Monthly financial statements are important and March has been exciting –
Barbarians are the fourth highest in warfare, soft vehicles the highest, LV 9 the best month, MLRS high, IFV/strv and artillery are high numbers.
One of the major events of the war has passed somewhat unnoticed but has been clearly visible in the artillery and MLRS loss statistics over the past two months.
Ukraine now has FPV drones in quantity at the fronts with a range of 40km.
So RU artillery is essentially neutralized, including MLRS.
In fact, Ukraine has introduced a completely new category of indirect fire they did not have before as they have gradually increased the drone umbrella range from 4km-10km-20km and now 40km.
It is a 40km wide corridor where the Russians are hunted prey.
Those of you who have read the posts over time know two things – that UA began offensive operations on February 6, 2025, and then we have vividly described how UA would achieve their breakthroughs before the spring offensive of 2023, which is difficult to spin positively.
When will the UA offensive start is the big question – positioning struggles and reconnaissance struggles seem to continue, and pre-emptive strikes in the rear.
Europe has also been very clear recently about what applies, and that is the borders of 1991.
RU has unexpectedly resumed attacks and UA warns that RU is about to start offensives on the northern and southern fronts.
At the southern front, RU seems to have already started some time ago in my opinion.
It is very clear to Ukraine that negotiations will never return their territory, so they must take it by force.
The easiest way would be if RU collapses and the army throws in the towel.
But… if RU, in the midst of a blazing offensive, has managed to build up strategic reserves for the Southern front including the Dnieper, the northern front, and the Baltic states, then perhaps Europe should be a bit quicker in their decisions than they are now.
However, self-defense has proven to work excellently, but it probably required Ukraine for that, Lex 1940.
So what are we really witnessing playing out right now?
Well, 80-85% of Russian losses are caused by drones – there you have it 😶
Why is Ukraine advancing in Pokrovsk?
Why are they not focusing on breakthroughs and trying to drive spearheads deep?
Well –
Ukraine first lays down the drone blanket like a wet blanket over an area essentially anywhere. They pair it with effective EW that now also stops the Russian FAB bombs.
(this advantage may be a window of 6 months).
Instead of large mechanized falls, they attack maximally with a composite battalion force, and the goal is to defeat the enemy within an area – for example, a village. By defeat, I mean annihilate a bunch of Russians.
They have effectively blocked the hunted force, which is a platoon, company, or battalion – if they try to retreat, it’s death for the Russians.
Then they chase FPV drones into every opening, and finally they launch cluster weapons from artillery, GRK, or drones when the defense goes into position.
The Russians now flee back into their dens, and it is a cleanup that unfolds.
Larger hardened areas get hit by FAB, which is as terrifying for RU as for UA.
The defense lacks support from armor and has no artillery. Air and army aviation are now denied to the fronts.
The mechanized battalion’s task is to clean up, and with very small losses, they wipe out a Russian battalion. We will go back to attacking in numerical inferiority and a 1:9 loss ratio.
You see it all the time, and you saw this already in 2023 when Azov cleared trenches in Bakhmut.
But now in 2025, the quantity has increased, and they have trained the units and the coordination between different types of weapons, and have activated the drone weapon.
Probably they still need to pool capabilities to gain a local advantage in priority areas, but this is a bit like Polish cavalry against German tanks.
So what we should expect to see is more and more of this type of warfare in more and more places where they eliminate those present in the target area and work their way forward.
Every Russian defense system becomes an isolated island that is then fought against, rinse and repeat.
It will be like the Russian advance and be slow, where we see a small blue dot here and there, but the difference is that UA retreated and RU will be wiped out one battalion at a time.
And this is how UA will keep grinding until it collapses.
Now I have read the NYT article and have some comments –
I think it is written from an American perspective but is fairly well substantiated – I am willing to take the information at face value, but some details have probably been withheld because they are sensitive or reflect poorly on the USA.
“Over more than a year of reporting, Adam Entous conducted more than 300 interviews with current and former policymakers, Pentagon officials, intelligence officials and military officers in Ukraine, the United States, Britain and a number of other European countries. While some agreed to speak on the record, most requested that their names not be used in order to discuss sensitive military and intelligence operations.”
1-
“An early proof of concept was a campaign against one of Russia’s most-feared battle groups, the 58th Combined Arms Army. In mid-2022, using American intelligence and targeting information, the Ukrainians unleashed a rocket barrage at the headquarters of the 58th in the Kherson region, killing generals and staff officers inside. Again and again, the group set up at another location; each time, the Americans found it and the Ukrainians destroyed it.”
I remember this well and how they targeted many high-level staff positions – why has it stopped?
I recall that at some point long before Trump, the USA announced that they would no longer provide target information to Ukraine.
2-
“the Ukrainians poured vast complements of men and resources into a finally futile campaign to recapture the devastated city of Bakhmut. Within months, the entire counteroffensive ended in stillborn failure.”
Did UA really try to recapture Bakhmut – I always interpreted Bakhmut as the flytrap so they could strike elsewhere in my grand campaign plan. Hasn’t the USA understood that?
3-
” Time and again, the Biden administration authorized clandestine operations it had previously prohibited. American military advisers were dispatched to Kyiv and later allowed to travel closer to the fighting. Military and C.I.A. officers in Wiesbaden helped plan and support a campaign of Ukrainian strikes in Russian-annexed Crimea. Finally, the military and then the C.I.A. received the green light to enable pinpoint strikes deep inside Russia itself.”
Do you remember how I described the “red cards” from the USA?
4-
Zalizhny seems to have been almost the angriest at the USA? Sirsky received the information instead.
It was supposed to be “70 CIA in Lvov making the target selections,” we thought, but apparently it was in Wiesbaden where the main center was located?
In 2022, the USA told UA what to do – that’s what we guessed as well.
“Every morning, officers recalled, the Ukrainians and Americans gathered to survey Russian weapons systems and ground forces and determine the ripest, highest-value targets. The priority lists were then handed over to the intelligence fusion center, where officers analyzed streams of data to pinpoint the targets’ locations.”
And this is how we imagined it roughly happened.
5-
“There would be no points of interest on Russian soil. If Ukrainian commanders wanted to strike within Russia, General Zabrodskyi explained, they would have to use their own intelligence and domestically produced weapons. ‘Our message to the Russians was, ‘This war should be fought inside Ukraine,’ a senior U.S. official said.”
USA red cards.
“Wiesbaden would oversee each HIMARS strike. General Donahue and his aides would review the Ukrainians’ target lists and advise them on positioning their launchers and timing their strikes. The Ukrainians were supposed to only use coordinates the Americans provided. To fire a warhead, HIMARS operators needed a special electronic key card, which the Americans could deactivate anytime.”
USA strictly controls the use of weapons.
6-
Kherson 😁
“Their top commander, General Zaluzhny, along with the British, favored the most ambitious option — from near Zaporizhzhia, in the southeast, down toward occupied Melitopol. This maneuver, they believed, would sever the cross-border land routes sustaining Russian forces in Crimea.
In theory, General Donahue agreed. But according to colleagues, he thought Melitopol was not feasible, given the state of the Ukrainian military and the coalition’s limited ability to provide M777s without crippling American readiness. To prove his point in the war games, he took over the part of the Russian commander. Whenever the Ukrainians tried to advance, General Donahue destroyed them with overwhelming combat power.
What they ultimately agreed on was a two-part attack to confuse Russian commanders who, according to American intelligence, believed the Ukrainians had only enough soldiers and equipment for a single offensive.
The main effort would be to recapture Kherson and secure the Dnipro’s west bank, lest the corps advance on the port of Odesa and be positioned for another attack on Kyiv.
General Donahue had advocated a coequal second front in the east, from the Kharkiv region, to reach the Oskil river valley. But the Ukrainians instead argued for a smaller supporting feint to draw Russian forces east and smooth the way for Kherson.”
Here it is slightly adjusted, and I will explain why – Donahue did not support the attack plan from Zaporizhia towards Melitopol as the only UA offensive. In that area, there were no mines at the time, and RU had all their better units on the western side (wrong side) of the Dnipro, right?
Instead, Donahue suggested dividing the UA forces in two and then at the Dnipro go STRAIGHT AT the entire VDV defense and the huge minefields they had laid on the western side.
So – the article is adjusted here assuming that Donahue was not a total idiot, which he was not at all.
It avoids addressing WHY Donahue did not accept Zalizhny’s offensive.
What it does support is that UA did not receive approval from the USA for that attack, as Zalizhny also stated – it’s called conspiracy fact, right?
And this one, but it’s only the offensive from the WESTERN shore that is referred to 🧐
Until that moment, U.S. intelligence agencies had estimated the chance of Russia’s using nuclear weapons in Ukraine at 5 to 10 percent. Now, they said, if the Russian lines in the south collapsed, the probability was 50 percent.
In Washington, Mr. Biden’s top advisers nervously wondered the opposite — if they might need to press the Ukrainians to slow their advance.
The moment might have been the Ukrainians’ best chance to deal a game-changing blow to the Russians. It might also have been the best chance to ignite a wider war.
In the end, in a sort of grand ambiguity, the moment never came.
And this one 🧐
“To accomplish this, General Zabrodskyi explained as the partners gathered in Wiesbaden in late autumn, General Zaluzhny was once again insisting that the primary effort be an offensive toward Melitopol, to strangle Russian forces in Crimea — what he believed had been the great, denied opportunity to deal the reeling enemy a knockout blow in 2022.”
7-
Now I see that I was right about Bakhmut, forget above that the USA did not understand it 😁
“The secondary offensive, by General Syrsky’s forces in the east, would be focused on Bakhmut — where combat had been smoldering for months — with a feint toward the Luhansk region, an area annexed by Mr. Putin in 2022. That maneuver, the thinking went, would tie up Russian forces in the east and smooth the way for the main effort, in the south — the attack on Melitopol, where”
May 4, 2023 was probably the date I chose for the offensive when reconnaissance battles and Bakhmut reached a certain intensity.
“The counteroffensive was to begin on May 1. The intervening months would be spent training for it. General Syrsky would contribute four battle-hardened brigades”
We were also discussing this – as soon as RU moved everything out of reach, UA gained the next capability with longer range.
“The previous year, the Russians had unwisely placed command posts, ammunition depots and logistics centers within 50 miles of the front lines. But new intelligence showed that the Russians had now moved critical installations beyond HIMARS’ reach. So Generals Cavoli and Aguto recommended the next quantum leap, giving the Ukrainians Army Tactical Missile Systems — missiles, known as ATACMS, that can travel up to 190 miles — to make it harder for Russian forces in Crimea to help defend Melitopol.”
One becomes slightly suspicious of Sirsky, but it could also have been a power ambition.
8-
It stopped at Kursk, but maybe you remember my discussion about UA launching a violent offensive in 2024?
It didn’t turn out that way, but that was what they had in mind.
“Just weeks before, the president had instructed General Zaluzhny to push the Russians back to Ukraine’s 1991 borders by fall of 2024. The general had then shocked the Americans by presenting a plan to do so that required five million shells and one million drones. To which General Cavoli had responded, in fluent Russian, ‘From where?’”
9-
“Yet with peril came opportunity. The Russians were complacent about security, believing the Americans would never let the Ukrainians fire into Russia. Entire units and their equipment were sitting unsheltered, largely undefended, in open fields.”
We also discussed this – the string of bases just on the Russian side of the border where everything was just set up in the open.
10-
“Of roughly 100 targets across Crimea, the most coveted was the Kerch Strait Bridge, linking the peninsula to the Russian mainland. Mr. Putin saw the bridge as powerful physical proof of Crimea’s connection to the motherland. Toppling the Russian president’s symbol had, in turn, become the Ukrainian president’s obsession.
It had also been an American red line. “
Yep – UA is not allowed to take out the Kerch Bridge just as we guessed.
It hurts to see how the USA constantly micromanaged Ukraine and our gut feeling has always been right, and I think we have hit the major points in an entire war.
In other words – those of you who have read these posts and comments have actually been informed of the truth to a large extent, even though there have been many questions over the years and quite a bit of headwind.
I must admit that I am quite satisfied with having managed to report so closely on the events behind the drawn curtains over three years with the information we have received from open sources – I give myself 10/10 so you don’t have to.
One has had a bit of help from Budanov and Dengamle, but lesson number two is how much time one must spend on this to be able to make sensible analyses – a full-time job on the side of a full-time job and family, and completely unpaid, so it’s best not to think about what position one would have been on the career ladder if the time had been spent on a paid job instead – but now everyone is about to become paying members on Substack so the hunger of the lower class will soon be forgotten.
Lately, I have started to get too busy and lost touch a bit, but the UA offensive is in the cards, I am completely sure of that. Those of you who have been following the posts know that the puzzle pieces are starting to fall into place.
I have previously also decided that the USA has already decided to take down Iran – I believe that guess still stands and that it will happen.
Then comes the blocking of the Hormuz and the escalation that Russia can no longer handle. So, the USA is taking care of the next escalation.
Then you might also consider whether I might be right about the USA now doing what is best for the USA and that they (maybe) will come out on top, as well as the Russian attack on the Baltic States and/or Svalbard 😀
Regarding the economy, I am guessing, but I believe the outcome of all this is likely to be a recession in the EU – we will see, and as I said, I know nothing about economics.
Just as we want to try to economically break Russia, Russia is trying to economically break Europe with the help of the USA now that we have gone all-in. It’s no more difficult than that.
We MUST have a debate and people MUST have different opinions – but in Sweden, when it comes to the environment and the Green Party (MP), it seems not to apply even if you have the answers and post verifiable links – because the intention is good. I see how followers fluctuate on Substack, and there are always some who leave in a huff when something is posted about the Green Party, and the most aggressive comments about ruining one’s own career if you write such things always come in questions about the Green Party, or Trump nowadays.
So, of course, we must continue with that in between.
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https://bsky.app/profile/johanno1.bsky.social
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Update from 08:00 on 03.04.2025 regarding the Russian invasion
A total of 216↗️combat actions were registered during the past day.
#Kharkiv 2↘️
#Kupyansk 2↘️
#Lyman 21💥
#Siverskyi 5↘️
#Kramatorsk 6
#Toretsk 28↗️💥💥
#Pokrovsk 80↗️💥💥💥💥
#Novopavlivka 13💥
#Huliaipil 5
#Orikhivsk 12↗️💥
#Prydniprovsky 5
#Kursk 28↗️💥💥
In the Toretsk sector, AFRF🇷🇺 carried out 28 attacks in the areas of Toretsk, Ozaryanivka, Diliyivka, Krymske, and Leonidivka.
In the Pokrovsk sector, AFU🇺🇦 repelled 80 attacks from AFRF🇷🇺 in the areas of Panteleymonivka, Sukha Balka, Shevchenko, Vodiane Druhe, Yelizavetivka, Promin, Zelene, Novyi Trud, Kotlyne, Udachne, Kotlyarivka, Uspenivka, and Andriivka.
In the Orikhivsk sector, near Stepove, Mali Shcherbaki, Kamianske, and Novodanylivka, AFRF🇷🇺 launched 12 attacks against AFU🇺🇦 positions.
In the Kursk sector, AFU💥 repelled 28 attacks from AFRF🇷🇺 yesterday. AFRF🇷🇺 fired 343 artillery attacks, five of them from MLRS; conducted 20 air strikes, and shot down 31 UAVs.
Yesterday, Ukrainian air forces, missile forces, and artillery struck eight areas where AFRF🇷🇺 personnel, weapons, and military equipment were concentrated, as well as a control center for a UAV and an artillery system from AFRF🇷🇺.
Thank you as usual 205 👍
👍
Why am I not surprised? The USA has always put the USA first, regardless of the president or the loud cheerleaders.
Europe must now drop the boards and get into the game! Do a Bush: Either you are with us, or against us!
Put pressure on the Hungarian Barbapapa and Fig Uncle! Put pressure on the cowardly EU politicians!
This is the biggest decision and turning point of our time. We cannot rely on the USA and must cut the umbilical cord and become independent.
Either Europe emerges as a major player or we will be suffocated under a wet blanket in another cold war.
I know what I want
I believe Christina Stenbeck is absolutely right:
Four years with Donald Trump as the American president gives Europe a golden opportunity to catch up with the US tech advantage over Europe.
I say that we have a golden opportunity to make the EU greater in all areas if we just dare to invest.
Johanno1: “But… if during the ongoing offensive RU has managed to build up strategic reserves for the Southern front including the Dnieper, the Northern front, and the Baltics, then maybe Europe should be a bit quicker in its decisions than they are now.”
Yes, regardless. What decisions have already been made at the national/European level? What decisions are expected?
Has Russia reprioritized, or is there fresh information that the aggregate of forces in the Baltics is standing strong? It has happened before that Russia has slaughtered units and regiments elsewhere with completely different tasks and sent them to the front. The problems in Pokrovsk/Toretsk may have accumulated and be the reason for such a reprioritization.
But as mentioned, it’s best to prepare for the worst.
I only have UA’s own information to go on about RU’s offensive.
I myself thought they were heading into a low point.
Johanno1: “It will be like the Russian advance and be slow where we see a small blue dot here and there but the difference is that UA retreated and RU will be wiped out one battalion at a time.”
Yes, it’s hard to retreat with crutches and on a donkey with the rifle aimed at the hunters. Besides, the Kadyrovites probably earn well on bounty money on retreating own troops.
Are they still here? I thought they had moved to some Goat land.
eGet land!
Muaaahaha!
Get a life! 🙂
The blocking units are probably there, lurking in the background?
Also FSB and Rosgvardia
Johanno1: “Did the US really try to retake Bakhmut – I always interpreted Bakhmut as the flytrap so they could strike elsewhere in my grand campaign plan. Hasn’t the USA understood that?”
AFU🇺🇦 retreated in Bakhmut, as the Russian occupiers advanced with great losses (the flytrap). At the same time, south of Bakhmut (in the direction of Ivanivske Andriivka), we saw Ukraine go on the counteroffensive in the summer of 2023 and recapture territory (2023-05-11 — 2023-09-30). It took the Russians almost two years to regain the terrain, and even today (2025-04-01) the green light shines on DeepState from this Ukrainian counteroffensive.
Before the counteroffensive, 2023-05-11:
The peak of the counteroffensive’s results, around 2023-09-30:
Current terrain, 2025-04-01:
Syrsky was very eager to recapture Bakhmut, as has been revealed in several articles, including the one in NYT that Johan links to. A ruin city but with high symbolic value. Symbolic gains can be important for generals’ egos, which can sometimes blind them to more important tasks.
What UA is now doing in Pokrovsk is not making big headlines but is important. A new type of warfare that could become pioneering.
The butcher of Bakhmut was indeed his name?
I’ve had my suspicions about Sirsky but nothing confirmed and he did manage to maneuver Zalizhny out.
Not my usual source (Aftonbladet) of information, but Andreas Cervenka is often worth reading.
USD plummets 😭
I am now reading that Volvo Cars is going to increase its production in the USA, maybe even move over some models that are currently manufactured outside the USA.
It will be interesting to follow up on how much more they will sell in 🇺🇸 from that factory. If things go badly and tariffs and counter-tariffs remain in place, then there is no point in shipping them across the Atlantic and getting EU tariffs on them.
https://www.expressen.se/ekonomi/volvo-vi-flyttar-tillverkning-till-usa/
Now this takes time and T may have turned to ashes.
One thing I don’t understand about T customs –
Are the counter-customs so similar for similar?
Or are they new creations?
I hear both being marketed as truth
I am just a mediocre middle-aged middle-class person, someone from the competence bank will surely sort it out for us.
The idea is to do like Toyota does in Europe, manufacturing within the borders and perhaps getting some components duty-free as it creates jobs within the USA.
Rutte: USA is “absolutely” committed to NATO
Published on April 3, 2025 at 10:29 Updated at 12:21
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio promises continued commitment to NATO – but reiterates demands for increased defense spending.
“We are on a realistic path to get everyone to invest five percent (of GDP), including the USA,” Rubio says in Brussels.
AB
Rutte continues to put lipstick on the pig, he made a U-turn after a series of very inappropriate statements.
However, he is supposed to be very competent.
This is apparently how the tariffs are calculated?
Can anyone confirm?
https://bsky.app/profile/johanno1.bsky.social/post/3llvrqa5z6k2k
Something like this:
“The method that the USA has used looks something like this: The USA’s trade deficit with a certain country is divided by the total imports from that country and then divided by two. This means that if a country has a trade surplus of 10 percent with the USA, the tariff rate will be 5 percent.”
https://omni.se/ekonomer-om-donald-trumps-tullformel-helt-godtyckligt/a/5Ez95e
“Trump justified the 20 percent tariffs on the EU by pointing out that the union already has tariffs of 39 percent on American goods. Something that Dousa questions.
– The figures that are presented, I don’t understand where they come from. We have approximately the same tariffs in both directions today.”
https://omni.se/dousa-forstar-inte-var-usa-far-sina-siffror-ifran/a/4BJ9nq
“The EU’s trade tariffs against the USA are on average 2.7 percent according to the WTO, but according to Donald Trump they are 39 percent.
‘What extraordinary nonsense this is,’ writes economic journalist and author James Surowiecki, who was the first to figure out how the Trump administration had calculated.”
https://omni.se/trump-skippade-helt-tjanster-extraordinart-nonsens/a/vgP4Al
He rounded up 🤣
Good activity in the comment section, I think we can reach 1000 comments before the afternoon coffee break 👍
They have apparently taken the trade balance into account when setting tariffs – starting to understand now.
So the figure that country X has 50% tariffs may not be accurate at all.
Just like having a product that Americans were happy to buy.
In 2024, the USA had a trade deficit of nearly 1 trillion USD.
The largest deficits are with China, Mexico, and Vietnam at 600 billion USD, and then the entire EU accounts for the rest. But the EU consists of 27 countries.
Instead, could targeted subsidies/tax breaks have been given to domestic industry/agriculture?
I don’t know if I understand your question correctly. Providing subsidies/tax breaks increases the budget deficit. By raising tariffs, the cost is shifted to the consumer, resulting in a surplus in public finances. Unfortunately, tariff wars often lead to an economic downturn that erodes the surplus from tariffs.
I’m thinking like this –
If you want to benefit American companies, you can either have tariffs so that international competitors become too expensive OR you can do like the EU (especially France) agricultural sector and provide a lot of subsidies to companies/sectors to compensate and increase their competitiveness.
Then I think the plastic bag tax clearly shows that what you think you will earn can instead go towards zero.
Johan the no 1 🙂
He starts with style and names them Barbarians! Good name for the tourists!
“barbarian (from Greek baʹrbaros ‘person who does not have Greek as their native language’, actually ‘person who speaks unclearly, stammering’), stranger, foreigner (in relation to the Greeks or Romans), generally derogatory; person belonging to an uncivilized and cruel people, primitive, cruel and inhuman person.”
40 km is good because then you can take on the Barbarian fiber operators at 20 km. Definitely a fantastic advantage!
UA offensive is on the cards, I’m completely sure of that – Yep, a sure bet on V75 even!
Regarding the EU and the economy, Russia is in deep trouble and the USA is digging itself a deep hole! Everyone is looking for other suppliers, which is good for the EU! If we can just push back against China a bit, I believe the economy will be better than others even though the situation is inflationary!
Looking forward to Friday’s Barbra!
haha, Jari with such a bubbly optimism that it almost woke us up here in the office 😀
Have had a real hell-week here and really looking forward to a wild Friday night out.
I also believe that if Europe pulls itself together, we can come out of this less damaged than others, and we should be cautious with China, moderate trade… but just moderate.
Yes, “lagom” is a very good Swedish word for others within the EU to learn. A harmless word with the Chinese since they don’t understand what such a word means 😉 Simply doesn’t exist in China (Asia?)!
The EU Commission is considering proposing weaker climate and environmental legislation in an attempt to boost the competitiveness of the union’s companies. Sources tell Politico. The Commission has previously simplified the requirements for companies to report on their climate actions. Now the focus is on rules that companies should work to reduce their energy consumption, according to two of the sources.
It is difficult for the EU to implement costly climate measures while facing trade wars with the USA and military threats from Russia.
EU climate goals will surely be revised, and contributions to the worst excesses will be withdrawn. This is unlikely to be announced with drums and trumpets, but rather the climate frog will slowly be boiled until it only amounts to a compromise.
Quite fun that my post for Friday discusses exactly that – that we over-regulate and have 3 times the electricity price compared to the USA and 8 times the electricity price compared to China, as well as double the gasoline price compared to both.
Our trade surplus is also largely with the UK…
The answer one gets is “we have the lowest electricity prices in Europe” which is just silly and “we are not in the worst position on the Titanic” class almost.
This is a very difficult discussion to try to push, I feel, as it always leads to unreasonable opposition and people who stop reading, so nice that our elected officials think the same way – then you’re not completely off track at least.
Then maybe one can already dare to guess at least which party will violently protest against this sensible proposal 😀
Romina Pourmokhtari will have a lot on her plate when the opposition keeps nagging about Swedish goals and she is supposed to defend EU’s goals. Quite impressive that she has held her ground for so long despite being bullied by the opposition.
We are (formally) bound by the EU’s climate goals. It is totally idiotic to have our own as well. Furthermore, one can strongly question how reasonable the EU’s climate goals are in terms of how they impact Sweden. I have also written about this. (Title and lead as usual are not included.) Today, we clearly have the lowest emissions in the EU and belong to those who are clearly most affected by the EU’s requirements.
https://bulletin.nu/debatt-vara-klimatforhandlare-ar-for-mesiga
She is good at talking. Romina, that is.
Best in class but it’s a lousy class.
I certainly don’t want to join those who engage in “Backlash,” but the electricity prices do vary depending on the state, right? I have friends who own houses in Florida and they are not exactly thrilled about the electricity prices.
But yes, we are good at over-regulating, bureaucratizing, and, when things go wrong, subsidizing.
Do you remember Reagan’s old quote about how the state thinks about the economy?
Yes, I have generalized with average prices, I think.
In the case of the EU, very low prices in Kiruna don’t really affect much more than slightly lowering the average, as the industries are located in more expensive electricity areas.
China also has a significant difference in electricity prices between private customers and industries.
The USA is probably the same as you say.
Sweden and Germany are supposed to be the best in class in the green transition. We have regulations in our DNA. And we like big state projects where we show our green righteousness. Yes, the more billions invested, the better. There’s something fishy when it’s only taxpayer money or fund money being invested. Hardly a single private penny. When will Stegra in Boden shut down?
Yes, even the Green Party seems to have, if I understand correctly, abandoned the obligation to reduce emissions. I wrote an article about this about a year and a half ago.
https://bulletin.nu/debatt-tveksam-klimatnytta-med-reduktionsplikten
It has been obvious since their introduction that the EU’s climate goals would be impossible to achieve. Too bad you couldn’t bet on that.
https://www.bulletin.nu/debatt-bryssels-klimatkrav-ar-ogenomforbara
Good debate post.
Thank you for the review and thank you for reading.
Now I’m just waiting for T to change the language from English to American, like he did when he renamed the Mexican Gulf.
So all instructions should be in American, German, Spanish, etc.
Perhaps it will also be forbidden to set the table with a knife, as food should be eaten with a fork as 2-year-olds do. At least if you are MAGA. I see that this is a trend that can sometimes be seen in Swedish restaurants as well, can’t there be separate sections with children’s tables for these?
Head on the nail. I’m trying to show my grandchildren how to eat with a knife and fork. I usually say that if you learn to eat nicely, you’ll get a better job when you grow up.
Where is MXT?
The question you should ask yourself is – where are Dengamle and MXT 🧐
Have been very busy, but just started catching up on reading!
Good that you posted the lottery numbers! 👍
I have a small theory that doesn’t have much backing at all that Putin will blow Trump.
As I see it, all of this is now part of a larger game – Iran is a global escalation but it comes from the USA, economic warfare is in full swing, and so on.
But it requires that Putin makes his Baltic move at least and continues in Ukraine.
So what would happen if Russia simply backs off from Ukraine and lets the USA continue to torpedo itself?
I’ll have to think more about that, but Putin is not exactly known for keeping his promises, and I believe that the USA has exposed itself a bit too much now where a lot will depend on whether Russia does its part.
Yes, it’s worth considering. But it can make the narcissist Trump furious (Seeing Charlie Chaplin in The Great Dictator ahead). Does Putin dare? It could be a devilish backlash for Putin that will, if he’s lucky, lead to him handing over the throne. If he’s unlucky, dangling in a noose. But you’re right that the USA has bared its throat too early (due to Trump’s negotiation technique being information overload and not the other way around).
My thought is that if the USA beats the crap out of Iran, then the USA will not only get rid of the Iran problem, but likely also the Houthi rebels, Hezbollah/Hamas, and thus Russia will realize what happens when challenging the USA with the current administration.
I have seen a first notice that was very exciting – someone claims that Chinese people have started leaving Spain in large numbers.
This is out of the ordinary – has anyone seen anything more about this?
I have no idea in this case but can contribute to further thicken the fog. My partner told me that Chinese people began to appear in Sarajevo around the same time just as the civil war ended. And quickly established themselves primarily with silk and silk products. Everywhere, small shops, markets, portable stands. Still, just a few years ago, she still had silk clothes from that time.
And just as quickly and around the same time, they disappeared from Sarajevo. Not a trace remains. From everywhere, always, to nowhere, ever.
Thank you Johanno1, exciting to read your exposé on the development so far. And yes, the USA seems to have had its fingers in all the jam jars trying to control Ukraine. Imagine if instead they had put their energy into dominating and controlling the Moscow realm…
Now we see the most bizarre customs duties taking shape. They have, among other things, imposed high duties on an island in the South Atlantic, near Antarctica, where the population consists of… penguins.
I have no respect for their mercantilist policy and believe that it will cost more than it’s worth.
And I wonder how they can stand on a podium and lie about the high tariffs on American products imposed by the EU and present pure falsehoods. Which they then, with triumphant voices, claim to counteract through self-created high tariffs. It applied to the whole world and not just the EU, of course.
I’m starting to wonder if it’s a show for the galleries, where Trump will present the real numbers in a few weeks and then claim that these are the results we can now achieve thanks to the trade war. WIN!
But probably not, and therefore Europe now has a huge opportunity to at least partially dethrone the USA and take over market shares. My guess is that the USA will not benefit from this.
The EU has already announced its intention to ease environmental regulations to increase competitiveness, and we have started a revitalization that (if managed correctly) will give a significant boost to Europe’s industries. Together we are strong!
MES!
MES ✊✊✊
META
We get to draw some inspiration from the artilleryman 😀 You have to guess the song,
Take a look around you at the world we’ve come to know
Does it seem to be much more than a crazy circus show
But maybe from the madness something beautiful will grow
In a brave new world
You will not be surprised to hear that one of the bidders is CCCC.
The French withdrew, a major American company is participating as a bidder, and a local entrepreneur in the region, which is large enough and should have many advantages.
I expected the Chinese to fail due to high mobilization costs and a poor technical solution.
The Americans wanted to withdraw when they realized that the Chinese were involved.
Tomorrow we will listen to the local bidder, but so far the Chinese have outperformed the Americans in how they intend to implement the project technically, and they have also made the most progress in their technical analyses.
The Americans went with “confirm that we don’t need to do more analysis X” and the Chinese said “you made a mistake here, we will conduct another geotech to optimize this” – a slight difference in commitment…
We are far from where they used to sell poor craftsmanship by dangling financing and bribes – they will win with a superior technical solution.
And they have all the heavy equipment in the region where they have just completed two projects.
News to me is that the Chinese are now acquiring local consultants and entrepreneurs to gain local anchoring as leverage, and they are represented in 27 countries in Europe…
The last time I dealt with them in 2019, they were still trying to break into Europe 😀
This one is good – actual existing tariffs against the USA are what the USA says they were
https://bsky.app/profile/johanno1.bsky.social/post/3llw2lvmcts2k
Wall Street plummets at the opening and the S&P 500 is heading towards its worst trading day since September 2022. At 3:45 PM, it looks like this:
• S&P 500: -3.2%
• Nasdaq: -4.6%
• Dow Jones: -2.7%
Tech giants are under heavy pressure during Thursday’s trading. Amazon, Nvidia, Apple, and Tesla are plummeting between 9 and 7 percent.
The stock market doesn’t seem to appreciate Liberation Day.
This is NOT going well for the USA right now.
It’s also obvious that they haven’t even understood this thing with tariffs and made a complete mistake – not entirely impossible that Trump actually believes they’ve implemented tit-for-tat measures, but when you see the lists of actual tariffs and what they’ve implemented, it’s quite clear.
Just because others produce products that the US population wants to buy, it’s not exactly a criminal offense.
So all he’s done is that popular products will skyrocket in price in the USA 🤣🤣
Some Lorry warning in 🇺🇸
– didn’t think about it
Trump has had tariffs on his mind since he first met Xi and explained that you have 30% on our goods to you while we only have 15% on your goods to us. Trump is the tariff man.
Vietnam is the third largest with a trade surplus to the USA, but that’s because all companies in the USA have their production located in Vietnam.
Vietnam had 9.5% tariffs, which the USA interpreted as 95% due to the trade deficit with them.
If a 100% tariff is imposed on goods shipped from Vietnam, it will definitely hit all companies in the USA hard, right?
If they then relocate production to the USA, it will take 10 years and is a major investment – and no one knows if the tariffs will still be in place in 4 years.
What a mess this is 🤣🤣🤣
Regarding bringing production back to the USA, it is something that Trump initiated already during the previous term (resulting in a number of American companies bringing production back, including Tesla, Apple?). Then Mr. Biden followed up with policies along the same lines. So if it takes 10 years to make the switch, maybe one has had their head in the sand. The plans should have been in place for quite some time now, shouldn’t they?
Got the impression that Nike, for example, had huge factories in Vietnam and bleeding rivers on the stock exchange right now
Yes, those kinds of mass consumption products, probably with a fairly high element of manual labor (shoes/clothes), are much more difficult to bring home with any profitability. Easier with products whose production lines have been automated. As well as high-tech products.
It’s difficult to bring production of shoes and clothes back home but easy to move to another country with similar manufacturing costs and lower tariffs.
As mentioned, Nike has a large part of its production in Vietnam. The question is what happens if Nike moves its production to another country, will that country get higher tariffs and Vietnam lower when Nike leaves?
There you probably hit the nail on the head because it is precisely the unpredictability that makes it impossible for companies and causes the risk to skyrocket
But he was still kind and halved it, so 50% is probably the maximum that countries that only export and do not import get.
He completely ignored existing tariffs and only looked at the trade balance in percentage and then halved it.
It was probably just the right level of complexity in mathematics for him to follow the calculations.
Trump can read about the Smoot-Hawley Act of 1930 and the Tariff on Abominations from 1828 if he bothers. I am not so wise and educated that I could do this, but I was at least able to spend five minutes skimming through some Facebook posts from time to time. I don’t think I’ve come across any previously unknown material directly, and the arrogance that characterizes Trump on this issue must therefore be monumental.
We’ll see how long they can keep this up. I guess not for much longer. Then everything will return to normal (except towards Canada) and Trump will declare a win.
Surely, wasn’t the great depression initiated by tariffs?
Yes, wasn’t it Hoover who had a trade war against Europe?
In 1930, US President Herbert Hoover (1874–1964) signed one of history’s most famous trade laws: the Smoot-Hawley Tariff. The law raised tariffs on over 20,000 imported goods to protect American jobs, businesses, and agriculture from foreign competition.
Precis, Hoover. Didn’t exactly become popular afterwards.
It didn’t get any better because of the tariffs, in any case.
We could have read what you wrote, Lynx 🤣
Just fired the driver. Yesterday the car was refueled in the morning, then at 5 I was picked up an hour away and it was already half a tank. We have known for quite some time that this was the case, but now it was impossible to get the gauge down in any other way than by siphoning out a lot of gasoline 😀
Also, the USA will not be present at the upcoming Ramstein meeting.
Perhaps it was important for the driver to take advantage before the oil price rises.
OPEC+ agreed to make a larger than expected oil supply hike in May, deepening the slump in oil prices triggered by Trump’s tariffs, – Bloomberg ❗️The group will add 411,000 barrels a day to the market next month, the equivalent of three monthly tranches from its previous plan to revive output
https://bsky.app/profile/maks23.bsky.social/post/3llwdg5wdpk2x
When do you think Iran will have built nuclear weapons in violation of IAEA and UN guidelines, and when do you think the USA will have evidence that Iran plans to use them in the near future?
Weeks or days?
We’ll see. Garcia is fully booked but it could be strategic communication. Also.
But I won’t be sad if they strike, the mullahs are neither peace angels nor our friends in a more general sense.
//J
Colombia buys Gripen. They have apparently conducted some exercises together with Brazil and the USAF and been impressed by the superiority of the Gripen.
Both the media and bloggers uncritically bought into an article in a Spanish-language newspaper that the USA had blocked the deal, even though SAAB denied that was the case. Source criticism seems unnecessary when something can be used against the USA.
Yes, now it’s a declaration of intent and signed so it seems to be in place.
Incredibly joyful
👍
If you look at the “reciprocal tariffs” list, it is completely illogical, not in alphabetical order, and then not in ascending or descending order of tariffs either.
Maybe because it wouldn’t be so easy to notice that Russia is not included. 😄
However, an island where only penguins live (unless it’s fake news)
Late comment but good update today 👍👍👍
Choosing to comment on what is most off-topic, namely the Green Party (MP).
The problem is not the Green Party, it is a party that is needed and exists in our parliament, however, I believe that it is the responsibility of the other parties, especially the Social Democrats (S) and the Moderates (M), to ensure that the Green Party’s most absurd proposals are not implemented. The most important thing for a politician today is not, as one might think, to be able to conduct a consequence analysis but to be able to shift blame, and in that regard, it is convenient to have the Green Party to blame.
I agree that it is shameful that the two blocks for more than a decade became dependent on the Green Party and their policies that have been directly harmful to Sweden.
Countries including China, Germany, Japan, and South Korea have pursued policies that suppress the domestic consumption power of their own citizens to artificially boost the competitiveness of their export products. Such policies include regressive tax systems, low or unenforced penalties for environmental degradation, and policies intended to suppress worker wages relative to productivity.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/04/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-declares-national-emergency-to-increase-our-competitive-edge-protect-our-sovereignty-and-strengthen-our-national-and-economic-security/
Maybe not the image that we have of Germany.
There has been speculation about which party Musk will support in next year’s election, now we may have the answer, S. This assumes that they move forward with the proposal to shorten working hours which will lead to increased consumption and lower production.
They don’t seem to agree that tariffs are a brilliant idea.
Trump: “Tariffs will bring our country 7 trillion dollars.”
Today the US stock market lost ~3 trillion dollars.
I miss Russia in various arenas so much that even FIFA now thinks it’s time to let them in, as other federations have also suggested.
I long for Russians as much as I long for algal blooms, ticks, and killer slugs.
FIFA’s president hopes to soon “welcome back” Russia into the world of football.
“I hope that we can turn the page soon,” says Gianni Infantino at the UEFA Congress.
I don’t want to see Russia in any sport for at least 20 years; they should also be banned for life from participating in European competitions. They can compete against North Korea, Iran, and China in both winter and summer sports, with a good chance of winning medals without state-funded doping.