Modern Warfare

A bit disjointed, as it was written in a hurry, but here we go...

I wonder if, when the Russia / Ukraine debacle is over, it will be shown that the most effective form of warfare in an interconnected world is economic and informational, rather than using armaments -  whether the threat of violence alone doesn't work, but the world crippling your economy does. 

We can be justified in asking which has been more effective - NATO or the EU?  What has happened certainly a good argument for the EU as a force for good, despite Germany's reticence. 

NATO has 30 member states, 28 of which are European, 21 of those 28 are in the EU. EU states comprise 75% of European NATO members. This will increase with the admission of Bosnia Hertzegovina and Georgia to both the EU and NATO. With its recent spending announcement, Germany will become the 3rd largest military in the world, after America and China. High Time for an EU Army as part of NATO, despite German rearmament (which will be neutralised within the EU by trade), rather than independent countries. Whether that's unanimously possible remains to be seen, but Russia, in its present guise, may force the issue.

Russia neutralised Germany by means of its gas exports; however, the remainder of the EU still had a stranglehold over the Russian economy. Had the rest of Europe been as beholden to Russia, then the tables might have been turned by Russia. 

The corollary of the Russian stranglehold on gas, however, is the German stranglehold on cash for that gas, but only if Germany accounts for a good percentage of Russian gas. While Germany was reliant on Russia's gas, Russia was reliant on German money in exchange for that gas, so it kept flowing. The questions is, who needs what most. 

Countries that trade together stick together but, what's happened so far shows that becoming too reliant on another country puts you at its mercy and you lose sovereignty as a consequence. When dealing with stable democracies, that's not much of a problem, as the trade will prevent them waging war on each other; however, when one of those is a rogue state, it becomes very dangerous.

Trade cannot be asymmetric and at the overwhelming advantage of one party only. The West is reliant on power, whether that's gas or oil, and that puts it in a weak position geopolitically. It's the oil rich nations that seem to have a high proportion of countries with questionable human rights among them.

There have to be cases where trade is asymmetric but, if those countries can be integrated politically, through a federation, then the power of one over the other is lessened. That, however, can only be achieved for countries that border each other, are stable democracies and have similar sized economies.

Reverting for a minute to the economic side, Russia can raise money from the companies owned by the oligarchs but, assuming money comes mainly from the population, to raise $1bn it has to levy a tax of $6.88 per person. For America it's $3.00 per person. For the EU it's $2.22 per person. America and the EU have a simple numeric advantage in raising money.

On the information side, it has been reported that 75% of Russians support the war. Some of those supporters will be of the idiotic 'my country, right or wrong' brigade, but most will be subject to Putin's propaganda, which works, providing you control the narrative and severely censor the independent media. 

The weakness of global communications today is that it is trunked via a terrestrial network, which is easy to monitor and switch off. To overcome this there needs to be a global network that's based in the sky using satellites. Blocking downlink signals is possible, but only within line of sight of the receiving station, making reception much easier. Cost, however, is currently an issue.

It has also shown that having a cause to die for (Ukraine) makes for a motivated nation, whereas having no cause to die for (Russia) is a hindrance.