【Article/Observer Network Columnist Chenfeng】
On 22 April, Russian forces announced the second phase of operations in Ukraine. It is generally believed that the Russian army concentrated the main force in The Donbass in an attempt to annihilate the main force of the 9 brigades of the Ukrainian army that had been assembled in Donbass before the war, and these 9 brigades remained unchanged after the outbreak of the war. Once the Donbass Ukrainian army was annihilated, the goal of demilitarization and de-Nazismization of Ukraine was achieved.
The first phase of russian operations was opportunistic. The feint attack in the direction of Kiev did not frighten Ukraine, nor did it mobilize the Ukrainian army to return to the defense, as the main attack and lacked the preparation for a strong attack, so it had to retreat.
The Donbass Ukrainian army held firm on the spot and did not give the Russian army the opportunity to move to annihilate the enemy, and the Russian army had to nibble Mariupol, fighting for two months, but still failed to eliminate the remnants of the Ukrainian army at the Azov Steel Plant.
The Russian Defense Ministry said 46 civilians were evacuated from the vicinity of the Azov steel plant. Image source: Visual China
The Crimean Russian army took advantage of the situation, but the strength was weak, and after crossing the Dnieper River in a bluff, it was difficult to continue, and it also retreated. However, the Russian army is known for its tenacity in history, never giving up lightly, and after moving to the second stage, shrinking the target, it can play the advantage of firepower and mobility.
North of Kiev are forests and swamps, the Russian advance route is limited, the Ukrainian army is easy to hide and close combat. The Russian army is thin, interspersed with weak strength, and there are loopholes everywhere. The Ukrainian army did not dare to attack in a big way, but the small detachment still erased many small Russian troops that ventured or fell alone. The transition to The Donbass was different. This is the Great Plain, and it also concentrates the large troops of the Ukrainian army. On the one hand, the Ukrainian army has been preparing for a long time, and the Russian army must be prepared to fight a hard battle; on the other hand, there is no way to break it into pieces, and the Ukrainian army can only confront the Russian army.
The War of Ukraine resembled World War I in many ways. Before the war, the parties underestimated the situation, believing that the war was "a good thing and easy to win.". Russia thinks it has the military certainty to bring Ukraine down in one fell swoop, and the West thinks it has the economic certainty to bring Russia down in one fell swoop. At the beginning of the fight, they all found that they had underestimated each other, but they could not help themselves, and this was how the First World War was fought by Schlieffen's plan into a trench war. Now, the Ukrainian war is entering the Moment of the Somme.
When World War I broke out, the Germans carried out Schlieffen's plan, first concentrating their forces to defeat France, and then returning to the eastern front to defeat Tsarist Russia. But the French fought in the direction of mud and water, and soon fought a trench battle. When the war was fought for nearly 2 years, the French commander-in-chief Xia fei and the British commander-in-chief Haig jointly decided to launch an attack on the Somme, but the Germans attacked first, attracting the main French force at Verdun, and the Somme was turned to the British as the main force of the attack, with more than 57,000 casualties on the first day, of which more than 19,000 were killed. It was the day with the heaviest casualties in British history. Throughout the campaign, Britain and France sent 2.5 million troops with 620,000 casualties, while the Germans 1 million suffered 433,000-445,000 casualties.
Now, the "New Schlieffen Plan" of the United States is to borrow Ukraine to fight Russia in one fell swoop, and then return to the Asia-Pacific region to deal with China. But Russia is fighting trench warfare militarily, and the United States is also fighting trench warfare economically. The Donbass is militarily on the Somme, and energy and inflation become economically on the Somme.
The Donbass is unlikely to be as miserable as the Somme, but by modern standards, it may be a refresher perception. The fiercest fighting to date broke out in Mariupol, and the fighting in Donbass has the potential to replicate the fierceness of Mariupol to some extent. Donbass is not everywhere in a big city like Mariupol, let alone everywhere there is an Azov steel plant, but here the industrial base is deep, there are many "little Mariupol", but also the Ukrainian army since 2014 in the confrontation with the East Ukrainian armed forces focused on the battlefield, the Russian army can not expect easy victory. Similarly, the Ukrainian army cannot expect the Russian army to give up as easily as it did in Kiev, let alone to have opportunistic opportunities like in the direction of Kiev.
This makes the battle in Donbass show a completely different situation. Mariupol is critical. If Mariupol was still in Ukrainian hands, the Russians would have had to roll unilaterally from the right flank. Before Kharkov was taken, the Russian army that broke through the center might even be cut off and surrounded by Ukrainian troops.
Although the Crimean Russian army can directly attack from the flank and rear, its strength is thin, the front line is long, and the supply through the Kerch Bridge is not only small, but also easy to be cut off. The Black Sea Fleet's ability to cross the Sea of Azov for supplies was also insufficient. It was not easy for the Crimean Russian army to firmly watch the direction of Kherson and Nikolayev, and the Dombass Ukrainian army, which took the initiative to attack strong and strong, was really unable to catch it.
The general offensive of the Russian army against the Donbass Army was only after basically taking Mariupol and rolling from both flanks. The Ukrainian army only killed and wounded a large number of Russian troops in the war of attrition, and suddenly frustrated the Russian offensive.
The Russian army is bound to win, and the Ukrainian army is only allowed to succeed and not to fail. However, the russian army's front line was greatly shortened, the supply line was greatly shortened, the turning period of spring had passed, and the logistical difficulties in the early stage of the war were greatly reduced.
The Russian army also fought a dull battle in Donbass, opening the way with firepower, following up with heavy troops, fighting steadily and steadily, and taking the battalion step by step. This means that the tactics of the small detachment of the Ukrainian army in the direction of Kiev are useless, and the information superiority provided by NATO is not working, and NATO is tossing and aiding the heavy weapons of the Ukrainian army because of this.
The United States has already assisted with 18 155 mm howitzers, and in addition to the new aid, 72 have been added, accompanied by assistance to tractors. In other words, the 90 guns were all towed M777s, along with 144,000 shells.
It was the heaviest piece of equipment ever aided by the United States. The M777 is a towed heavy artillery (lighter, but larger caliber and greater power, or a heavy artillery), with a range of 24 kilometers, an extended range of 30 kilometers, and a "Excalibur" guided shell of 40 kilometers.
Infographic: American M777 155 mm howitzer
The Russians targeted the 152 mm howitzer. The old D-20 has a range of only 17 kilometers and an extended range of 24 kilometers, which is less than the M777. The Russians rarely use the D-20, mainly self-propelled howitzers, but the Pro-Russian militia in Donbass still uses the D-20.
In self-propelled howitzers, the old-fashioned 2S3 had the same range as the D-20, and should now be used less frequently by front-line troops. The 2S19 was commissioned in 1989, which is the existing main force, with a range increased to 25 km and an extended range of 28.9 km, comparable to the M777, but with the advantages of maneuverability and armor protection. The latest 2S35, which has a range of 40 kilometers and precision-guided shells of up to 80 kilometers, only entered service in 2016 and is estimated to be a small number.
If the 2S19 and M777 are fired against each other, you can't just look at the guns, you have to look at the system, but also look at the tactics.
The M777 is a towed type, requiring a 5-ton 6x6 medium tactical truck (or corresponding vehicle) to drag away, and it takes a certain amount of time to unfold and withdraw, but in the case of NATO's comprehensive intelligence support, it can be concealed and unexpected, if it can be carried out, it still has a certain combat effectiveness.
The UAV is the most handy against the towed artillery, and the Russian military may not have as many UAVs available. Special forces are also a weapon for hunting and killing towed artillery, but the open and flat terrain and the dense deployment of the Ukrainian army make it inconvenient to make waves. But the Russians do not lack anti-artillery radars. As soon as the M777 was fired, it could be quickly positioned, and then the anti-artillery fire immediately arrived.
In the 2014 War in Donbass, the Ukrainian artillery was suppressed by the Russian digital artillery. M777 is lighter than the Soviet heavy artillery of the Ukrainian army at that time, but the traction type is the traction type, and it still takes so much time to expand and withdraw, and the Ukrainian army does not have long-term training time, and it is difficult to avoid the fate of "disposable artillery".
On the contrary, the Russian artillery is highly mechanized, and the self-propelled howitzer is not only ready to shoot and withdraw quickly, but also has a certain degree of armor protection. Of course, being hit directly by the immortals can't save their lives, but if they are closely lost, they can still resist the shrapnel. Relatively speaking, the reaction speed and survivability are significantly higher.
Another problem with the Ukrainian M777 is that artillery needs to be used in clusters to maximize its power. This is especially true for "solid targets" such as the Russian Army in Donbass, which are not enough to dump a little tonnage, and it is not enough to just knock out a few point targets. Fortunately, the digital artillery command system can connect scattered individual guns into integrated artillery groups, divide troops and gather fire, and coordinate attacks. The US military has such a digital artillery command system, and it is estimated that it has also been provided to the Ukrainian army, but it is not known whether the Ukrainian army is proficient. Advanced technology has a fool's side and a complex side. The more advanced equipment provided by the West in the future has the same problem.
Modern howitzers have the function of "single gun salvo", quickly firing several shells, using different charge packs and different heights and trajectories, so that the shells fired successively land on the same target at the same time. However, such a dense rapid fire is easier to achieve with a higher degree of automation of self-propelled howitzers, and it is difficult to achieve a more manual towed howitzer. M777 is estimated to be unable to play this job.
With the support of the digital artillery command system, the M777 can certainly inflict damage on the Russian army. But the Soviet Union was once the only artillery superpower, Russia inherited the mantle of the Soviet Union, and now China has overtaken to the front, but the Russian artillery still has a numerical advantage over the Ukrainian army and the West, and there are a large number of rockets with fierce firepower and long range. Even if the M777 attacks, it will not last long, and it is difficult to substantially change the war situation in Donbass.
The same is true of the Cheetah self-propelled anti-aircraft guns supplied by Germany. This is the double 35 mm self-propelled anti-aircraft gun that began to enter service in the 70s, the first to integrate radar, fire control, and anti-aircraft guns on the same hull, representing the highest level and the most expensive level in the Cold War era, and the unit price is equivalent to 3 "Leopard 1" tanks of the same era.
But this was also designed for low-altitude raids by ground attack aircraft, and after the popularization of over-the-horizon precision guided munitions, it was already lagging behind, so the German army retired all the remaining Cheetahs more than 10 years ago. For the Ukrainian battlefield, unless the Russian aircraft continue to drop iron bombs at low altitude, the "Cheetah" has little use, and the aircraft above the hollow level will not be able to hit. Cruise missiles or low-altitude drones for critical ground defense may still be useful, but old-fashioned radar and simulated fire control systems are vulnerable to suppression.
Cheetah's ammunition is another problem. The Cheetah uses a twin-mounted Eri air 35 mm rapid-fire anti-aircraft gun with a rate of fire of up to 1100 rounds per minute in two salvos. Germany now has an inventory of 23,000 rounds of ammunition, that is, enough for 50 Cheetah salvos for 30 seconds. Both Eri air and ammunition were made in Switzerland, and Switzerland remained neutral and refused to provide ammunition for the 20 mm Erli air rapid-fire gun on the "Weasel" infantry battle of Ukraine "donated" by Germany, and most likely refused to provide ammunition for the "Cheetah".
Brazil has a fleet of second-hand "cheetahs" and a stockpile of 300,000 rounds of ammunition, but Brazil also takes a neutral position on the Conflict in Ukraine and refuses to provide it. Qatar and Jordan also have second-hand "cheetahs" that are unclear if they will be offered. Ukraine said it would refuse to accept a "cheetah" if the ammunition issue could not be resolved. This is a playful episode of Western aid to heavy equipment.
Germany is still struggling to deliver 88 sealed Leopard 1 tanks to Ukraine, but using the Leopard 1 of the 60s to fight the T-80s, T-90s and even T-90M is too much to treat bean bags as dry food. In terms of combat effectiveness, the Leopard 1 is not necessarily higher than the T-72, or the Eastern European T-72 is more practical. Poland is said to have transferred 200 Ukrainian T-72s.
This is actually a common theme: the West is generous when it comes to aiding relatively cheap individual weapons; when it comes to aiding heavy equipment, it is one thing to get out of the inventory of the Qinghua Treaty era, and when it is necessary to ship from the existing equipment inventory, the West will cut the rope.
The United States did not aid the old M198 howitzer, but the cutting-edge M777, which is very conscientious, but without the assistance of its own M109A7, the unit price of up to $20 million is certainly a factor. The M777 "only" has $3.9 million (India is $5.2 million). The German-aided "Cheetah" and the considered "Leopard 1" are retired and mothballed obsolete goods for a long time, if it is not a war in Ukraine, it would have been in addition to the scrap steel recycling field, and it will never see the light of day.
Germany replaced the Slovak T-72 tank with 20 Weasel infantry and 20 Fox armored vehicles, which "gifted" Ukraine, which also meant the same thing. Rheinmetall is also applying to export 100 used "weasels" to Ukraine. In the 1990s, German used cars were cleared to Eastern Europe and Russia, and now it is the turn of second-hand arms clearances.
However, the stocks of Soviet-made equipment and ammunition in Eastern European countries have been almost hollowed out, and the next assistance can only be based on Western equipment. Ukraine's Soviet-made equipment and ammunition stocks were also hollowed out, the military factories in Kharkov, Kiev, and Zaporizhia were almost blown up, and without steel from Donbass (including Mariupol), Ukraine's autonomous military industry could not be sustained. If the Ukrainian army wants to continue to fight, the amount of Western aid cannot be small.
For the Ukrainian army to continue fighting, it needs more than equipment and ammunition. Before the war, Ukraine produced less oil than New Zealand, let alone during the war, and had to be transported in only by the West. Mechanized warfare requires a lot of fuel, and transportation also requires a lot of fuel. The Donbass Ukrainian army had stockpiled a large amount of ammunition and fuel before the war, but the consumption of the war could not be supported by the reserves for a long time, especially fuel oil.
Ukrainians line up at gas stations to refuel. Image source: Visual China
In World War II, even in the later stages, the German army rarely ran out of ammunition, but there were often times when the oil ran out. Two months after the outbreak of the war, the Russian army recently began to attack Ukrainian fuel facilities, kramenchuk refineries and several large oil depots were hit. By the way, fuel facilities are strategic facilities that are usually hit as soon as the war begins. Russia is really carrying out a "special military operation" in Ukraine.
How Western heavy equipment, ammunition and fuel could be transported to the Donbas front was a big problem. 90 heavy guns and more than 100,000 shells could not be smuggled to the front, 50 Cheetahs taller than the main battle tanks could not be sneaky, and there were more and bigger transportation problems behind. For some reason, the Russian army in the first phase of the Ukrainian transportation, bridges, railway stations and other infrastructure basically did not move, and now began to work. This would seriously affect the transport of Western equipment and supplies to the Donbass front.
Western equipment could only enter from Poland and then cross most of Ukraine and across the Dnieper River to reach Donbass. The first phase of aid was mainly individual weapons, which could be smuggled in casually, and the Russian army could not intercept them. Now that it is heavy equipment, it is difficult to escape the reconnaissance and surveillance of the Russian army.
Ukraine's road, railway, and bridge foundations are still left over from the Soviet era, and railways are the main means of long-distance bulk transportation, but they are also the easiest to cut off in war. Large convoys on the road are also conspicuous. Then there are the bridges on the Dnieper, and after cutting off several major bridges, the transportation of heavy equipment, bulk ammunition and fuel oil is greatly delayed. Ferries can solve a little problem, but car ferries are already few, sink one less, the Russian army controls Kherson, and reinforcements from Romania can not swim against the current.
In the first stage, the Russian army made a long-distance advance and was hit by the Ukrainian army for logistics; in the second stage, the Donbass Ukrainian army was alone, and it was the turn of the Russian army to fight logistics. Russian forces are already attacking oil depots, lines of communication, bridges and railway hubs across Ukraine.
Cruise missiles and Iskander alone will not work, and it may be time for the Russian Air Force to move. If the air force was only the icing on the cake during the long-distance attack of the Russian army in the first stage, the air force in the second phase of the blockade wartime was a blessing in disguise. If the Army can count tank losses, it is time for the Air Force to count aircraft losses.
There is no chance of the war in Ukraine to disarm the cattle, and the cattle have condensed into large stones, only to be smashed little by little with a heavy hammer. It will be a fierce war of attrition.
The Ukrainian city of Kiev was in ruins, and women, children and the elderly were asked not to return for the time being. Image source: Visual China
The Battle of the Somme, in 1916, was the midpoint of World War I. It's been two months since the war in Ukraine, and the fighting in Donbass may not even be at the midpoint. NATO has declared that the war in Ukraine could last for years. Arahamiya, chairman of the parliamentary caucus of Ukraine's ruling Servants of the People's Party, also said Ukraine was developing a strategy for a situation in which the conflict had lasted for years.
NATO's Special Operations Command claimed that the Ukrainian government approved a national resistance strategy dominated by special forces in January, preparing for large-scale resistance in the event of a Russian offensive. Ukrainian special forces were also the main force in attacking the Russian convoy in the direction of Kiev.
The war in Donbass has not really stopped since 2014, but after this all-out war, it is possible that even if the Russian army returns to the state it was in before the offensive at the end of February, Ukraine will start some form of guerrilla warfare in Donbass and even in Crimea.
If the Russian army stays in Kherson, Zaporozhye, and Greater Donbass, there is a high probability that the Ukrainian army will have a long-term guerrilla war. The Russian counter-guerrilla army will expand, and it is not impossible for the Russian army to enter the western part of the Polish border outside Greater Donbass and even near the Polish border, and the Russian guerrilla war will also be long-term. The claim that NATO's war in Ukraine will last for several years is not an exaggeration.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson insisted from the outset: "Putin must lose!" ”。 British Foreign Minister Teras has explicitly proposed the expulsion of Russian troops from all of Ukraine, meaning Greater Donbass and Crimea. U.S. Defense Secretary Austin also made it clear that the purpose of the United States is to weaken Russia to the point where it can no longer wage war. In other words, the U.S. aim is Russia's unconditional surrender.
In the eyes of the United States, the United States was the victor of the Cold War, and Russia was the defeated country of the Cold War. Without the permission of the victorious powers, the defeated countries cannot be spoken of. But the Cold War did not end with the unconditional surrender of the defeated nations, Russia retained conventional military and strategic nuclear forces, which the United States considered a "mistake" and that now was the time to correct it. In a way, this is the same thinking that Saddam Hussein was not completely disarmed after the Gulf War and "needed" to invade Iraq again in 2003.
The overall economic power of the West is sure to crush Russia. NATO does not go directly, but it has enough strength to ensure that Russia will not take military risks, so the West believes that it is sure to drag Russia to death in the war of attrition, and the Russian military's ability to "count losses" is limited.
The sharp drop in the ruble when the West announced comprehensive sanctions also proved the West's judgment. But Putin unexpectedly announced the "ruble settlement order" for Russian energy, and the ruble actually rose back to more than the pre-war level.
If Europe opens an account in a Russian bank, buys rubles in euros or dollars, and then settles them in rubles, the appreciation of the rubles will continue. In the past two months, Europe has paid Russia $35 billion to buy Russian gas and oil, which has not yet begun to be settled in rubles.
The United States and Europe have constantly clamored for "confiscation of Russian assets to pay for the war in Ukraine." Private property is inviolable, and the government can only confiscate the illegal gains of criminals, so the property of Russian oligarchs in Europe and the United States is considered to be the proceeds of corruption and can be confiscated, but the wealth of oligarchs is simply not enough for the cost of war. Most of Russia's assets are still deposits and bonds of central banks and commercial banks in various countries.
The United States and Europe deliberately emphasize that they are not in a state of war with Russia, and maintaining the current state of "I helpEd Ukraine to give you bloodletting, but I did not do it, so you cannot beat me" is very important to the United States and Europe, and it is estimated that it will not directly confiscate Russian government and commercial property.
What the United States and Europe are most worried about is the combination of Russian energy and food and China's manufacturing industry, which forms an unstoppable sustainable internal cycle, and the only remaining killer weapon of the United States at sea is completely lost. The us dollar still has financial hegemony, but in the current tense global supply chain and inflation, the credit of "no standard currency" is not dominant against the energy-based ruble and the commodity-based renminbi, and continuing to engage in the reputation of the dollar weaponization can only marginalize the dollar. The same goes for the euro. The role of money is intermediary, the flow of goods to consumers is just needed, money can manipulate this flow, but it can also be overwhelmed by flow. This is the reason why water can carry boats and can also overturn boats.
The bigger problem is the U.S. and European economies themselves. Inflation remains high, and even rises steadily, and the inversion of US Treasury interest rates and inflation rates is a matter of minutes, which is the clearest precursor to the economic crisis. The U.S. economy recovered strongly after the epidemic (the epidemic in the United States did not have a "post", but lying flat is "after") in fact, there was no real growth, just returned to the pre-epidemic level. Still, the economy unexpectedly contracted by 1.4 percent in the first quarter, while month-on-month inflation in March was as high as 8.4 percent, the highest in 40 years. It's terrible.
The Fed has been in a dilemma for several years (between a rock and a hard place) to raise interest rates, first to restore the minimum means of financial regulation, then to suppress inflation, but also to suppress the economy that is still fragile recovery. Now the rock is harder, the hard place is harder, and the Fed is squeezed in the middle to be out of breath. It is said that the Fed is still going to raise interest rates, and the "stagflation" is about to come true.
Stagflation refers to inflation while the economy is shrinking, which is the worst combination. In general, economic overheating leads to inflation, economic contraction leads to deflation, and it is difficult for economic contraction and inflation to occur at the same time. However, under the influence of external forces, such as soaring energy prices, inflation is bound to occur, and economic contraction will follow.
The "Nixon shock" of the dollar's departure from the gold standard in 1971 and the successive shocks of the oil crisis in 1973 contributed to a decade of stagnation in the West, especially in the United States. Another scenario is that economic policies cause productivity declines, while excessive government monetary policy can also lead to stagflation. In the 1960s and 1970s, the government took over and took over a large number of poorly run businesses, while also significantly expanding social welfare spending, which also caused stagnation.
In 1979-83, under the auspices of Fed Chairman Paul Volcker, the Fed vigorously but briefly raised interest rates, quickly controlling inflation; at the same time, the dollar and oil anchored, so that the "unprofitable" dollar actually became the oil standard, and the dollar credit had a substantial backing; Walker also operated the "Plaza Accord", forcing the Deutsche Mark and the yen to appreciate and rebalance the US trade deficit.
Former Fed Chairman Paul Volcker. Infographic
Since then, the United States has come out of the stagflation and begun the "Reagan ZTE". At the same time, Margaret Thatcher pushed privatization and tightened social welfare spending in Britain, and Britain also came out of stagnation, although it has been locked into the ranks of second-rate powers forever.
Now, the epidemic has severely suppressed the productivity of the United States and Europe, the impact of the 2008 financial crisis has not passed, the epidemic period has doubled the money, and the war in Ukraine has greatly exacerbated the soaring energy prices.
Statistics Germany announced that imported electricity prices rose 440.8 percent year-on-year in March, coal 307.5 percent, natural gas 304.3 percent, petroleum products 110.3 percent and oil 81.3 percent. The global supply chain crisis has pushed up the prices of all consumer goods across the board.
By reference, the oil crisis of 1973 began with the outbreak of the October War and peaked two months later, but ended in March of the following year. The surge in energy prices began before the War in Ukraine, which worsened dramatically after the War in Ukraine. The war has been going on for two months, and according to the trend of de-Russification of european energy and the trend of prolonging the war in Ukraine, energy prices will not be able to fall for several years. It is difficult for the United States and Europe to enter the stagnation.
Inflation is not unique to the United States, China also has, and it can even be said that since the reform and opening up, China's inflation has long exceeded that of the United States, and people who talk about market prices with the elderly at home have experienced.
The difference is that China's growth has always been significantly higher than inflation, so the negative impact of inflation on the economy and society is controllable, and inflation control is relatively simple. Low inflation in the United States is compatible with low growth, but growth continues to be low and inflation soars, which is messy. The same is true of Europe.
Under Walker, the Fed's average interest rate was 11.2 percent in 1979 and briefly reached a peak of 20 percent in 1981, directly leading to the 1981-82 U.S. recession, which reached 10 percent unemployment. If the Fed raises interest rates to half of Walker's level today, it will probably introduce a recession that doubled compared with 1981-82.
On the other hand, the old prescription doesn't work. The Fed can not violently raise interest rates, the United States can not force the renminbi to appreciate like the yen that year, the dollar is still possible to return to the "no standard".
How the United States got out of the stagflation this time is really difficult to say. The Fed is now raising interest rates three times in one step, and Biden is pushing the responsibility for U.S. inflation on Putin, just as Trump has pushed the responsibility for the epidemic in the United States on China. If the epidemic "ruined" Trump, will stagflation "ruin" Biden?
Biden is still on his way to self-destruction. The war in Ukraine has been fought for two months, and the $13.6 billion in aid approved by the U.S. Congress has largely run out. Mainly military aid, the economy and people's livelihood are not issues of concern to the United States. Now Biden is asking Congress to approve another $33 billion in aid.
The first stage cannot be said to be a low-intensity war, but compared with the second stage, it is definitely a small witch. In the first phase, U.S. aid to Ukraine averaged $200 million a day. At this rate, 33 billion could last 4.5 months. But even in the first phase, daily aid is actually gradually accelerating.
The second phase of the fighting became more intense, and the effects of Ukraine's economic shutdown began to emerge in full swing, with 200 million per day not enough. Three months later, it would be no surprise that Biden would ask for another 33 billion, more than 100 billion a year, similar to the era of the war on terror. If the war in Ukraine becomes protracted, the U.S. aid burden will also become permanent. Dropping Ukraine in the middle of the road has more consequences than fleeing Afghanistan.
Ukraine has also made no mistake of proposing: 30% of enterprises have stopped production, 45% are reducing production, exports have been reduced by half, imports have been reduced by 2/3, military and civilian property losses have exceeded 270 billion US dollars, Western military aid cannot fill the fiscal deficit, and Ukraine also needs 7 billion US dollars in monthly financial subsidies. Of Biden's 33 billion aid, 20.4 billion are military aid, 8.5 billion economic aid, 3 billion humanitarian aid, and 1.1 billion for unknown purposes. In other words, economic assistance is enough to fill Ukraine's financial loophole for more than a month. Ukraine is sure that the lion has a big opening, but the gap is certainly huge.
What is Biden thinking?
From the beginning, Biden was a weak president. The ultra-left represented by Sanders and the AOC (Alessandria Ocasio-Cortés) in the Democratic Party is despised by the Republican mainstream and hated by the extreme right represented by Trump.
Biden's election is hard to win, and now it is up to the congress to hold a midterm election, and if Biden loses the "technical majority" of the Democrats in Congress, he will not only be lame president in the next two years, but also be determined by the Republican Party to take the White House in 2024. Then he was not human inside and out.
All diplomacy is a continuation of internal affairs, and tossing diplomacy when internal affairs cannot be pushed forward is the unchanging theme of American politics. Biden can't push the US reconstruction plan, the Republican Party has always opposed big government and big infrastructure, and the Democratic Party has doubts about big debt.
The stagflation pressure is at the top of Taishan, and the rebound of the epidemic is also looming from time to time. Biden can only start with diplomacy and win back support. The epidemic is lying flat anyway, don't talk about it. How big is the stagflation problem? The less Biden talks, the bigger the problem.
China's allies will not work without real money and silver, and the War in Ukraine has become a life-saving straw for Biden. War is always united, and it's an opportunity to squeeze allies into a stand, to show American leadership, and to crown biden as wartime president.
Interestingly, the U.S. Congress, which is in charge of the whole world, has unexpectedly kept a low profile on the issue of the war in Ukraine. The United States has just escaped from the war in Afghanistan, the economy is a chicken feather, and the society is also messed up by the racial contradictions represented by the Floyd incident and the ideological division represented by the Capitol Hill riots.
American public opinion does not support Biden because it supports Ukraine, and the upcoming congressional midterm election will ultimately be decided by the US economy and people's livelihood. Congress also does not attack the White House more on the issue of stagflation, because the time bomb is ticking at a speed visible to the naked eye, and it is the White House that will explode, and it will hide as far as it can. How much lethality the stagnation has on Biden is almost clear.
But Biden is already on a high stool in support of Ukraine, and it is easy to go up and down. The American iron heart wants to drag Russia to death with Ukraine, and the Russian iron heart wants to live. But a prolonged war in Ukraine is ultimately not in the interest of the United States, which has not intervened directly militarily as it did in Vietnam and Afghanistan, and it is relatively easy to withdraw.
If Biden has shown a modicum of political wisdom, here it is. Britain and Poland, which betrayed Ukraine or even jumped up and down, are not the problems that the United States is worried about, and the United States has always had no psychological burden on the dead and the poor.
The United States is also determined to make Europe bear the greatest cost of the war in Ukraine, which is in line with Biden's allyism: allyism is led by the United States, and the allies contribute. This is even more the strategic need of the United States.
Despite the war in Ukraine and the "once and for all" issue of Russia, China remains a core strategic goal of the United States. Europe is half-hearted about whether to tie up the anti-China chariot, and the United States uses the Ukrainian war to lash out at Europe, on the one hand, through China's refusal to sanction Russia to drive Europe away from China, on the other hand, through energy dependence to tie Europe to the US chariot, but also to cut off the euro's threat to the return to the "unsub-standard" dollar.
Europe's economic difficulties are deeper than those of the United States. The war in Ukraine is closer to Europe, millions of Ukrainian refugees are in Europe, and the wartime survival and post-war reconstruction of Ukraine are the responsibility of Europe. Europe will either bear the high price of energy imports from the United States or the high investment in the carbon-free energy transition, and the economy will be sluggish for a while.
Germany, the locomotive of the European economy, has also gone wrong because of the energy crisis, and the German Economy Ministry has cut the economic growth rate from 3.6% to 2.2% in 2022, and inflation has risen to 6.1%, the highest level in 40 years. Economic research institutions have shown that if Russia's energy is completely disrupted, economic growth will fall further to 1.9%, and inflation will rise to 7.3%.
In the decades after the war, European trains were riddled with problems, and they were dragged by brute force by German locomotives. Now that the German locomotive is deflated, the European train really can't climb. Poland and other countries are unscrupulous in sanctioning Russia's energy because they believe that there is a German support, and the sky is falling down with the big Man of Germany. But there was also a day in Germany when the big man was crushed, when the little man was under the big man's ass.
Faced with foreign pressure from the United States and Britain and domestic pressure from the coalition ruling party, Scholz was passively dragged into the mud pit of the Ukrainian war, and he could only postpone but could not avoid the reality that Germany was sliding into the black hole step by step. France announced a great deal of aid, but meaningfully announced only the amount of aid, and never announced the content of military aid on grounds of secrecy. There are reports that French aid is a rare non-military one in the West.
Without Britain as a churning stick, Germany and France returned to the actual leadership of Europe. But in the War of Ukraine, Germany and France were losing control of Europe, passively being pushed by the situation, and had to do a lot of useless work, like the Austro-Hungarian Empire in World War I. On the eve of World War I, the Austro-Hungarian Empire was still a Pole of Europe, but it had been a foreign power for a long time. The Battle of the Somme was fought for three months, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire was not eligible to participate. Three months after the Battle of the Somme, Emperor Franz Joseph was killed. He did not see the end of the First World War, when the Austro-Hungarian Empire collapsed. Today Austria is just a country of waltzes and Viennese coffee.
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