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Comment by u1hcw9nx | Hacker News Reader

To add into what you said. EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) already affects the United States, though its impact varies depending on the sector. CBAM is big permanent change, and that will be rolled in smoothly below all this.

EU has carbon tax internally and they are rolling out CBAM to prevent "carbon exports" (manufacturing stuff outside EU and then importing those product without tax). CBAM is currently used directly some high-emission sectors: iron and steel, aluminum, fertilizers, cement, electricity, and hydrogen.

EU importers require granular data on the embedded emissions (both direct and indirect). US companies in these supply chains have had to overhaul how they track and verify carbon intensity down to the sub-supplier level to help their EU buyers comply with strict European reporting standards.

EU will gradually expand CBAM after allowing supply chains to adjust.

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And then the Europeans suddenly discover that they cannot manufacture enough artillery shells and tanks to out-number the Russians.

You are not very informed on the EU's artillery shell production capabilities.

If anything, the major gap is the EU's lack of cheap drone manufacturing, but even that is starting to make progress with help and integration from Ukraine.

> You are not very informed on the EU's artillery shell production capabilities.

> In 2025, Russia produced an estimated 7 million artillery shells,

vs.

> Germany has rapidly scaled up artillery ammunition production, led by defense giant Rheinmetall. Output targets have surged from roughly 70,000 shells per year prior to 2022 to a projected 1.1 million to 1.5 million rounds annually by 2027–2030,

so now vs. "projected" and Russia still heavily outnumbers the former Nazis.

Which is to say give me a fricking break, I live in the closest EU and NATO capital city to Southern Ukraine, I know my shit.

Rheinmetall's current output is 1.1 million per year, aiming to hit 1.5 by 2027 and continue to scale up from there. That is just one company in one country in the EU, though they are the largest one.

The EU also simply has way more capacity to scale up shell production than Russia does, and the EU is building up stockpiles while Russia uses up everything they make.

Plus Russia can't replace easily some soviet era vehicles because nobody alive knows how to make this vehicles anymore.

> And then the Europeans suddenly discover that they cannot manufacture enough artillery shells and tanks to out-number the Russians.

Germany (by itself) is apparently out-producing the US artillery shell production.

* https://www.newsweek.com/germany-overtakes-us-in-ammunition-...

Russia's GDP is below that of Italy (and barely above Canada, who is in NATO):

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nomi...

If the Europeans really want to, they could produce a lot more by converting over to 'war mode'. Certainly they need to do more with current geopolitics, but there is no need to crank it to 11.

>if the Europeans really want to, they could produce a lot more by converting over to 'war mode'

As an Italian there's definitely been a perceptible shift due to the increase in defense spending. Leonardo now makes TV ads (something I had never seen before), they advertise on newspapers (...)

Off topic, but it's funny to me how the Leonardo TV ads basically skips over the defense part https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXytSNOt_0I

Note that GDP does not directly translate into a number of tanks and missiles produced. I doubt Italy has more weapon than Russia.

Of course, because Russia spends 7+% of its GDP on its military, and Italy 1.6%. It does say something about the relative capacity though. Russia probably cannot sustain this level of spending forever, and European countries could (continue) raising it if needed.

> Note that GDP does not directly translate into a number of tanks and missiles produced. I doubt Italy has more weapon than Russia.

Not wrong, but GDP is a rough metric of economic and industrial capacity. So if Italy wanted to, it could convert its economy to produce tanks and missiles at a similar rate as Russia is doing. And Italy is just one member of NATO:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Member_states_of_NATO

If the economic capacity is in "the service sector" it's going to be just about meaningless in a war.

yes all those guys selling drinks on the beach can just take a bus to the tank factory.

> yes all those guys selling drinks on the beach can just take a bus to the tank factory.

Exactly. (What do you think happened during WW2? When war broken out everyone learned to make tanks (and planes, and machine guns, and…). In Ukraine a whole bunch of people learned how to make drones that never made one before. )

> Not wrong, but GDP is a rough metric of economic and industrial capacity. So if Italy wanted to, it could convert its economy to produce tanks and missiles at a similar rate as Russia is doing.

Italy can make more expensive tanks that would amount to a bigger GDP. It doesn't mean it'll make more and better tanks.

> Italy can make more expensive tanks that would amount to a bigger GDP. It doesn't mean it'll make more and better tanks.

Just because Italy is making one kind of tank now does not preclude them making another type of tank later on. If a design change needs to be done, the important part is that there is some kind of tank building capability around, and the rest can be adjusted as needs arise.

Chinese tanks costs 5x less than Italian ones. Same GDP, different amounts of real assets. In the past people would use the quality excuse but that's not the case anymore, the Chinese ones are probably better.

> ity. So if Italy wanted to, it could convert its economy to produce tanks and missiles at a similar rate as Russia is doing.

This is pure NAFO-oid cope, which it shouldn’t surprise me seeing the technical audience here (no Svechin stans on HN, that’s for sure, knowing your Svechin doesn’t ever bring any VC money nor big-tech employment), but still. Back to arrr stupidpol for me.

it doesnt, but it does speak to an ability to invest in tank production

dunno why youd want tanks and not drones though, when even russia's new tanks with anti-drone defenses can be taken out by 30ish drones

Idk, I think the europeans can do better than paying over 500 million dollars to manufacture none [0].

[0] https://www.propublica.org/article/general-dynamics-artiller...

You are deluded, the EU is an industrial powerhouse compared to Russia, what's missing is just the political will

Uhhh, we're not doing so hot there either. https://www.propublica.org/article/general-dynamics-artiller...

Please. Russia had an economy of the size of Italy.

And I said "had", because this was before Ukraine destroyed most of their oil plants, and refineries, and their navy, and their petrol fleet, and the online stores, and before they killed a big chunk of their male workforce. And before they have an increasing debt with China and NK that they will need to repay somehow.

At this point everybody knows that the Russian economy will not survive after the war is over and that the country most probably will split.

Europe can deal with a ruined post-Ukraine war Russia.

They would just stand some suffering, but for sure 500 millions of motivated people can build more and faster than 100 millions of a Russia tied by deliberate anti-efficiency rules build to please oligarchs. The only question is how much damage could Russia do, before Moscow and St Petersburg are reduced to ashes as retaliation if they dare to try the final solution.

The hybrid war is the real problem. Russia can sponsor still many street "Syrian" terrorist attacks in Sweden, or cause a train wreck here and there, or burn Malibu for basically peanuts. They can do this for years and years.

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