Brief War Update
The good news is that the threat of war in Niger appears to be receding. France has backed off from its threats of intervention. Neighboring Sahel countries Mali and Burkina Faso have expressed strong support for Niger’s coup government. Algeria, which certainly has the most capable military in the entire region and has great economic importance for Europe, while unhappy about the political instability to its south, has also voiced strong opposition to military intervention in Niger—seeing it as a security threat to Algeria itself. The ECOWAS countries probably are not going to move without their largest member, Nigeria—and the Nigerian Senate has rejected the president’s plan to invade Niger. The US now admits that the ECOWAS countries are simply not militarily prepared for such a venture.
ECOWAS Member states in dark green
Suspended states (including Niger) in light green
While Niger has vast thinly populated regions it is still a nation of 25 million people. Conquering and attempting to control Niger would be a recipe not only for regional war on a vast scale—far beyond Niger’s borders—but also for a humanitarian crisis that would lead to a further flood of migrants into Europe. Meanwhile, Niger is proceeding with demands that France remove all of its military presence from Niger. That would leave the large US base somewhat isolated, and the US will probably wish to come to some understanding with the new government.
All that is good news, in terms of avoiding an imminent humanitarian catastrophe. The region will remain restive and troubled, but freer to pursue its own interests. In a geopolitical sense, Western neocolonialism has suffered a serious setback, as these events will allow for greater Russian and Chinese influence all across the region, from the Red Sea to the Atlantic.
Readers may have seen the recent stories about the Russo-Chinese naval exercises and patrols off the Aleutian islands. Why this development should so exercise the Zhou regime is a bit of a mystery. The US continues to sail warships through the narrow Taiwan straits and expects China to be happy about that. Why should not the US welcome a Russo-Chinese presence off Alaska? A reasonable compromise would seem to be quite obvious:
A combined Chinese and Russian naval force recently conducted a patrol near the coast of Alaska. Eleven Russian and Chinese ships came close to the Aleutian Islands, but never entered U.S. territorial waters according to U.S. officials to WSJ. Four U.S. destroyers and P-8 aircraft were dispatched to shadow the patrol. It was reportedly a historical first as it is appeared to be the largest such flotilla to approach the U.S.
The US chooses to maintain that sailing large warships through the Taiwan Strait is about “freedom of navigation”, although China has never interfered with international commercial ship traffic. On the other hand, the US professes to see this obvious Russo-Chinese response to constant US provocations—not only near Taiwan but also in the Black, Baltic, and Artic seas—as heralding “a new era of authoritarian aggression”.
It’s high time that responsible politicians in the US start talking about the US coming to terms with new realities in a changing world.
Now, here’s a possible development that, IF TRUE, would be highly disturbing, as portending an enormous escalation of war into NATO regions. I offer this caveat. I haven’t seen any confirmation of this talk—it remains speculative and readers should bear in mind that Poland is as much a bugbear for Russians as Russia is for Poles. Each nation is deeply suspicious of the other and each speculates freely on the hostile intentions of the other. I remain skeptical that Poland would take such a foolhardy step—both for rational military reasons as well as for domestic political calculations.
So what I’m talking about are the recent missile attacks by Ukraine on Russian bridges in the Crimea region. The speculation is that these strikes may have been launched from Polish airfields, given that Russia has been systematically striking Ukrainian airfields. I would expect that the location of the airfields that were used cannot possibly remain secret. Nevertheless, I repeat these reports just so readers will be aware of the rising tensions.
Please note the word “may” that keeps cropping up. This remains speculation:
John Moran
@RueDaungier
NEWSFLASH: Reports from Russian sources state Poland may now be allowing its military airfields to be used by Ukrainian attack aircraft to bomb bridges in Crimea. If these reports are correct, then NATO itself has allowed this explosive escalation.
4:14 PM · Aug 6, 2023
Ukrainian airfields were used too, according to the report.
Here is an angry Polish responses:
Sure, using airfields in Poland witch are farther from Crimea than Ukrainian ones make sense. Please, tell me that at least they're paying you for spreading that nonsense propaganda.
Nevertheless, here is typical speculation from the Russian side:
If Poland is allowing its military airfields to be used by Ukrainian attack aircraft to bomb Crimea, then we are on the verge of a wider, potentially nuclear, pan-European war. "if the plane takes off from Poland, makes attacks against Russian forces in Ukraine and returns to its base, I am 90% sure we will have to make attacks on Polish airfields. I think the Americans understand how this could end..." Do Americans understand? Does the US govt?
I’ll close with this interesting tweet by Mykhailo Podolyak which acknowledges—reading between the lines just a little—that Poles and Ukrainians still hate one another. This arises in the the context of Polish complaints about Ukrainian ingratitude for Polish aid against Russia and Ukrainian refusal to express much in the way of regret for having massacred many tens of thousands of Poles during WW2. Podolyak is an adviser to Zelensky, so … I assume this reflects pretty official Ukrainian views. Poles will get to vote on all this later this year:
-- GEROMAN -- time will tell -
Podolyak: Poland will no longer be a close friend of Ukraine after the end of the SMO Poland will remain a close friend of Ukraine as long as the hostilities last. However, as soon as they are completed, the countries will begin to compete, the adviser to the head of the office of the Ukrainian president is convinced. “Our closest partner and closest friend today is Poland. And, in principle, it will be so until the end of the conflict,” he said.
[video]
Lots of interesting comments. Here’s a mild one:
flankerpraha
@flankerpraha
This statement is not surprising at all, the only surprising thing is that Poles must have known that and still they support those nationalists just because of the hatred towards Russia.
5:18 AM · Aug 6, 2023
"ECOWAS countries are simply not militarily prepared for such a venture". ECOWAS, meet NATO.
As for the Polish-based aircraft speculation (protecting Ukrainian bombers from airfield missile attacks), here is an illustrated war-mapper rationale from Military Summary channel: https://rumble.com/v358gre-summer-operations-ukrainians-use-su-24-from-nato-territory.-military-summar.html?start=326