In the worst case for U.S. grand strategy, China might be emboldened by Russia’s assertiveness and threaten confrontation over Taiwan. But there is no guarantee that an escalation in Ukraine will benefit the Sino-Russian relationship. China’s ambition to become the central node of the Eurasian economy will be damaged by war in Europe, because of the brutal uncertainties war brings. Chinese irritation with a Russia on the march will not enable a rapprochement between Washington and Beijing, but it may initiate new conversations. "Russia can pose a major conventional military threat to NATO for the first time since the 1990s in a timeframe set to a considerable extent by how much the Kremlin invests in its military." The Institute for the Study of War thinktank says the costs of allowing Russia to win in Ukraine are "higher than most people imagine", as US resolve - particularly among Republicans - possibly wavers over providing more military aid to Kyiv.
- The European Union and the United States are each other’s largest trade and investment partners, with trade in goods and services totaling $1.1 trillion in 2019.
- Jessica Genauer, international relations lecturer at Flinders University, said the chance of nuclear weapons being used has "increased significantly in recent weeks" as more Russians voice their objections to how the war is being fought.
- If Russian troops moved fast enough to outflank Ukraine's ground forces, they could capture prisoners and seize weapons and equipment, said Scott Boston, a defense analyst with the Rand Corp. think tank.
- "Putin," said a senior British military source on Tuesday, "is not about to attack Nato. He just wants to turn Ukraine into a vassal state like Belarus."
Russia is a major exporter of rare-earth minerals and heavy metals — such as titanium used in airplanes. Russia supplies about a third of the world's palladium, a rare metal used in catalytic converters, and its price has soared in recent weeks over fears of a conflict. "There's a geopolitical premium, or call it a fear premium, in the price of oil," Daniel Yergin, vice chairman of IHS Markit, told Morning Edition. "An expectation that as this crisis spirals worse, that supplies of oil from Russia are going to be disrupted." Either way, if Europe's natural gas supply is pinched, that could cause energy prices — which have already been climbing — to rise even further.
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It’s not just the deportation, and kidnapping, abduction of Ukrainian children from the conflict zones who are then being turned into Russians, literally, and in many cases, through adoptions. But it’s the fact that Ukrainians living in the occupied territories are being forced to take Russian passports and Russian citizenship to be able to get basic payments for their jobs, pensions, et cetera. Putin has already made it clear that he no longer thinks that there is a separate Ukrainian identity or language or heritage, and that Ukrainians are nothing but Russians. And that’s aside from the obvious win of being able to turn the tide on Ukraine, because Putin will now see an opportunity to partition Ukraine. The partition will be along the existing ceasefire lines, he’ll start to push, and others will be pushing, for a negotiation.
- Strong resistance from Ukrainian forces significantly slowed Russia’s advance, however, leaving Russian troops “pretty exhausted,” says Cancian.
- This week, Mr Putin put his nuclear forces on a higher level of alert.
- As the top UK general recently observed, it is dangerous to assume that the war on Ukraine is a limited conflict.
- We have a situation now where perhaps Biden is the only person who can actually break the legislative logjam.
"They could simply be casualties of a military invasion," Rediker said. Further sanctions, energy market disruptions and cyberwarfare could reach Americans seemingly far removed from the conflict between Ukraine and Russia. Here, https://euronewstop.co.uk/what-tanks-are-russia-using-in-ukraine.html are loaded onto trains to move them back to their permanent base after drills in Russia. The roots of Russia's invasion of Ukraine go back decades and run deep. The current conflict is more than one country fighting to take over another; it is — in the words of one U.S. official — a shift in "the world order."Here are some helpful stories to make sense of it all.
What If Russia Wins?
All of this is happening as Russian forces appear to be preparing to lay siege to Kyiv. Special funding assistance will be required for long-term training and the modernisation of Ukrainian forces, de facto bringing them to NATO standards. This is necessary, as Ukrainian weapon stocks composed of Soviet-standards equipment are depleted, and availability of such arms outside Ukraine is limited too. Crowdfunding military equipment for Ukraine – already successful in Lithuania – shows that the general international public is sympathetic and wants to play its part in this process.
We’ve already heard former President Trump saying he would solve the conflict in 24 hours, and many other senators and people who would be supporting Trump in an election, basically saying we need to get this over with, pushing Ukraine towards the table. That’s not the position of this administration, to be very clear. Ukraine has succeeded so far because of massive military support from European allies and other partners. If Russia achieves its political aims in Ukraine by military means, Europe will not be what it was before the war. Not only will U.S. primacy in Europe have been qualified; any sense that the European Union or NATO can ensure peace on the continent will be the artifact of a lost age.
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“They’re causing tremendous damage to civilian infrastructure,” said Rachel Denber, the deputy director of the Europe and Central Asia division at Human Rights Watch. “They’re taking many, many civilian lives.” Denber pointed to the use of weapons in heavily populated areas, including those that are explicitly banned, like cluster munitions. Human Rights Watch documented their use in three residential areas in Kharkiv on February 28.
- She’s been talking to some lawmakers about Ukraine, and she’s worried that their partisanship has blinded them to the dangers the country faces if Putin gets his way.
- Whole cities – like Mariupol – are being razed to the ground.
- The election of Donald Trump or of a Trumpian candidate might destroy the transatlantic relationship at Europe’s hour of maximum peril, putting into question NATO’s position and its security guarantees for Europe.
- This is our land,” Zelensky said in an interview with CNN on July 7.
A solution in which Ukraine is recognized as the party in the right, as the aggrieved party by the whole of the international community, and where Ukraine is, if not completely in territory, but materially and in every other way possible, made whole. Biden’s got to try to help Ukraine, but can he get enough people to see past the election and also see the jeopardy we are in? There’s such an anti-American wave that’s out there in the world. We have a situation now where perhaps Biden is the only person who can actually break the legislative logjam. Members of Congress and senators, many of whom I know from my own discussions with them absolutely support assisting Ukraine and get the importance of this moment, still can’t get past the domestic politics. Biden is going to have to somehow persuade them that if they rise to the occasion, helping Ukraine is not going to give him some kind of political boost and a consequential win.
- "But if Central/Eastern Europe felt abandoned by those powers, it's not hard to imagine a Polish or even a Ukrainian nuclear programme."
- "If they weren't able to compel Ukraine towards a desirable outcome by taking half of the Donbass, what would another limited incursion achieve exactly?" he said.
- Russia lacks a decisive, breakthrough capability to overrun Ukraine and will do what it can to hold on to what it currently occupies, using the time to strengthen its defences while it hopes for the West to lose the will to continue supporting Ukraine.
- The analysts predicted refugee flows of 5 million to 10 million people from Ukraine to Western Europe.
- The aim would be to create “shock and awe,” causing Ukraine's defenses or will to fight to collapse.
- US officials have also pointed to an increase in Russia's social media "disinformation".