting operations on the sea bed. Britain and France both have carriers. Any coalition including Britain and France would absolutely merk Russia in a defensive war.
No, he wants security guarantees. Without them, putin will attack again and war will go on forever. He wants security guarantees because that is the only way to ensure peace. So much so that he offered to step down in exchange to join NATO.
All wars have significant issues with fraud. If you think this is worse than any other consider the war budget.
Economics says that Ukraine is not doing as badly as you project. Their supply chains are robust. Russia on the other hand is a basket case. I agree victory is illusive, but to cast the war as lost, is I think hyperbole. The USA withdrawal is not insignificant and it can be said this is a war by proxy between nuclear superpowers. Something Putin is fond of saying. European views on this differ.
The anti war sentiment rather diluted out. There's a lot of global warfare, Putin has a hand in much of it. Perhaps when we have one war to fight, anti war left sentiment can coalesce but right now it has it's hands full in the middle east.
"The Pandora papers do not indicate whether any dividends were ever paid or their size."
"Nor do they reveal how many payments might have been made."
"One reason for setting up Maltex was “tax-efficient accumulation of business profits”;"
This all sounds like a nothingburger. It is most likely the local equivalent of creative Hollywood accounting.
This kind of rhetoric is the equivalent of saying that someone doesn't deserve saving form the local mafia because they're a criminal too -- after all, they ran a red light once and claimed a few things on their tax return they likely shouldn't have.