What caught my eye this week including the challenges facing the incoming EU Commission, is Barnier continuity Macron, America's Ukraine timidity and why isn't Labour braver?
Europe undoubtedly has trouble getting its defence industries moving. But let's not get overly impressed by Russia and its war footing economy. Pre-war, a GDP the same as Italy's. Russia can't make much. Russia is industrially incompetent. No new Migs. Or tanks, they drag them out of storage. Many of them haven't moved for 40 years, and it's not the nice dry Arizona desert. 1200 casualties a day for a cumulative total near 700,000. 1, some say 2 million Russians have fled to avoid being drafted; their finest, best educated young men mostly. There's a labour shortage. High inflation - 16% is the official number, so for sure it's higher. Russian no longer publishes most economic numbers, so it's all a guess. A war economy may give impressive looking GDP growth numbers. But everything they make is blown up. Reality is, the Russian economy is shrinking. Oil? A low price set by the Chinese. They can't increase sales because the pipelines aren't built. Whatever Europe is not doing well enough, Russia does far, far worse.
He obviously misses those Brussels' days. At least he is clear about his opposition to Brexit. Those meals with cronies in Brussels....where did they go?
Europe undoubtedly has trouble getting its defence industries moving. But let's not get overly impressed by Russia and its war footing economy. Pre-war, a GDP the same as Italy's. Russia can't make much. Russia is industrially incompetent. No new Migs. Or tanks, they drag them out of storage. Many of them haven't moved for 40 years, and it's not the nice dry Arizona desert. 1200 casualties a day for a cumulative total near 700,000. 1, some say 2 million Russians have fled to avoid being drafted; their finest, best educated young men mostly. There's a labour shortage. High inflation - 16% is the official number, so for sure it's higher. Russian no longer publishes most economic numbers, so it's all a guess. A war economy may give impressive looking GDP growth numbers. But everything they make is blown up. Reality is, the Russian economy is shrinking. Oil? A low price set by the Chinese. They can't increase sales because the pipelines aren't built. Whatever Europe is not doing well enough, Russia does far, far worse.
He obviously misses those Brussels' days. At least he is clear about his opposition to Brexit. Those meals with cronies in Brussels....where did they go?