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It’s a supermarket simultaneously raising its prices while rolling out an anti-competitive new policy where you can’t buy there if you also buy from the competitor. It assumes that the supermarket has infinite leverage, that it is so unilaterally indispensable that the customer has no choice. This kind of blackmail works until it doesn’t, like russia banking on europe’s gas dependency.
Psychologically, people prefer a less competitive supermarket to being coerced in that way. I think you overestimate your leverage, and how “rational” your customers are. I’m way more pro-american than average, and even I think US allies should tell trump to take a walk.
It's not an anti-competitive new policy. It's an old already practiced by the parties which are facing reciprococity, which they themselves justified in the past on the basis of competition. Note, again, the common market trade barrier.
This is one of the issues with the supermarket analogy. Both parties are 'supermarkets', and the trade barriers have already been in play.
There is no assumption that there is infinite leverage, only that there is drastically uneven leverage. This uneveness exists- the US and China are not substitute providers for Europe's priorities, and thus Europe cannot credibly claim to go to a different provider for what Europe seek from the US.
This another of the reasons the supermarket analogy is a bad analogy. Supermarkets provide analogous goods and services- however, the US and China do not.
You seem to be conflating characterization with advocacy, as well as psychology for policy position.
Unfortunately, you cannot tell a security provider to 'take a walk' from not fighting on your side, because your consent is not required for them to not fight for you. Similarly, you cannot tell someone to 'take a walk' from no longer providing a service to you- the breakdown of the relationship is the BATNA, not the continuation of the status quo.
This is a third reason why the supermarket is a bad metaphor- it reverses the agency in the relationship. The US is not a supermarket trying to persuade a European customer to come in but which the European has plentiful alternatives- the US is the only viable service provider that the European customer is trying to convince to stay when the new boss believes it's a bad business relationship. If the European consumer believes the new price is not worth paying, that's not a victory over the no-longer-provider, that is the provider leaving an unprofitable relationship.
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Who knows how "rational" Europe is in this scenario but the US has a lot of leverage. In a world where
Europe is now
The only way for Europe to collectively mitigate these problems is to build a large military, quickly, or to develop European autarchy, relieving the need to trade with China (or possibly both!) But Europe hasn't demonstrated the ability to do that. Building a conventional navy is extremely expensive and the requisite nuclear capability is fraught (I can absolutely see Russia attacking Poland if they try to develop nuclear weapons). And this is assuming Europe can pull this off in perfect harmony instead of getting locked in another European arms race or getting dominated by the only European power with nuclear weapons (France – I doubt England splits from the US and I'm counting Russia as its own thing.)
I dunno the exact numbers involved so who knows how the math plays out. But to me it seems like the supermarket has a lot of leverage.
The relative cost of this goes down the more nakedly transactional the US gets in US-European relations. If your choices are to get bent over a barrel now by the US or maybe get bent over by a barrel later by China, cutting a deal with China is going to start looking a great deal more appealing.
A large part of US power is that it doesn't demand very much of its allies (occasional Article 5 moment aside); the more the US tries to treat its allies like vassals or tributaries, the weaker that soft power grows. And if you're stuck dealing with a transactional superpower, you might as well go with the one offering money instead of demanding it.
Give me your scenario for a US-EU war.
Yes, I agree with this. I just think that trading with China is more expensive than it seems up front because it raises a lot of vulnerabilities that need to be mitigated against (or Europe can ignore them and then risk the outcome). But who knows, maybe it's best to run the risk and not mitigate in the long run since you can ramp up profits in the short term!
Well, my point here is more that if the US and EU (broadly) aren't allies, the EU would need to plan for a potential conflict with the US, otherwise they are at the mercy of US coercive diplomacy. (I'll just add that the EU pivot to China is me accepting Tree's scenario - I'm not sure how likely this is.) I don't foresee a near-term US-EU war (in part because I am not sure "the EU" will end up being unified enough to be a military alliance) but I don't think adopting a policy of non-defense is the wisest long-run strategy - even if the United States doesn't take advantage of it, others might. I will add that at least one German defense commenter I've read has spoken about the need for Europe to secure itself against the US militarily - I am not certain if that's remotely within the Overton window, possibly it's just literally one guy. But it's an interesting perspective to read.
But, hedging aside, scenarios are fun, so, a hypothetical:
The year is 2039. It's been a bad decade for American relations with Europe, between the President's 2026 revelation that FVEYS had been aware of Ukraine's plans to sabotage Nord Stream, the 2027 "annexation" of Greenland - accomplished without Danish consent via a referendum in Greenland - and the 2029 Sino-American war, which ended as abruptly as it began when the United States retaliated against a devastating Chinese conventional first strike on its naval and air assets by using nuclear weapons against the Chinese amphibious fleet in harbor.
It's also been a bad decade for Europe generally. Since their pivot to China, they've been subject to escalating tariffs from the United States. Their new chief trade partner is still finding unexploded mines in its coastal areas, and has been spending money on domestic disaster clean up - as devastating as the US nuclear weapons strikes were, the fallout from Taiwan's missile attack on the Three Gorges Dam was more devastating, even if it was not radioactive. And Russia, still licking its wounds, has not been inclined to forgive or forget the EU's support for Ukraine - which still weighs down Europe considerably, as Russia's destruction of its energy infrastructure has resulted in Ukraine drawing power from the European grid, starving it of resources.
Perhaps it is to distract from the economic malaise and renewed impetus for Catalan secession that Spain has been pushing the issue of Gibraltar harder than usual, and in 2039 a long-awaited referendum takes place. To everyone's surprise, Gibraltar votes - narrowly - to assert its sovereign right to leave English governance, opening the door to its long-awaited return to Spanish territory. However, England refuses to recognize the referendum, citing alleged voter irregularities, possible Russian interference, and the facial implausibility of the results given past elections, and moves to reinforce Gibraltar with additional troops. The EU makes various official statements, resolutions, and pronouncements that England is to respect the will of its voters.
When England refuses to respond to Brussels, the Spanish military overruns Gibraltar's tripline defense force. England responds with airstrikes from its naval task force, only to lose her only operational aircraft carrier to a Spanish submarine. Deprived of air cover for a surface fleet, England plans to conduct a far blockade of the Strait with nuclear submarines and, to facilitate this, launches cruise missile strikes on Spanish maritime patrol aircraft. Spanish intelligence assesses that US recon assets were involved in facilitating the strike, and retaliates by announcing the Strait of Gibraltar is closed to US traffic, contrary to international law.
The United States, which has already provided material aid to England during the conflict, declares a state of war exists between the United States and Spain (again!). With US naval assets depleted due to the war with China, Congress issues letters of marque and reprisal, authorizing the search and seizure of any ship that is or may be carrying military or dual-purpose goods to Spain.
In practice, this is nearly any ship with a European destination, and US venture capitalists have a very broad definition of what constitutes "dual-purpose goods" and "Spanish destination." It's not long before all of continental Europe of smarting under the humiliation of having their ships boarded and cargoes seized by American privateers, who within six months are operating effectively in both the Arabian Sea and the Atlantic. With Spanish naval assets tied up in a game of cat-and-mouse with British nuclear submarines, Europe must decide whether to continue enduring the consequences, or commit its naval assets to breaking the Anglo-American stranglehold and restoring its freedom of navigation.
(Do I think any of the above is likely? Not particularly. But it was fun to write up! I'd be interested to hear your scenario.)
That was a fun read!
Thanks :)
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You reversed the incentive structure of cutting a deal.
The issue with this framing is that in the non-hypothetical the EU is already getting bent over a barrel by China. This is most notable in the field of green technology (solar panels, EVs, etc.), where for a lot of notable (and sometimes ethically questionable) reasons the Chinese state owned / backed enterprises have cornered the European markets in fields that the Europeans a decade or so thought they would dominate. Moreover, the expectation of China as a forever growth market has given way to the general recognition of PRC mercantilist strategy of IP theft and domestic protectionism, which limits than reverses chinese market share of industrial production, i.e. the great big German hope.
There are other fields and contexts as well, but the construct of a guaranteed versus uncertain screwing has since been passed by the paradigm that Europe is already getting screwed by the one that is presented as the hypothetical lesser risk.
As such, this framing should be reversed for understanding the actor perspectives. There is no choice about Europe being bent over a barrel now- it's already happening- but it's already happening with the Chinese, whereas the potential US risk may be mitigated by cutting a deal.
This confuses money flows between various actors, which undermine the monetary argument.
The 2022 China-EU trade balance was roughly 390 billion Euros in China's favor. The 2022 US-EU trade balance was about 130 billion in the EU's favor. Europe is already dealing with a transactional power, and paying quite a bit for the privilege.
The issue with your framing is that you neglect a third and more relevant patron-client relationship: the protectorate. In a protectorate relationship, the patron party subsidizes the client rather than extracts the resources. In the US-European context, this subsidy has been through granting the Europeans favorable access to US markets without reciprocity for US firms to access European markets since the early Cold War.
While in economic terms there is no meaningful difference between raising taxes or decreasing subsidies, in diplomatic terms there is a difference between demanding money and offering less of it.
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The US military umbrella, while nice, is unnecessary against russia’s second rate military (insert joke about joining the ukrainian military umbrella instead).
If the US and China go at it, it would be far better for us to sit on the sidelines than to be stuck in the US supermarket. The manager’s already raising prices in peacetime, we’d better get out before he turns desperate and asks us to pay in blood.
What is the threat of ‘the US becoming hostile’? Is the US going to double the tariffs to punish us from walking away because of the tariffs? Or is the threat war, blockade, invasion? If so , then the normal human pride reaction would be to militarize, get more nukes, and cooperate with US enemies, not accept US blackmail.
But neither I nor the rest of europe appears to believe that is a real threat – what you interpret as an inability to build a large army, I view as unwillingness because of a perceived lack of need: see minimal percent of GDP invested in the military, lack of nukes despite know-how.
Tacitus famously said that the Secret of the Empire was that an emperor did not have to be made at Rome . In other words, that the senate’s power was a sham and the ‘first senator among equals’ was in reality a military dictator.
Is the US secretly a military dictator, even though we peripherals pretend it’s a business partner, or worse, a friend? To me the strongest argument against is that allied US countries who could retaliate militarily after a US invasion (France, UK) have no meaningfully different politics and geopolitics compared to countries who couldn’t (Germany, Spain, Italy, Japan, etc). If anything, western nuclear powers seem even more eager to support the US, which is the opposite of what you would expect from 'hard' power relations.
Why is the manager being desperate if he no longer subsidizes your purchases?
Again, bad market metaphors are bad metaphors, but the US economic relationship with Europe- the 'supermarket'- is not a net moneymaker for the US. The trade balance between the US and EU is, and has for decades been, in Europe's favor, in part because of trade barriers such as the European common market wall.
If you want to make a marketplace metaphor, this is the market selling to the consumers at a loss. There can be benefits for the US side of the of the trade (advantage to the specific industries benefiting more), there can be non-monetary gains from providing subdisized services, but if you want to model the relationship as a commercial transaction (shopper and supermarket), the supermarket stops losing money the sooner it gets out of the business of subsidizing goods.
This is a mercantilist perspectives that get involved in arguments of why mercantilism isn't a good strategy for countries even if it makes sense for businesses, and service-vs-good economy differences, but the business case for the US-European relationship is not 'the Europeans bring in more commercial profits than costs.'
You are not in conflict with Donald Trump when you say you do not believe that there is no real threat, you are in agreement. What you consider blackmail is just the natural extension of that consensus.
The American-European economic relationship for the better part of the last century has been an extension of the Cold War American-European strategic alliance. But instead of the classic hegemon relationship of military protection in exchange for preferential market access for the hegemon (hegemon provides client protection in exchange for money), the Cold War alliance was the inverse- the Americans gave the Europeans preferential market access in exchange for strategic deference. This started with the Marshal Plan, continued with things like the trilateral agreements for getting the Japanese and Koreans during their recognistruction phases, and continued in various forms elsewhere.
If the Europeans are uninterested, unable, and/or otherwise unwilling to provide strategic deference- particularly due to a lack of mutual need- there is no strategic basis for continuing to pay for the strategic relationship.
The result of this what you call 'blackmail'- threatening to no longer pay (via ending preferential trade access that were the forms of payment) for services no longer rendered (strategic deference and military partnership).
OK, so the main disagreement is that I think trade balance is irrelevant . Trade isn’t a zero sum game where the US sells ‘at loss’ because they have a trade deficit. It’s kind of the opposite really, given that trade surplus countries are accused of ‘dumping’ manufactured goods like electric cars or planes they supposedly produce at a loss.
The excellent american economic health has gone hand in hand with trade deficits, to the point that many have suspected that americans get free stuff while the rest of the world gets worthless dollars. I’m not saying it’s causal, just that trump’s domestic story of exploited americans might not play as well elsewhere, when he’s negotiating supermarket prices. Non-americans have their own exploitation story, and at least they're, you know, poorer.
Because I see trade as mutually beneficial, you can understand why trump’s threats look more like ‘blackmail’ to me , and I understand why to you or trump it’s just ‘putting pressure’.
And yet, trade balance is incredibly relevant to a supermarket metaphor. The supermarket is in the business iof maintaining a positive trade balance with its customers, because if the supermarket does not then then supermarket goes out of business. This is, in fact, the basis of the threat to go to another (China) supermarket- it is a threat to reduce the trade income with MuricaMart, on the assumption that MuricaMart makes a profit off of trading with you.
If you think a supermarket's profitability is irrelevant to the interest of a supermarket staying in business, you are not talking about a supermarket.
Because the trade balance was itself a trade- a systemic trade bias in European favor (thanks to higher tariffs against American goods than for European goods) in exchange for European military cooperation against the American geopolitical rival. That prioritization of shared security over money was the positive sum dynamic that motivated the initial alliance beyond the monetary cost.
When the Europeans are not interested (as you are not) or able (as the continent is not) in upholding that positive-sum game, then the negative-sum game of trade flows absent other interests reasserts itself.
Good news! Donald Trump will graciously allow the Europeans to be free of that accusation by magnanimously leveling trade barriers and trade deficits that the Europeans currently have over the United States. He will even support the Europeans in raising their own anti-dumping tariffs on any global overproducers, of which the most notable is China.
If you are poor, what do you think you have to offer for preferential trade access to the American market?
Remember that the approval of European public is not required for the end of the structural basis of the European-American alliance via the end of American economic subsidies to the poorer European public from the American end. (Arguably, European public opinion has already approved of this from the European end, by continuing to vote for decades of demilitarization and increasing strategic autonomy before there was an end to advantageous trade terms.)
The American public, at least, has in the last election indicated it is not convinced that major trade deficits are the cause of American economic health, as opposed to unnecessary costs that lowered them more than they could have otherwise risen. They may be wrong, but being wrong does not change ambivalence for ending subsidies to other continents, despite the near-term economic disruption that could bring.
The question for the European public, as a result, is what does it want to offer- if does and if it can- to keep some manner of American subsidies coming, even if at a reduced rate.
Apparently not, since you misunderstand my position (or seem to believe it is Trump's). Instead, let me try to place your position and the Trumpian position in an inconvenient context.
You see trade as mutually beneficial, but you do not want to deliver what was traded in the original Euro-American alliance- Europe's military-strategic deference against the American geopolitical rival.
The Trumpian perspective is that this is fine! This is your sovereign choice. He just also does not see a point in continuing to provide concessions that were initially provided for such a military-strategic deference deal. He will not blame you for it if you think it's a bad deal. He doesn't think it's a good deal either. That's why he's willing to reduce it.
The inconvenient context is that this is only blackmail if there is an expectation that European market access preferences are an entitlement that should be provided regardless of degree European strategic alignment.
If there is no European entitlement to preferential market access, then what we are observing is not blackmail, but the mutually consenting unraveling of a former trade deal: the Europeans no longer want to offer strategic deference, and the Americans no longer want to subsidize the Europeans.
Buying an item in the supermarket (or trading beans for bacon with my neighbour) is a mutually beneficial transaction. I don’t owe walmart military service afterwards.
Was this military-support-for-one-sided-tariffs agreement commented on by anyone at the time (preferably european)? These needlessly complicated ‘subventions’ breed confusions. Next time we’ll take it in cash, not in trade.
You’ve had a way bigger deficit against china than us for a long time. What did they agree to do for you in order to get this preferential treatment? We have a big deficit against saudi arabia – is that a subsidy too?
The average tariff between US-EU is 3%. I don’t mind equalizing if you find an ‘unfair’ percent here and there, but it’s not going to meaningfully change the balance of trade, because it depends on other characteristics of the economy. So Trump is still going to claim exploitation and raise tariffs 25 % and so the people, agreeing to disagree, will mutually consent to the unraveling of mutually beneficial trade.
If the supermarket is losing money selling to you, it is not a mutually beneficial transaction.
A transaction is only mutually beneficial for the supermarket if both parties are getting something they want that is worth more (to them) than what they give up. What the supermarket wants in exchange for your purchases is money. If the supermarket is losing money on the deal, it is not getting more than it loses.
Because Walmart is not subsidizing you for a military alliance. Which is why the supermarket metaphor is, again, bad. The European-American alliance relationship is not like your relationship with Walmart.
It's fine that you don't want to provide military support to your allies. It's even fine if you don't want military allies. Just don't expect to benefit from economic benefits provided in exchange for a military alliance without the military alliance.
...yes. There is plenty of historical documentation on the strategic rational of the Marshal Plan, from both sides of the Atlantic. It is not hard to find. Nor is the history of the European-Japanese and European-Korean trade relations.
You can search for it on your own if you are curious, though I'd actually recommend against the Europeans for anything more recent (since the EU's creation), since the EU establishment has significant interest incentives to downplay, ignore, or reframe why US-EU tariff barriers are at the level they are. The general EU-adjacent policy sphere refrain is that EU tariff walls don't meaningfully hinder American trade with Europe, but also that equivalent tariff barriers is very bad.
If you insist, pending your ability to arrange such. Mercenaries with little military capabilities to offer have little ability to dictate terms, however, and cash transfers are less enduring than trade concessions.
And you'll note that Trump has been an even larger advocate of tariffs against the Chinese than against the Europeans. This is a poor whataboutism, given the politician involved.
As for what the Chinese agreed to- the answer is they didn't, nor did they need to beyond some promises for market reforms that they've largely ignored. The post-Cold War US administrations thought integrating China into global markets markets would lead to political liberalization, which would have been the 'benefit.' This was expected to occur naturally. It did not occur / has not occured, and is generally considered a major strategic mistake of the Clinton administration.
No, European purchases of middle eastern energy is transactional. Notably, the Arabs are making a profit off of providing their good/service to the Europeans at market rates.
There is no meaningful 'average tariff.' Averaging non-comparable categories leads to meaningless numbers, given the difference in the scale of the economies those tariffs apply to and the relative importance applied to them.
To bring a relevant specific category: automobile manufacturing. During the first Trump administration, it was considered extremely provocative when Trump raised the import tariff of 2.5% on European cars, in a context of importing 1.15 million cars for around 43 billion. At the time, the European tariff barrier for automobiles was 10%, in a market about 260k US cars exported for around 6 billion.
Even if there was an entire category of X-but-small trade volume at 0% tariffs, that wouldn't mean the 'average' tariff was 5%.
The characteristics of the economic differences is the point of the protectionism.
From a macroeconomic perspective, the US primarily exports services and resources, and inputs manufactured goods. This is in part a result of the American macroeconomic decision to export manufacturing during globalization, which significantly impacted American manufacturing capability while bolstering other parts of the world- especially China. Various parts of those industrial base losses were relevant to military production rates, as military industry is converted from / tied to domestic industrial manufactuing capacity.
The Americans are in the process of re-industrializing, for strategic and other reasons. Part of that is setting the rules so that the economic incentives of companies isn't to immediately decamp industry and then sell from outside of the US to the US. These are characteristics of the economy that are being deliberately changed.
In this respect, the Americans are aligning to a European norm. The Europeans were embracing industrial policy as a systemic government priority well before the Americans, and won the argument. Trump, Biden, and now Trump again are adopting a more European-understanding of the value of trade barriers.
There is not a mutual consensus that it is mutually beneficial trade. That is a point you do not acknowledge because you do not want to agree that it is not mutually beneficial, even though your concession is not necessary, by definition, for there to be a lack of mutual consensus.
You may think the trade is mutually beneficial, and you may think that the Americans should feel the trade is mutually beneficial, but your thoughts do not matter for whether the Americans in question believe it is mutually beneficial trade. If they do not, they will not continue as if it is.
The question, as raised earlier, is what you are willing to offer to make it convincing to the Americans that it is in their interest. Given that they do not believe the current exchange ratio is favorable, you can either increase incentives, or decrease perceived costs.
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First off, Russia is currently eating Europe's largest military land power for lunch. When they finish digesting, they will be bigger and stronger than they are now, both by virtue of having acquired a larger military and by virtue of gaining invaluable combat experience, including against Europe's most modern weapons systems. (This isn't a fringe view! This is the US/NATO military assessment of the situation!) Meanwhile, Europe (which nearly ran out of munitions in 2011 fighting a minor war of choice against Libya and had to be bailed out by the United States) is militarily weaker now than it was before the conflict, in no small part due to having donated large numbers of its weapons systems to Ukraine.
Secondly - if the US pulls out of NATO/Europe, it should not be taken for granted that "Europe" will act as a collective. That's the risk, I think - not Russia deciding it wants to fight a unified Europe, but rather Russia engaging in coercive diplomacy against e.g. Estonia and Germany, France and Spain deciding they don't care.
If Europe is China's trading partner, and the US and China go at it, the US may close shipping lanes to China, either by a blockade or just incidentally through e.g. mining Chinese waters. (India may try this as well in a conflict, but I think they have less capability to do so). The reverse is unlikely - China probably wouldn't try to threaten Atlantic shipping. The likely threat, I think, isn't Europe getting drawn into a war so much as their chief trading partner no longer being able to trade.
Over the long run of state relations, there is always the threat of nation-states becoming hostile to each other if they do not share interests. Personally, I think that American planners recognize a unified Europe (and China) as the only likely competitors to their dominance over the long course of history. If Europe begins to act in a unified fashion, we should expect the United States to react accordingly. (This will be by UK-style "offshore balancing" rather than "declaring war on the continent.") In fact, I would argue that the United States has already acted in this fashion.
Does Europe [broadly] have a normal human pride reaction? For instance, in 2014, Russia threatened to cut off gas supplies to Europe. Instead of remilitarizing, Germany...doubled down on energy deals with Russia. (This was not in alignment with US interests or desires at all, in case you're under the idea that Germany is in lockstep with the States.)
I agree there is - or was - a perceived lack of need, prior to 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea. And, a mere 9 years later, Germany has finally hit their NATO 2% defense spending target. Look, I'm not saying it's impossible for Europe to reindustrialize and remilitarize in the long run. But I am saying that they haven't demonstrated the ability to do so. I think it's reasonable to assume that it will be a difficult and expensive task.
I don't think it's necessarily wise or helpful to reduce complex geopolitics to simplistic roles like "friend" "military dictator" "business partner" etc. This is particularly true when US policies are not towards Europe as a whole (although I've spoken reductively at this level) but are towards each of the separate European states, and its relations with states such as England are different to its relations with states such as France or Germany. In fact, I think a lot of the US relationship with Europe after World War Two is best explained by understanding England's strategy and foreign policy. England has, with some degree of success, managed to get the United States to embrace England's goals as its own - this is most obvious when it comes to things like "entering World Wars on England's side" and somewhat more subtle when it comes to the goals of e.g. NATO. Which were - as per the words of its first Secretary General, an Englishman - “keep the Soviet Union out, the Americans in, and the Germans down.” Does that make the US a military dictator? Friend? Business partner? Maybe a bit of all three. Maybe it depends a bit on where and when you sit.
Over the very long course of history, the Russian empire has the ability to be a competitor for the United States. It happens to be an incompetent corrupt oligarchy which doesn’t care about economic growth. But there are possible-if-not-plausible futures where a Russian empire is a superpower again.
I don't doubt Russia's ability to be a competitor or a superpower (indeed despite its problems it is punching above its nominal GDP as a competitor!), but I think that it is more likely to be a Eurasian land power. The United States' core strategic interests are likely going to be protected as long as it maintains dominance over the seas, and I think a unified Europe or China are both much more likely to cause problems in that area.
Russia was a global superpower in 1990. While it has a natural tendency towards land power in Eurasia, it’d be foolish for strategic planners to disregard the possibility of substantial Russian global power projection. Indeed, is suspect the biggest reason for Russia’s lack of global power projection today is fiscal, rather than lack of ambition.
Fair enough - I don't disagree here. I'd suggest that even in 1990, Russia's power was more "Eurasian land power" and less "maritime rival" although they were building out their naval capability tremendously. Certainly if fiscal restraints were removed (and some technical knowledge rebuilt - Russia has had a dearth of shipbuilding expertise since the fall of the USSR, as I understand it) I could see them becoming a maritime power. But I suspect for the foreseeable future their naval power will remain limited. Perhaps this flatters my biases, as I'd prefer to believe that the US and Russia throwing down in Eastern Europe is a solvable problem rather than a cycle that's doomed to repeat due to mutually clashing core strategic interests.
I've been surprised before, though (and I generally tend to think Russia is in a better position than people are willing to give it credit for, so maybe this is not a good departure from form for me?) so maybe I'll be wrong again!
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Building submersible suicide drones is extremely cheap though.
How do cheap submersible suicide drones solve any of the problems I outlined?
You don't need conventional navy if you sink everything that moves.
How are you going to deploy a "sink everything that moves" drone force from Europe to the Strait of Malacca?
Why do we need to project force in the Strait of Malacca?
Not sure who "we" is, but if you are Europe and you've pivoted to China as your main trading partner, and China goes to war with the US or India (as in the scenario Tree and I cooperatively outlined) the answer may be "to protect trade with China."
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Sabotaging the ability of large nations to sabotage the shipping of small ones, I guess. Worst case I suppose shopping by sea becomes generally suicidal for everyone.
If your drones are capable of escorting shipping from Italy to China they are no longer cheap. And since ship interdiction is likely to be via submarine or aircraft, a submersible suicide drone will be useless unless you add on a sonar and radar array. And, you'll either need the suicide drone to fly or you'll need to add on surface-to-air missiles to shoot down the aircraft. But then at that point you might as well not make it a suicide drone and just add on torpedoes as well, to interdict the submarines. And since it's risky to hunt for submarines using only an array that is attached to your own craft and we don't want our suicide drone to be sunk by an enemy submarine, you'll want space to park a helicopter with a dipping sonar to do dedicated submarine hunting.
At which point you've made an escort frigate.
I don't think suicide drones are dumb. But the OG "submersible suicide drone" is called a torpedo, and I think submersible suicide drones are best thought of as extended-range torpedoes, not replacements for ships or submarines.
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