MBW - 3/9/2022
Hi folks, it’s Wednesday already. Without further ado, let’s get down to it.
The 14th day of war in Ukraine is upon us. More corridors for the evacuation of civilians have been established. The number of people having left Ukraine crossed 2 million.
In the past 24 hours there has been talk of supplying Ukraine with MIG-29 jets from Poland as these models are the only ones that their pilots can operate without the need of additional training. But the whole thing seems to have turned into a hot potato situation. Poland’s plan was to send the planes to the American base in Germany, in return to get used F-16 jets from the US, and let the Americans hand the planes to Ukraine. The Pentagon later declined to take ownership of the planes or deliver them. Russia has repeatedly said that supplying Ukraine with fighter jets would be considered a declaration of war.
McDonald’s decided to close all its 850 restaurants in Russia. This is quite symbolic as the opening of the first McDonald’s restaurant in Moscow on January 31st, 1990 drew huge crowds and marked the beginning of a new era for the former Soviet block.
The US and the UK banned the import of Russian oil. Oil prices in the US were already high before the ban, but President Biden said a price for freedom had to be paid. Experts believe that this is the economic weapon that will most hurt the Kremlin. Oil revenues are much more important than gas revenues.
The EU also revealed its plan to cut dependency from Russian oil and gas. More on this here.
(continued). Question: Would Putin drop a nuclear bomb in Ukraine?
What we can assume (speculatively) would happen if such a thing took place is that the US/NATO would be considering three separate category of responses:
a. Tit For Tat.
They could respond in kind with the same level of aggression, i.e. their own low-yield nuke, saying implicitly and explicitly that they are willing to go down this path, but they don’t really want to. This would be on a target of comparable “escalation” level, for example either no target (demonstration) or purely military target (Russian base in Ukraine). Nothing on Russian soil most probably.
b. Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better
This would be an escalation. They use one, we use two. Something to say “look, we can do this all day, and we can do worse. Stop now, or else.” Or “escalation to deescalate” in the military jargon. This would come with huge risks, obviously. The US/NATO does not know whether Putin would back down, or escalate himself.
c. We’re Not Stooping To Your Level
An attempt at deescalation - no nuclear response from US/NATO, maybe lots of conventional things (more sanctions, a conventional bombing strike on Russian forces in Ukraine etc.). Basically saying, we’re not going to play the war crime game, we have faith we don’t need to win, look at how indelibly alienated you are now, you monster. The risk here is that it would be taken as a sign of weakness, which itself could lead to more escalation by Russia. (to be continued)
If you grew up in the 80s (even early 90s) you probably know who this guy is.
His name is Don Johnson. He starred in the series Miami Vice where he played Sonny Crockett, the undercover detective and professional stubble-cultivator who lived on a houseboat with his pet alligator Elvis. In the show, Crockett's partner was Ricardo Tubbs, played by Philip Michael Thomas.
So why are we speaking about him? Apparently, there is one episode in his life that not many know about.
In November 2002 Johnson, along with two other men — his personal assistant and an “unnamed Swiss financial advisor” — were stopped by German customs officials as they made their way into the country by way of Switzerland. Everything seemed legit; the customs agents were even fans of Johnson. “I signed some autographs, we joked around,” he told Larry King in 2003.
The seeds of trouble for Johnson were sitting in the trunk of the car. When officials searched it, they discovered a briefcase with over $8 billion in receipts, certificates, and credit notes. Johnson explained that the paperwork was from investors he was in the process of collaborating with for his film production company. The customs agents made copies of everything in the briefcase, and sent Johnson on his way, presumably to the Daimler-Chrysler plant in Germany to see the new Maybach. After a while the whispers of a money-laundering racket became very loud. Eventually he was cleared by the German authorities and nothing came out of it, but looks like Sonny broke bad after all. Weird af.
Zbigniew Brzeziński, or Zbig, was a Polish-American diplomat and political scientist. He served as a counselor to President Lyndon B. Johnson from 1966 to 1968 and was President Jimmy Carter's National Security Advisor from 1977 to 1981. He gave an interview to the Le Nouvel Observateur in 1998, where he said “We didn’t push the Russians the intervene, but we knowingly increased the probability that they would… drawing the Russians into the Afghan trap… giving to the USSR its Vietnam war.”
Do with information what you want.
And lastly, the usual pics, vids and memes from around the web:
Vice President Cringe ladies and gentleman. “We have the ability to see what can be, unburdened by what has been.” Wtf are you saying?
Here’s the recorded death of single-celled organism. Holy shit this is painful to watch. Almost like when my cat died. Almost.
Take me somewhere expensive.
I can hear the accent.
From Reddit: “I wish you couldn’t count.” “That’s wish number 3, goodbye”
Me too.
Thanks for following us friends. Wishing you a nice rest of the week. See you tomorrow.