Burnwinter official imports are zero, notwithstanding fossil products sold by Russia to India or other third countries and then re-sold to Germany with a different provenance label and a premium slapped on it.

To add to what you said US policy has always been to drive Russia and Europe and specifically Germany apart. If it were up to them Germany would have never been allowed to buy Russian gas for 30+ years, it was because of social democrat politicians who actually put German interests above American it did happen; all scholars agree the whole 'economic miracle' of rising from the ashes to a world economic power would have been impossible without cheap Russian gas.

    jones a short war time alliance out of necessity. Fell apart before the war even ended, and let's not forget the war started after Hitler and Stalin divided Eastern Europe between them.

        Qwiss It's not an alliance in my view, although they are not openly hostile to each other either. They increased trade because it was convenient to do so.

            Good objectives, but probably unrealistic.

              Gurgen you're one of the more cynical people around, you think there are any political alliances that are not borne out of necessity? you think the Germans actually like the French or the Polish or vice versa?

                  jones why would the US as the world's sole superpower allow Europe to become a bloc that could become its rival? Because Western values and rules-based order?

                  Isn't that the lesson from the Suez crisis? US benevolence towards Europe was only to ensure a wealthy market for US products and the ensuing peace on the continent meant that the US didn't get pulled into generational wars while they were fighting the Soviets across the globe. Any real attempt to chart a course away from US interests has always been met swiftly and firmly.

                      Mirth you're right of course but people haven't even learned anything from 2008, bold to assume anyone remembers or learned anything from Suez.

                        jones letter agencies are a lot less likely to miss.

                          Raises some interesting points. It feels like the world order has changed before our very eyes, some people are struggling to accept it.

                            JazzG I mean nails the point trump has no idea what he's doing in the negotiation as well and a total clown that the Russians are laughing at. He thinks about everything as a business and it's totally played for fool by the Russians giving them everything they want.

                            Also UK needs to lean into Europe as you said the world had changed plucky little Britain is weak on our own we are going to need to be part of a European response to the new world order.

                                The missing piece of the "multipolar" assumption is whether there's any real trajectory for deglobalisation. I think that remains to be seen and the question is being tested now.

                                The utility of military power will mostly be at flashpoints in the imperial peripheries like Palestine or Ukraine (not at all discounting the people who live in these "peripheries", but it's their geography that allows empires to view them as expendable) while China and the US remain interdependent.

                                The self-preservation trick for imperial satellites like Australia is not to think like an imperial periphery. It's when your country ends up as little more than a subsidised missile and submarine base that you're in real trouble.

                                JazzG didn't finish the clip but this guy starts by saying we're "leaving" the rules-based order and that's because of strong men like Xi Jinping Putin and Trump, and Europeans didn't share this mindset.

                                He mentions the Yalta conference but did Europe have this mindset in the thirty years after when it beat down liberation movements in Africa and Asia and millions died in liberation wars? Or did that rules based mindset raise its head when they joined American wars and invaded Iraq twice Afghanistan Libya and Syria?

                                This whole vague bollocks of "rules-based order" is the most transparent attempt to deflect and distract from an actual order that exists called international law. Not like they're without issues of their own but the United Nations and international courts and conventions have clear concise rules to govern everyone like the absence of which this MI6 prick claims to lament, just funnily enough Europe and especially the US (under Dem or Rep presidents) simply don't observe or adhere to any of it when it's not convenient. Just astonishing to me that people actually still fall for it in 2025.

                                    Even one of the most annoying men in the world has lost patience with the most annoying man in the world.

                                    jones I think most Western Europeans like each other these days and they share a culture to an extent. What you are referring to is probably the xenophobia from some people against foreigners but this exists within countries too.

                                        awooga83

                                        Russians are laughing after completely depleting their military equipment, almost a million men dead, and a front that is barely moving? Worst win of all time.

                                            jones I think it's more a reflection on the geo political situation saying you need military power to be respected in the current climate. There are plenty of criticisms of Western hypocrisy but the US wouldn't have gone making these kinds of moves over the last 30 years where they blatantly sell out clear allies to countries that are committed to their defeat ideologically so things have definitely changed in the past 5 or so years. The idea that a country like Russia would launch a direct war (recognising the crimea event) would not have been imaginable and that there's looking to be no team long term consequences either.

                                            We have swung back into a similar landscape of the 20th century time frame he's referencing. You mention the United nations but it's always been weak as body now almost all big countries don't even bother to pay it lip service. You can see another equivalent in the league of nations the delusion was believing we had actually effectively replaced the former with an effective version, we never did.

                                                Kel Varnsen the Russian state will, Putin doesn't care about his people, they have all the weaknesses you claim today but also sanctions and no long term out. Trump and the US should be in a very good position to push a negotiation that costs the Russians. Instead giving them more then they would have dreamed forcing Ukraine to give territory, no security guarantees, proposing removal of NATO troops from all Eastern NATO countries with no reparations for destroying an independent country. Giving that as you say Russia is on its needs that's a massive win for them. They launched an aggressive war of they come out with normalised relations, US openly abandoning Europe, gaining territory. It's been clear Putin's gamble these last 18 months was I hope trump gets in I think we can get a positive outcome and he was absolutely right.

                                                  Gurgen nah what I'm referring to is there are no 'friends' in geopolitics, everyone looks out for themselves. Germany for example is supposed to be even more grateful than other European countries for the Union yet they've had zero scruples to abuse the Euro and Maastricht rules to run an internal devaluation policy for two decades and export mass unemployment to its neighbours.