Goodbye Grandma Nancy!

Andy's grandmother Nancy Lundgren passed away last week. She was 92 years old. We'll all miss her!

In her last message to me she wrote that she had read all my blog. A few years have passed since, and still when I write I sometimes wonder if she'd enjoy reading my post. So, it's only fiting that I post a last reminder of her here.

That she was a strong, wonderful woman it sounds a bit like a flat understatement of all her personality and yet I cannot find more words to write at the moment. Perhaps I will add more later on. For now I am including a last picture with her, Andy and some of the children when we last visited the US. It was in 2019. Goodbye Grandma! I hope you had a fun week up there!

(Economic) War with Russia. Western Strategy: Bleed it Dry!

Russia is the largest country in the world. It also has the largest stockpile of nuclear weapons with the largest combined destructive power in the world. But, in other ways, Russia is tiny.

Russia's population is tiny. At 140 000 000 people, Russia is 9th in the world in terms of number of people, just above Mexico and below Bangladesh. Russia's totals over half of the population of Brazil, Nigeria, Pakistan and Indonesia, but Russia's people are much older.

For example, compared to Russia, Nigeria has just under 4 times more people under 14 than Russia, just over 3 times more people in the 15-24 years range, and slightly more working adults (24-54). In other words, Nigeria might have more of a future than Russia. Russia has just over twice as many older adults (55-64) than Nigeria and slightly over three times more retired people (over 64).

Afghanistan has more than half as many children than all of the Russian Federation. Yet it is these precious few children that are now turned into cannon fodder, killed and left to rot in the marshes of Ukraine. Russia has precious few of them.

Not only has Russia relatively few people, but Russia's people are also poor. Before the sanctions, in terms of GDP per capita, Russians were about as poor as people in Romania, Turkey, Oman, Croatia, Malaysia, Panama or Kazakhstan, Chile or Taiwan.

Before the invasion, Russians earned about twice as much as Ukrainians, making the conquest of Ukraine not a very attractive option. Ukrainians earn about the same as people living in Cuba, Iran, Moldova, Paraguay, Egypt, Albaina, Columbia or Brasil.

The western strategy in the war with Russia is now clear: Bleed them dry. Aim for the weakest points: money and people. Be gentle. Take the people away if you can. Ukraine now offers each deserting Russian soldier 5 million rubles, considerably more than I proposed in my earlier letter to the president and blog post.

The EU is considering giving soldiers who choose to desert asylum with unemployment benefits and the right to stay. It might follow up by giving all Russians refugee status, the right to immigrate and settle in the EU alongside the Ukrainians and be friends again. Among the Russian and Ukrainian people I know, the situation never changed. They stayed friends, and were brought closer together by the common desire to have no war in Europe.

The Nuclear Threat: A chance for Victory?

These measures make Russia more Russian. More empty. More Poor. All that will be left is Putin and his nuclear bombs. Hopefully, without the technology to deploy them into populated cities in Western Europe and the US.

The Russian strategy should be to steer the conflict towards a battlefield where Russia has a strategic advantage. To my mind, that means nuclear war. Russia's leadership isn't concerned about its people dying. They are far less sensitive to the danger of atomic bombs being used against them because it's a huge country with relatively low population density and so it will survive a nuclear attack better that Western Europe. This war can be viewed, after all, very much like a suicide mission for Putin. Die together with his Russia, not alone.

Thus, it may be in Russia's interest for the war to escalate quickly and bend the truth in some way to justify using atomic bombs pergolas, I think, against the West. Then it will end in a few days or weeks at most.

We can only hope that Russia's methods for delivering the bombs to their targets aren't working. We can only hope that their planes and rockets are old and can be shot down from the sky. Or that their nuclear submarines can't come close to a large city like Los Angeles and destroy it.

Russia has a reasonable chance to emerge victorious from a Third World War. It has no chance in a conventional one. Its economic losses and loss of status cannot be easily reversed. Thus, Putin's Russia, as long as Putin exists, may well be on a one way road to a world war.

Diplomatic Agreement, followed by retirement?

The alternative is for Putin to end the war through an agreement with Zelensky and then retire to let the opposition have a chance at leading Russia. The next president could be Vladimir Kara Murza, who recently visited Washington to discuss the future of Russia and Ukraine. Russians have been known for being kind to their politicians: e.g., Boris Yelten and Mikhail Gorbachev have had a good life after renouncing leadership (ok, there was Anastasia and her family, but this was before presidents and she was a woman after all). George W. Bush is happily painting in a well-earned retirement after his invasion of Iraq. Even Joseph Stalin, who is believed to be the most murderous dictator in world history, died at 74 in his own bed after a stroke.

It may be a question of what Putin wants: a place in history next to Stalin or a quiet old age with his mistresses and children and of what he can get. If the politicians and oligarchs who support him lose their money, it might not be a problem for Putin, but it does set a precedent for a form of neo-fascism that makes investors feel unsafe since very few of the very rich can justify their gain. I don't think staying in power and continuing this proxy war for years is an option at this point, but I could be wrong. I think it has to end in weeks or at most months. Yes, Russia's economy is tiny, but all of Europe's satellites have been launched by them, and, of course, there is the gas and the oil that can't be shed off in weeks. So, Russia does have what to negociate with, and Putin is no stranger to sales that result in loss for his own country -- after all he began his political career by selling $93 millions worth of metals for some trucks of food that never arrived -- and so he might not be the patriot that everyone considers him to be. If the war turns nuclear, it still ends quickly, it just destroys so much more.

An (unlikely) end: Zelensky becomes president of Russia and remains the president of Ukraine

I've been thinking of a way to end the war that would not be a disaster for the world, for Ukraine and for Russia. So many people have died already. So much has been destroyed and this path continues without an end in sight. People believe that a regime change in Russia is the solution. But what kind of regime change? If Putin dies tomorrow (i.e., before a resolution is reached), Russia will be left in turmoil. Its economy is crippled, and will be crippled further by the thirst for punishment which is so popular today. There is no shortage of people who cause harm when they have power. So, I worry that Putin will be replaced by somebody else who does even more harm in a Russia that is like a post-WWI Germany. I'm not Russian or of Russian origin, yet I see that this permanent threat it represents could only be defeated if Russia becomes a stable, democratic power. Of course, there is no magical wand, but giving Zelensky the presidency for both countries would be a start, and it could stop both the war and the collapse of Russia.

I see no problem with unifying Russia and Ukraine -- it just has to be under the right kind of leadership. Of course, the down side of that is that Russia could become strong again, and this whole war is aimed at bringing it and Ukraine down or bringing down Europe or both.

The war to end all wars?

We've heard this before. The idea was floated during World War I and after it. People thought that we'd fight this war, the "right" side will win, and then we'd build a world where war would not happen. Germany and Austria started the war with a flimsy veil, the assasination of an archduke. Like always, it was easier to paint the world in black and white or good and evil. Throughout the war and after that the Kaiser of Germany was deemed to be "evil" or mad just like Putin is today. The Germans were the agressors after all. So, when the allied forces won, Germany was severly punished, and had a huge debt that it had to repay. The punishment, and the economic turmoil that followed led to World War Two. By then only about 1% of the debt was paid. Then the role of the evil, mad person was played by Hitler. Later the role was temporarily filled by Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden and Bashar al-Assad. Today, it's Putin. We sanction Russia. We block its bugdet, we block its oil, and blame Putin for everything - he is evil, he is mad, he is the cause of war, it's Putin's war. Everybody cheers and seems to think the powers to be are doing everything they can. We cheer sanctions. We cheer when weapons are sent and we ask for more weapons for Ukrainans who have to defend themselves to survive the invasion. What we don't see is a way out of this war.

We've seen this sort of cheering during the pandemic, but the pandemic seems to have suddenly ended. The media is only able to focus on one story-line at a time. Restrictions are quietly being lifted. COVID-19 is no longer news worthy, but back in 2019-2020 every power to be thought the zero-COVID policy was a great idea. They practiced selective track and trace of some of the cases they knew about when it was known COVID had already spread beyond any tracking possibility and people cheered while COVID positive patients were placed in hospitals and old people homes to make the world a safer place. They'd say it's the first time you can stay home, do nothing and help. Well, staying home, and avoiding crowds does reduce virus spread, but the zero-COVID policy took that to an extreme that crippled institutions and people while we cheered.

I take the train to work and I walk to go shopping with a bag with wheels, which helps me do the carrying, pulled behind me. So, the increase in the oil price might not matter to me directly. I do fly two or three times a year and I am known to take my children along. I own a car, which I occasionaly drive when I take the children out. I have also been wearing the same coat for the more than ten years and I know that very little of what I do matters in the grand scheme of things. However, I don't see the sanctions as a solution. I don't see the way out of this war yet, and I don't see a way out of future wars.

The US is a superpower. So, it was not punished for invading Syria, Afganistan, Iraq, etc. The US cannot be punished since there is nobody stronger than them yet. OK, perhaps China is getting to be stronger in many ways, but they seem to want to do their own invading and Xi plays a similar role to Putin only next door to Russia. But punishing is not the point. Stopping the war, picking up the pieces and avoiding a similar tragedy from following the same script is what is needed. So far we have replaced world wars with these proxy wars that follow a script, and happen over, over again until when? until nuclear war? They often had the US on one side and Russia on the other. Each arming people and causing fraticide. This war is different in that Russia is the aggressor, and not the US. It's still fraticide since Ukraine was once part of Russia and many people there speak Russian, but want to be free. Russia has been punished for the Ukraine invasion. The punishment has not stopped the war. It's like expecting austerity measures to fix an enconomy. They might be popular, but they do not work. So, what else can be done? The popular answer is to destroy the evil side. But are the people who fight in this war on either side evil? World War I and II had no winners. But how do proxy wars differ? They are not on the soil of anyone who matters, which makes it easier to gain from such wars. Of course, proxy wars should not happen. War should not happen. There must be a way to stop it and to stop future wars. But how? Where is the golden bridge that Russia and Ukraine can follow to end this war?

Oh, moving weapons and personnel is expensive, and they just got started. So, the show must go on. There is a Serbian proverb that has been quoted all over twitter and facebook. It says that during wartime politicians send weapons, rich people give food, and the poor give their children. Then when the war is over, the politicians get back leftover amunition (and make more), the rich grow more food, and the poor search for the graves of their children. All past proxy wars have taken many years. The people in the country that was to be destroyed always fought for freedom, and ended up less free than before the war. However, none of the aggressors were sanctioned before. Today we sanction Russia without stating when the sanctions will end and without providing a golden bridge for the war to end. Is Putin really mad? Will he make a suicidal move and use atomic bombs or is it just another proxy war with the script slightly altered where Putin is playing the lead role and the sanctions add the spice that scares and makes the play exciting? The world bets on this latter scenario. And howevermuch it all seems like a play we've seen before, the war is real. It should stop without further escalation in days not years since the people who die are real, too.

How much is a soldier's life worth?

The life of a Russian soldier is worth 20 000 USD. Here's how I got this number:

Putin is paying the families of dead soldiers 7 million rubles. Right now, 1 Ruble is about 1 cent. Thus, the families of dead soldiers get 70 000 dollars. Other news sites report the lump sum to be around 40,000 USD , but Putin says are additional compesations offered to each family member. So, I am going to take his statement at face value and assume the compensation is 70 000 dollars.

Ukraine, at the same time, offers soldiers 5 million Rubles if they surrender.

Thus, a soldier may choose to surrender and stay alive with the 5 millions from Ukraine or fight and die for Putin and get 7 million for his family. I suggested something similar on this blog, two days before such an action was actually taken. The offer to surrender and be paid is still valid. The soldiers will also be reimbursed for the millitary equipement they bring along.

The difference is the price of the soldier'a life, and it's less than 20,000 USD. Unfortunately, this offer from Ukraine's minister of defence has not made the war turn around, yet. If I had a son or daugther who chose to fight to feed his family, I'd want him/her to surrender and live! Russia has a fertility rate well under 2 children per woman, which means most Russians are losing their only child or perhaps one of two children or both children in this war. Of course, the compensation money may or may not be obtained, e.g., not all the deaths are reported. Many will be missing in action. Russia is known to have not compensated the families of ordinary soldiers from prior conflicts.

A foray into Putin's mind

In his war declaration, Putin told the world that he is going on a mission to denazify Ukrain, a country with a Jewish president, who speaks Russian.

How is Ukraine Nazi? What does he mean? What does he think?

In the following, I will put myself in Putin's shoes. I do not agree with the opinions and ideas below, but, I believe, Putin does.

Putin's world is skit between Putin's Russian East and the Nazi West. Nazi, in his mind, is a way of saying "not Putin's", i.e., the other side, the opposition. The Nazi West is dominated by Nazi Germany, which never stopped being Nazi, in the same way Russia never stopped being Soviet and Putin's office still smells of Stalin.

Germany has started two world wars and lost both. Upon losing the first, the country was allowed to recover and be, again, the strongest on the European continent. Soon after, it started the second World War.

Upon losing the Second World War, plans were put in place to destroy Germany. The purpose, as the Soviets saw it, was the prevent Germany from dominating Europe again and starting another war. The Morgenthau Plan, which was never fully implemented, has the purpose to destroy the German war machine and make sure these people disperse across the world, engage in subsidence agriculture and never raise again.

In order to prevent it from building weapons, Germany was not supposed to develop industry of any kind. This would make sure it cannot produce weapons in case of war.

The world, however, is very different today.

German industry is the engine of Europe.

Germany is one of the largest exporters of arms worldwide.

The same work ethic that led to the success of the Nazis is now powering a modern western state. It's used wise political decisions and Frauen Power to position itself at the center of the European Union, and, after Brexit, remained the unmatched in economic and financial power in the EU. It's Deutschland Über Alles, Putin may say.

After all, if Hitler would have stayed in power, the German economic machine would probably make Europe something like what it is now. United under one flag, Putin may say. And, unlike under the Soviet flag, in "the Nazi" camp, the economy works.

Russia tried hard. It deported Volga Germans to Kazakhstan and Putin's KGB friends recruited many in Putin's Dresden for sunny Siberian holidays. Those Gulags brought Nazi labour and technique to Putin's Russia, but, it didn't stick.

Now, "the Nazi" the West keeps expanding further East. One by one, former Soviet republics came under the flags of EU and NATO: Romanians, Hungarians, East Germans, the Baltic states, and the Slavs -- Poles, Yugoslavs, Bulgarians, Czechs -- all have left Putin's Russia for Nazi Europe.

Ukraine has been the beating heart of the Soviet Union. Ukraine is the better half of Russia. Ukrainian and Russian share the same alphabet and are similar languages. Furthermore, virtually all Ukrainians, and, for sure, all those who matter speak Russian. Ukraine inherited Soviet nuclear power plants and bombs, one being the infamous Cernobil.

It wisely choose to destroy the bombs, in exchange for a guarantee from NATO and the International community for territorial integrity. As it is after the case, some politicians lied. I wonder what the future holds, if that group includes the Ukrainians.

Now, Ukraine has a democratically elected president. The Servant of the People is not a servant of Putin anymore. Ukraine is trying to joint the capitalist Nazi West and, while culturally, the people are virtually the same as father East, politically, even the Russians in Ukraine are free.

Demilitarize and Denazify very likely means bringing Ukraine back into Soviet Times, back under Putin's command.

But ... Putin is losing the war. He expected his planes to be met by peasants fighting with sticks or scared enough to give him flowers. Instead, he encounters the Nazi weapons, made by the German Nazi industrial machine -- one that works with the same people and the same work ethic as in the times of the Nazis.

The conflict runs on old conflict lines. On one side the Russians -- many, poor, unskilled and not terribly well armed and on the other, the Ukrainians holding "Nazi" made guns (Nazi = German, American etc.)

The Nazis used an equivalent of the nuclear option when it comes to the sanctions against Russia. They took all Russian money. They blocked the SWIFT, making it impossible or terribly hard for Russia to use even the little money it has. A nuclear bomb -- make it a large hydrogen bomb, could have been dropped anywhere on 90% of Russian territory and caused less damage. A smaller bomb, like Hiroshima, could have been anywhere on 99% of the land.

At this point, faced dissent at home, soldiers that lay down arms and lose the war in front of an army are perceived to be much weaker, Putin may find himself entitled to use nuclear bombs.

Against Who? A Russian bomb falling on Kyiv could be too much, even for Putin. After all, Ukraine only resisted, but didn't hit Russia on its home turf. Europe and the US, however did. He wouldn't be likely to hit Eastern Europe either. That was part of Russia, and might be his again.

War is not made only with guns. Europe did expand on Putin's Soviet land. And the Swift move cause very much harm. Private Russian property was also targeted.

In Putin's world, in Europe, Germany is the leading power. Thus, should the nukes fly, it may the the leading target.

A nuclear attack would probably be suicidal for Putin, and, perhaps, Russia. Thus, he'd try to strike simultaneously, as many targets as possible. He'd hit most likely, large cities. He'd hit Western Europe, most likely, Germany, but not only.

Russia has strong recollection of their fight against Nazi Germany, so he may even get a little bit of popular support for such a wild, suicidal move.

We did cripple their economy. Now all they have is bombs. And no way out of the pointless war they started. Or, maybe, there was a point -- to incite a war with Germany and justify the bombing?

Let's hope none of these happen.

Slava Ukraine!

Will the nightmare end?

All news sites are full of the destruction and loss of life in Ukraine. We see young men, women and children die for no reason. Some are Russian. Some are Ukrainean. Some are Russian of Ukrainean origin. Some are Ukrainean of Russian origin. Outside Ukraine everyone is very agressive verbally. They want to manufacture weapons in Europe again. Countries bordering Ukraine (e.g., Romania, Poland, Lithuania) have NATO boots on the ground. Why would they waste money on weapons and troops if they wanted to stop? Politicians sanction Russia (and Belarus), and they target some of the assets of some of the oligarchs -- a very selective number-- in hopes that they could help end the war or so they say. Will the war end when it has just begun? They keep saying everything is unprecedented, but is it? Haven't both the rich and the poor lost everything in past wars? And everyone blames Putin. He is the one man who is responsible for all the aggression, but is he? is Biden responsible for everything in the US? Was Trump just as responsible even though his sentences did not make sense and did not add up?

Then there is the dream. Most people, me included, would like the war to end, and would like Putin to vanish and to see "his" Russia be replaced by a democratic Russia that ultimately joins NATO and the EU. Ukraine would join first, but the rest of the countries from former USSR would follow. And if China continues to expand, the same measures that worked with Russia will apply. Then Xi would disappear and there'd be a democratic China, and all countries would work together to defeat evils like cancer and climate change. Eventually peace and oder would stretch to Africa and the Middle East. But is this dream possible? or will it turn into a nightmare yet again? Will the nightmare from Ukraine extend?

Will targeting people with loads of money work? maybe. On average, people with money are more influencial than those without. When one does not pay their obligations and is in debt, but has money to cover what they are not paying, their assets, e.g., their cars, their bank accounts, their yachts and private jets, are blocked or frozen. Then they get scared and pay up. They say everything has a price: the life of a person, the outcome of an election or the change of a regime cost different amounts but can be bought if one goes about them in the right way. While none of these people might be able to end a war on their own (or so they say) even though they are very rich, colectively they might find a solution if they are pushed to care or at least not oppose a solution when it appears. Of course, looking at them -- a bunch old, overweight and visibly ill men -- they look more like toys being taken out of business by others like them and eventually by a younger, more modern generation than as tools that bring an end to the war. I was hopeful at first, but now I am less sure we are safe or will be safe.

Instinctively, I oppose aggression and I agree with the pope. I don't believe our politicians are correct in patting themselves on the back. They are not stronger than ever, and neither are their alliances. They have failed! and they keep failing as long as war rages on! In a country in Europe people are suddenly killing each other. Bombs fall and kill and maim and destroy. And it's convenient to have Putin. He can be blamed for everything. Suddenly Boris Johnson looks good and Emmanuel Macron even better. Biden looked weak after Afganistan, but now he is the leader of the free world. I've always thought that sanctions are like applying austerity measures when the economy fails. They answer aggresion with more aggression, and cause an exacerbation in ostilities. Ideally, one proposes solutions from which both parties would gain, and then they never go to war.