Pentagon Freakout

Wouldn't any of you who wanted to build a tower first sit down and figure out the cost to see whether you had the funds to complete it? Lest, after laying the foundation but not being able to finish it, all the onlookers should begin to make fun of you and to say, 'This man began to build but he couldn't finish [what he started].' Or wouldn't a king setting out to meet another king in war first sit down and consider if he's able to oppose with ten thousand men the one who's coming against him with twenty thousand? If he can't, he sends a delegation to request peace terms while his enemy is still a long way off.

Well, not if that king was a Neocon.

Yesterday in In Search Of An Endgame we spent some time discussing recent publications emanating from the Deep State that show that the Deep State is aware that they’re in over their heads in Ukraine. At the same time, they’re scrambling to find a way to save face. This double dilemma is clear from two key indicators. First, the US demand that the Ukrainians disregard all prudential considerations and push forward with their offensive in the hope of strengthening the American bargaining position vis a vis Russia. Ukrainian lives for American bargaining positions—who could object to that? Second, whereas top US officials were loudly proclaiming, not too many months ago, that with Russia defeated the US would initiate a war with China. No later than 2025. The US is now in the humiliating position not only of executing a rapid back pedal but even begging the Chinese to please talk to us. All of this stems from what we discussed yesterday, which is the inability of the US to compete industrially on the level necessary to wage a modern conventional war. This is being demonstrated in Ukraine, with obvious implications for our posture in the Far East. Consider news items from today, which demonstrate that US sanctions warfare is losing its bite:

HC Newsroom

@HCNewsroom

US allowing 5G Qualcomm chip for Huawei?

US allowing 5G Qualcomm chip for Huawei?

Today, Chinese media sources are circulating a piece of interesting news about the Huawei 5G phone and the US allowing Qualcomm to sell the Snapdragon chip to the smartphone maker. People from the...

7:38 AM · Jun 12, 2023

And,

ShanghaiPanda

@thinking_panda

If this news is true, then Biden's decision means that China has made some breakthroughs in the field of independent chip manufacturing, making him realize that simple sanctions can only have a counterproductive effect.

WSJ News Exclusive | U.S. to Allow South Korean, Taiwan Chip Makers to Keep Operations in China

Top semiconductor manufacturers would be allowed to maintain and expand their existing operations in China without U.S. reprisals.

6:37 AM · Jun 12, 2023

It happens that after publishing yesterday I listened to Alexander Mercouris discussing a new article from Politico that openly addresses precisely these issues, that are otherwise glossed over unless one searches the interwebs diligently—from yesterday:

giving the Ukrainians a chance at a successful offensive campaign is already straining the resources of Western governments.

…

The heavy casualties and massive ammunition consumption seen during the war in Ukraine has top NATO commanders worried.

… the scale and intensity of the fighting in Ukraine has raised questions about the alliance's ability to fight a big-unit war against Russia.

"Scale, scale, scale," US Army Gen. Christopher Cavoli, NATO's Supreme Allied Commander Europe, told a Swedish defense conference in January. "The magnitude of this war is incredible. …”

"The scale of this war is out of proportion with all of our recent thinking," said Cavoli, …

…

"Production capacity remains vital, absolutely vital," Cavoli said. "A healthy and elastic defense industrial base is just as important" as the number of troops. …

Mercouris refers to a rumored Rand Corp. “secret” study, not for public consumption, that also addresses these issues. I leave it to readers to guess why such a study remains not for public consumption. The Politico article leaves nothing to the imagination:

The Pentagon Is Freaking Out About a Potential War With China

(Because America might lose.)

The article begins with the results of the latest war gaming, and then goes on to quote knowledgeable government connected officials. Excerpts:

The war began in the early morning hours with a massive bombardment — China’s version of “shock and awe.”

Washington ran out of key munitions in a matter of days and saw its network access severed. The United States and its main ally, Japan, lost thousands of servicemembers, dozens of ships, and hundreds of aircraft. Taiwan’s economy was devastated.

The Chinese “just ran rings around us,” said former Joint Chiefs Vice Chair Gen. John Hyten in one after-action report. “They knew exactly what we were going to do before we did it.”

Dozens of versions of the above war-game scenario have been enacted over the last few years,

In every exercise the U.S. uses up all its long-range air-to-surface missiles in a few days, with a substantial portion of its planes destroyed on the ground.

“The most common thread in these exercises is that the United States needs to take steps now in the Indo-Pacific to ensure the conflict doesn’t happen in the future. We are hugely behind the curve. Ukraine is our wakeup call.”

the stress [Ukraine] has put on the U.S. defense industrial base should be sounding alarms for the U.S.

the Biden administration has been slow to respond to what is minimally required

“across the board there is more talk than action,” says Seth Jones, a former Obama-era defense official

But a swift response may not be possible, in large part because of how shrunken the U.S. manufacturing base has become since the Cold War. All of a sudden, Washington is reckoning with the fact that so many parts and pieces of munitions, planes, and ships it needs are being manufactured overseas, including in China. Among the deficiencies: components of solid rocket motors, shell casings, machine tools, fuses and precursor elements to propellants and explosives, many of which are made in China and India. Beyond that, skilled labor is sorely lacking, and the learning curve is steep.

“the more you dig under the hood the more problems you see”

“We’re in the middle of a pivot … all we’re talking about is our industrial base.”

In April, China’s military completed three days of large-scale combat exercises around Taiwan that rehearsed blockading the island and said in a statement it is “ready to fight … at any time to resolutely smash any form of ‘Taiwan independence’ and foreign interference attempts.”

“We could throw a trillion dollars a year at the defense budget now, and we’re not going to get a meaningful increase in traditional military capabilities in the next five years. They cannot be produced.”

Washington heedlessly ceded shipbuilding, aircraft parts and circuit boards over to China and other cheap overseas labor forces. America’s new F-35 fighter jets, for example, contain a magnet component made with an alloy almost exclusively manufactured in China. China also totally dominates machine tools and rare earth metals, essentials for manufacturing missiles and munitions, as well as lithium used in batteries, cobalt and the aluminum and titanium used in semiconductors. While Beijing has made new advances in explosives, most American military explosives are made at a single aging Army plant in Tennessee, Forbes reported in March.

“While they were industrializing, we were deindustrializing,” says Brose [a former McCain adviser]. Today China commands some 45 percent to 50 percent of total shipbuilding globally, while the United States has less than one percent. “Given those numbers, explain to me how the United States is going to win a traditional shipbuilding race with China?”

So, when you read the usual propaganda statements, remember that in Deep State SCIFs they’re freaking out. Who thinks Putin doesn’t know this? It’s been rumored that the US has made overtures to Russia to begin talks, but the Russians rebuffed these overtures. How angry do you think Putin is at the human cost of this war—not only for Russians but also for their Slavic “brothers”, the Ukrainians themselves? I’m gonna tell you—super angry. Of course Putin is in no mood to bail out the Neocons. Larry Johnson has a smart, but brief, post today on this topic:

WHAT COULD RUSSIA DEMAND TO NEGOTIATE AN END TO THE WAR IN UKRAINE?

His conclusion:

The West is failing to grasp the reality that Russia believes it is winning the war in Ukraine and that it is not suffering economic or political damage at home. And, when you factor in the international arena, the war has proven to be a boon for Russia’s efforts to help create a new international financial/trade system that circumvents Washington’s control. In other words, Russia has little incentive to entertain negotiations that would require Russian concessions.

That’s right. And here’s an illustration of how successful Russian diplomacy is, and how the world is laughing at our diplo-clowns:

But why should the Saudis respect a clown regime that flies the “equity flag” from the White House?

Catching up on a few things. A few days ago I wrote about how foolish the current Polish regime is. They’re all puffed up because they think doing American biddings in Ukraine means Poland will be a great power again. They should think a bit about where Britain stands these days:

Britain Poses As Uncle Sam's War Enforcer In Return For Much-Needed Trade Deal

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak went to Washington last week cap-in-hand hawking a nefarious deal. Post-Brexit Britain is seeking a much-coveted bilateral trade pact with the United States, and to avail of Uncle Sam’s favor the British are offering to step up its role as provocateur-in-chief in the proxy war against Russia.

U.S. President Joe Biden and Sunak hailed the usual platitudes about their nations’ “special relationship” during the British premier’s two-day trip to Washington. Sunak added a new unctuous epithet, referring to the U.S. and Britain as the world’s “indispensable alliance”.

Topping their agenda in the White House summit was the conflict in Ukraine, Russia, China and trade issues.

Biden and Sunak unveiled an “Atlantic Declaration” promising closer cooperation on economics, security, military and artificial intelligence between the United States and Britain.

But crucially missing from the U.S. side was any concrete commitment to a new bilateral trade deal. When Britain left the European Union in 2020, the historic departure from that trade bloc was calculatedly made with the aspiration of securing an alternative special trading arrangement with the United States.

…

Sunak is the third British prime minister that Biden has had dealings with as president, reflecting the unstable politics in Britain provoked by its post-Brexit tribulations.

…

This fraught juncture is what makes London’s role as Washington’s global henchman more dangerous than usual. In order to win economic favors, Britain is more disposed than ever to escalate U.S. imperial hostilities toward Russia and China. Those hostilities are impelled by Washington’s own imperial decline as the once presumed “sole superpower” and “global hegemon”.

During his White House meeting, Sunak pointedly presented Britain and the United States as the two main military supporters of Ukraine in the war against Russia. He also said that Britain would be taking a lead role in cementing the new military alliance – AUKUS – between Australia, the United Kingdom and the U.S. That alliance, which involves supplying nuclear-powered submarines to Australia, is explicitly aimed at confronting China in the Asia-Pacific. In an affected attempt to sound profound, Sunak said that security of the Atlantic was “indivisible” from security in Asia-Pacific.

In the Ukraine conflict over the past 16 months, Britain has distinguished itself as NATO’s provocateur-in-chief. While in Washington, Sunak boasted about Britain supplying battlefield tanks, longer-range missiles and training Ukrainian pilots on the soon-to-be-delivered U.S.-made F-16 fighter jets.

The British PM also obsequiously set himself the task of driving other European members of the NATO alliance to increase their military support (that is, buying Pentagon’s weapons) for Ukraine. Much to Washington’s delight, no doubt.

It’s not smart, it’s not a good look, it won’t end well for Britain. Recall the parable of the Dishonest Steward who made friends for himself by availing himself of “unrighteous Mammon”? Britain in making no friends for itself, anymore than is Poland, by throwing their lot in with the Neocons.

Speaking of Poland again, two items. The first tells you a lot about the state of public opinion in Europe. If Poles feel this way, imagine other countries:

This next item tells you a lot about the demographics of Ukraine. A large proportion of the flood of “Ukrainians” Poland has accepted are, for most purposes, Russians:

Way to get even with Russia for historic grievances!