So explain it

Macron’s Address

Strangely enough, it was even more interesting than Trump’s address, which wasn’t really worth discussing. Trump spoke for a long time but said little of substance, which was expected. Macron also spoke without much clarity, but at least there was a chance he would announce some significant decisions. Spoiler: he didn’t.

For the most part, Macron tried to stir fear with his fantasies about Russia in an attempt to pressure the government into allocating more money for weapons. This is where his claim about Russia building 4,000 tanks by 2030 came from. I think everyone understands that this is completely unrealistic, given that Russia barely manages to produce a hundred or two tanks per year, even under wartime conditions.

That said, Macron did explicitly state that more weapons are needed, while also insisting that the French army is already the most effective in Europe, meaning no further strengthening is necessary. I wonder what the French military handbook says about a soldier’s actions if he hears a suspicious buzzing sound in the sky while outside of cover?

Regarding Ukraine, Macron once again reiterated that there should be no ceasefire and that the war must continue “until the last Ukrainian.” According to him, peace will only come with a “pacified Russia.” In polite circles, such statements are usually backed by a commitment like, “Therefore, I am providing Ukraine with €5 billion in military aid from French army stockpiles.” But Macron struggles with this—he wants to be a hero at someone else’s expense.

Before his speech, he also tried to single-handedly introduce an utterly ridiculous and unrealistic ceasefire plan, which proposed halting deep strikes. I don’t know what Zelensky did to upset Macron to the point where he decided to forbid him from bombing Russian oil refineries. Fortunately, no one takes Macron seriously, so even the UK rejected his plan. However, it’s known that Macron, Starmer, and Zelensky are once again trying to come up with another peace plan to present to Trump. I expect the outcome to be the same as their previous attempts.

Behind the scenes of his grandstanding, Macron and Starmer were reportedly trying to convince Zelensky to accept Trump’s demands, restore relations, and sign a resource deal. In other words, there’s no real effort to replace the U.S. in supporting Ukraine—Macron himself spoke about peacekeepers again. And once again, he made it clear that nothing is guaranteed (as we know, France is very reluctant to send troops without U.S. backing), that peacekeepers won’t be stationed at the front lines, won’t engage Russian forces, and so on.

In short, I am convinced that Macron understands Trump’s “deal” is inevitable and that there is no alternative. He is simply trying to increase his leverage. In the worst case, he’ll say he did what he could and blame everything on Trump. In the best case, he’ll pretend that peace in Ukraine was somehow his personal achievement.

If Macron wanted to make real decisions that could shift the course of the war—such as announcing that France is seriously committing to supporting Ukraine with weapons and funds—he would have done so yesterday. There won’t be a better moment, especially now that U.S. military aid has been suspended. Since he didn’t make such an announcement, I doubt he ever will. And neither did any other European leaders at the series of unusual emergency summits.

Macron has zero leverage over Trump because he would have to answer a simple question: Why should the U.S., which has invested $350 billion in the war (according to Trump) or $114 billion (according to the Kiel Institute), listen to France, which has contributed only $4.8 billion—less than Poland, Sweden, or Denmark? And you can be sure Trump will ask Macron exactly that.

This is just disingenuous.

Lookup trade balance with each one of these. EU, china, Canada and Mexico and all of these are majorly disbalanced

Europe’s Plans

The EU summit in Brussels is taking place today. I’ve lost count of how many there have been in the past two weeks—this might be the fourth? Zelensky will also be attending. I assume this summit will be crucial for shaping the EU’s future policy on Ukraine.

If any major decisions are made—especially regarding funding the war not just with money but also with weapons to replace U.S. supplies—it will happen now. There’s no more time to delay; Trump has already halted deliveries, so if not now, then when? However, I expect things will end much the same way as before.

The problem is that Europe simply lacks the physical capacity to supply weapons to the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Financial aid is one thing—money can still be found or printed—but weapons are another matter. For instance, a representative of the Bundeswehr has once again confirmed that Germany has exhausted its ability to send anything from its stockpiles to Ukraine.

But there are financial issues too. Ursula von der Leyen has presented her plan for rearming Europe, which has already been met with significant criticism in the Western press. Her plan includes:

Spending €800 billion on rearmament;

Creating a €150 billion credit fund for collective arms procurement;

Attracting private investment into the defense sector;

Offering incentives to countries that increase military spending.

However, this is merely a wishlist. Ursula is not a tactician but a strategist. The EU leadership doesn’t have—and won’t have—real money for this plan. The document itself states that the €800 billion should come from national governments, primarily by lifting borrowing restrictions. In other words, she is proposing that individual countries take on debt to rearm their militaries in exchange for vague incentives that will never truly offset the costs.

At the same time, it seems national governments are struggling to convince their voters that rearmament is genuinely necessary. The average European doesn’t believe that Putin—who has been fighting a single country, Ukraine, for three years without capturing a single regional capital and is now looking for a way to end the war—would suddenly turn around and attack NATO. Given the rising wave of nationalist sentiment in Europe, voters are focused on entirely different issues that contradict the idea of sharply increasing military spending.

As for real assistance, Politico reports that even the proposal to allocate €20 billion from EU funds is no longer being pursued due to opposition from Hungary. Anyone who thought Hungary was merely bargaining now has their answer—Orbán is seriously blocking military aid, unlike sanctions, which he has negotiated over before.

There is nothing stopping individual countries from pooling the same €20 billion without Hungary if they genuinely want to help Ukraine. But it’s clear that few are willing to do so. Those who do want to help already do—for example, Ireland recently announced a €100 million aid package, though it appears to be non-lethal aid, likely radar systems. But Ireland didn’t need Ursula or the EU to make that decision; if they want to help, they simply do. France, Italy, and similar countries could do the same, but they don’t.

That’s why I don’t see any reason to expect today’s summit to change anything. We’ll hear a lot of big words, see very little action, and once again, Zelensky will be pressured not to clash with Trump and to agree to his deals.

Europe’s Plans

The EU summit in Brussels is taking place today. I’ve lost count of how many there have been in the past two weeks—this might be the fourth? Zelensky will also be attending. I assume this summit will be crucial for shaping the EU’s future policy on Ukraine.

If any major decisions are made—especially regarding funding the war not just with money but also with weapons to replace U.S. supplies—it will happen now. There’s no more time to delay; Trump has already halted deliveries, so if not now, then when? However, I expect things will end much the same way as before.

The problem is that Europe simply lacks the physical capacity to supply weapons to the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Financial aid is one thing—money can still be found or printed—but weapons are another matter. For instance, a representative of the Bundeswehr has once again confirmed that Germany has exhausted its ability to send anything from its stockpiles to Ukraine.

But there are financial issues too. Ursula von der Leyen has presented her plan for rearming Europe, which has already been met with significant criticism in the Western press. Her plan includes:

Spending €800 billion on rearmament;

Creating a €150 billion credit fund for collective arms procurement;

Attracting private investment into the defense sector;

Offering incentives to countries that increase military spending.

However, this is merely a wishlist. Ursula is not a tactician but a strategist. The EU leadership doesn’t have—and won’t have—real money for this plan. The document itself states that the €800 billion should come from national governments, primarily by lifting borrowing restrictions. In other words, she is proposing that individual countries take on debt to rearm their militaries in exchange for vague incentives that will never truly offset the costs.

At the same time, it seems national governments are struggling to convince their voters that rearmament is genuinely necessary. The average European doesn’t believe that Putin—who has been fighting a single country, Ukraine, for three years without capturing a single regional capital and is now looking for a way to end the war—would suddenly turn around and attack NATO. Given the rising wave of nationalist sentiment in Europe, voters are focused on entirely different issues that contradict the idea of sharply increasing military spending.

As for real assistance, Politico reports that even the proposal to allocate €20 billion from EU funds is no longer being pursued due to opposition from Hungary. Anyone who thought Hungary was merely bargaining now has their answer—Orbán is seriously blocking military aid, unlike sanctions, which he has negotiated over before.

There is nothing stopping individual countries from pooling the same €20 billion without Hungary if they genuinely want to help Ukraine. But it’s clear that few are willing to do so. Those who do want to help already do—for example, Ireland recently announced a €100 million aid package, though it appears to be non-lethal aid, likely radar systems. But Ireland didn’t need Ursula or the EU to make that decision; if they want to help, they simply do. France, Italy, and similar countries could do the same, but they don’t.

That’s why I don’t see any reason to expect today’s summit to change anything. We’ll hear a lot of big words, see very little action, and once again, Zelensky will be pressured not to clash with Trump and to agree to his deals.

Just going to post some analytics here. To put things in oerspective

Real Leverage

Trump cannot exert economic pressure on Ukraine, and halting military supplies does not have an immediate effect. However, in my opinion, his most significant leverage is political. This factor could play a key role in forcing Ukraine into a peace agreement.

It’s important for understanding the context of why the U.S. needs this. For those who don’t want to read the full post, I’ll briefly summarize: The U.S. needs to contain China, which means preventing a China-Russia alliance. However, the U.S. lacks the financial resources, and due to this, Trump wants to scale back historical support for Europe.

Trump’s declared foreign policy goals extend far beyond Ukraine. His aim is to restructure the entire global order and dismantle the foundational principles established during the Yalta Conference, which are now completely outdated.

Accordingly, a warming of U.S.-Russia relations is a completely natural and logical process from the standpoint of U.S. interests. And this should happen independently of Ukraine. However, as long as the war continues, Trump wants to link these processes together—essentially trading concessions and a war freeze in exchange for lifting sanctions and resetting relations. But this is not a strict prerequisite.

This is directly evident from Trump’s rhetoric—he does not tie improved relations to specific actions from Russia, such as admitting guilt or paying reparations. On the contrary, Reuters has already reported that Trump has instructed the State Department and the Treasury to prepare a list of sanctions that could be lifted soon. While this likely won’t involve anything major at first, certain individuals could see sanctions removed. However, this in itself is an important signal: Ukraine is being separated from U.S.-Russia relations. For now, Trump does not want to make concessions in advance while negotiations are ongoing.

Yet, if the deal collapses due to Ukraine, then U.S.-Russia relations will develop without considering Ukraine at all, solely based on American interests. It seems that this mechanism was already set in motion after a White House dispute—CNN reports that preparations for a Putin-Trump meeting have been accelerated. Additionally, a second round of talks in Saudi Arabia is expected soon, where the focus is likely to be more on U.S.-Russia economic cooperation rather than Ukraine.

Any real steps in this direction will effectively lead to the EU lifting its own sanctions. Even now, secondary sanctions are more problematic than the primary ones. Countries like Turkey were willing to bypass restrictions, but Biden tightened the screws. Trump, however, doesn’t even need to formally lift sanctions—he can just turn a blind eye to violations by third countries.

At the same time, if the U.S. officially lifts sanctions, Europe will have little choice but to follow suit. Many companies left the Russian market voluntarily, as a gesture of goodwill, without being legally required to do so. As a result, they could begin returning once their governments give a quiet green light—publicly condemning the move, but privately claiming they can’t interfere because private companies are free to act in a democracy and capitalist system.

Right now, the only hope for hawks in Ukraine and the EU is to prolong the war, expecting that Russia will collapse under economic pressure, forcing Putin to negotiate from a position of weakness. However, if sanctions are lifted, this already uncertain scenario will become highly unlikely, making further war pointless for Ukraine. This would force Kyiv to either accept a far worse peace deal than what’s currently on the table or continue fighting alone, without any realistic hope of achieving what could be called a victory.

If china is about to kill you economy, who gives a damn about Russia?b

And u clearly have no historical knowledge of that conflict.

I disagree with Trump on many things, just not Ukraine Russia

This is a total lie. there is no sense to keep funding stupid usaid propaganda - it keeps population dumb

US is broke, have u seen the debt numbers?
It went into unontrollable territory.
Payments for debt financing alone is as much as military spending. This is dumb.
US has no choice but to radically change

Isnt that what us is? Capitalist authoritarian hellscape?

See, there is a strategy - u just tunnelvisioned and stuck in a cold war

Hallelujah

I like godless commies more than what Russia is now. Sad development

Word has changed since cold war u know.

I use it on desktop

Yeah I get they exist, but I will lose that in a day

Which one? There is literally nothing else.

Removed by mod

Not cars tho.