Links 35: Make Europe Dangerous Again edition
links that caught my eye
Make Europeans Dangerous Again
Europe needs to be militarily strong, says Mariska den Eelden:
Military strength is the only language people like Putin understand.
Supply Chains Matter
In discussing the recent Israeli sabotage of Hezbollah pagers, Perun makes the point that supply chains matter:
For this reason it has been the long-standing opinion of this blog that large geo-political entities, such as the EU, need to have full control of their computing and communications infrastructure, including manufacturing it all themselves.
(One quick way for the EU to achieve this might be to invite Taiwan, South Korea and Japan to join).
Israel uses Palestinian prisoners as human shields
CNN reports that Israel is forcing Palestinian prisoners to detect booby traps by activating them:
The soldier, who said his unit held two Palestinian prisoners for the explicit purpose of using them as human shields to probe dangerous places, said the practice was prevalent among Israeli units in Gaza.
“We told them to enter the building before us,” he explained. “If there are any booby traps, they will explode and not us.”
It was so common in the Israeli military that it had a name: “mosquito protocol.”
International law forbids the use of civilians to shield military activity, or to forcibly involve civilians in military operations. The Israeli Supreme Court explicitly banned the practice in 2005, after rights groups filed a complaint about the military’s use of Palestinian civilians to knock on the doors of suspected militants in the West Bank.
Zionist excuses war crimes when Israel does them
Further to the previous item, Zionist Shlomo Levin excuses war crimes when Israel does them:
CNN just published a lengthy article claiming the IDF uses Palestinians as human shields by forcing them to open doors and move furniture that may be potentially booby trapped. So now I anticipate we’ll see furious demonstrations as people living in total safety on U.S. college campuses or in European capitols express outrage and indignation that Israeli soldiers don’t risk dying from hidden explosives set by Hamas themselves but are instead forcing others to do it. Personally, my own feeling is even more anger at Hamas for prolonging the war by continuing to hide out along with their hostages in booby trapped tunnels.
I'm not a big fan of the phrase "human shields"; "human mine detectors" or "human booby-trap activators" might be more accurate, though less snappy.
According to Levin's bio he has a postgraduate degree in human rights. Hmmm:
I used to be a Rabbi, now I have a Master’s in International Law and Human Rights. I believe human rights are important even though I'm dismayed by the positions human rights activists often take, especially with regard to Israel.
Users win right to repair ice cream machines
IFixIt reports:
Ever tried to get an ice cream at McDonald’s, only to hear, “Sorry, our machine’s broken?” You’re not the only one: almost 15% of ice cream machines at McDonald’s are broken right now around the US—and in New York, it’s 32%. But today, we won more ice cream, and things should start to change.
The U.S. Copyright Office just handed down a ruling that marks an important victory for Right to Repair: we can now legally repair commercial food preparation equipment, including McDonald’s machines, without running afoul of copyright law.
This should apply to all machines of course, not just "commercial food preparation equipment".
Nuclear weapons and security guarantees for Ukraine
Anders Puck Nielsen talks about nuclear weapons and security guarantees for Ukraine:
Essentially, Ukraine cannot accept any peace deal where it doesn't have nukes or security guarantees (such as NATO membership).
As commenter @katamarankatamaranovich9986 puts it:
Lemme explain this real quick from a Ukrainian perspective.
There is literally 0 point in stopping the fight if there are no security guarantees from the West or nukes. What is stopping russia from re-arming and finishing the job in 2-5 years? It literally does not matter what russia signs or promises, we had enough of their promises. The cruise missiles we gave up after signing the Budapest Memorandum are leveling our civilian buildings now, because they were designed for delivery of nuclear weapons and are inaccurate. There can be no peace until it is safe to raise children here. The country would simply cease to exist because people would continue taking the children out to keep them safe from missiles now and safe from the draft in the future. There would be no next generation without safety. Even if the West is so unwilling to approve NATO membership that it abandons us altogether it is better to go down fighting now than face the fate of our ancestors in the 20th century. Maybe we will win, maybe we will lose, but without deterrence, there would be no future and no point in stopping fighting.
Its NUKE or NATO. As a democratic nation that once gave up nuclear weapons we would 100% rather go with NATO, but we might not have a choice at the end of the day.
Ukraine getting NATO membership might be difficult as NATO requires unanimity. Consider the difficulties Finland and Sweden had to go through.
So as an alternative to NATO, a European Military Alliance should be set up. Like NATO it would contain a mutual defence agreement. But it would also do more:
common military production
common military technical standards, to improve interoperability, building on NATO standards
no requirement for unanimity, because that means a rogue country (such as Hungary) can block everything. Instead everything is decided by a supermajority (similar to a qualified majority in the EU).
common foreign policy. This is important for common response when Russia does something bad but which is is less than war (e.g. the Skripal poisoning)
Misinformation
Matt Ridley recently posted on Twitter, about the Southport murderer:
BBC, 19 August: "The violence was started by false online rumours that the suspect in the Southport attack was a Muslim."
BBC, 29 October: "[He] has been charged with producing the poison ricin and possessing a military study of an al-Qaeda training manual."
Verify that.
To which I replied:
Every time the ruling class tries to shut something down because it is "misinformation", remember that "misinformation" just means "something the ruling class don't want you to believe".
So every time you hear the word "misinformation", realise that -- even if the particular factoid under contention happens to be false -- the ruling class is trying to pull the wool over your eyes. All ruling classes are like that: manipulating consensus reality has been a core competency of the ruling class since forever.
Thin-skinned wanker contra white poppies
On twitter I said:
Thin skinned wanker @yalding1666 subsequently blocked me, no doubt because he knows full well I'm right but can't admit it to himself.
Labour MPs contra nimbyism
The Guardian reports that 60 Labour MPs are opposing people who want to prevent electricity pylons from being built:
More than 60 Labour MPs have formed a bloc to push back against anti-pylon lobbying by Conservative and Green MPs, saying they back plans to build the pylons despite local opposition in several areas.
MPs, particularly in rural areas, have come under mounting pressure from anti-pylon activists to oppose the infrastructure. The Tories found themselves forced to commit to hold a “rapid review” of overhead pylons in their July manifesto.
The Green MP Adrian Ramsay has also campaigned in his Waveney Valley constituency against pylons, drawing criticism from the prime minister, since the pylons carry electricity from offshore wind.
Good. Personally I would have no problem if nimbies who object to electricity infrastructure were just disconnected from the electricity grid.
Nimbies cause really serious harm to the economy by preventing developments (housing, electricity, transport, etc) from happening.
Cremieux on American Elections
Cremieux Recueil says American Elections are unfair:
elections in America are unfair; they have been for a long time
Examples of unfairness, according to Cremieux, include:
ballot order, which may favour/disfavour some candidates/parties
the media being a prospiracy to promote certain views
the electoral college
Census Bureau mistakes
social media being biased for/against certain views
non-secret voting (e.g. mail in ballots) makes voters open to bribery/coercion: "if support for a given candidate is taboo, early voting, mail-in ballots, and ballot harvesting can become influence operations that push voters towards submitting votes for candidates they don’t really support"
no requirement for voter ID
To these I would add:
use of FPTP; PR is better
media and social media are owned by the rich, so obviously are biased towards them
social media consists of walled gardens controlled by big companies. Instead it should be required to interoperate using protocols such as RSS, ActivityPub, etc.
Poland to lead Europe?
Euractiv suggests Poland might lead Europe, due to divisions in Germany and France:
Poland could become Europe's political leader amid a looming government collapse in Germany and an unstable political situation in France, says Warsaw Mayor Rafał Trzaskowski, as Prime Minister Donald Tusk plans to meet EU leaders and the NATO chief to discuss the situation following Donald Trump's victory in the US.
Trzaskowski, the likely presidential candidate of Tusk's Civic Platform (PO, EPP) in next year's elections, hosted a rally in Poznań on Sunday where he discussed, among other things, the implications of Trump's return to the White House.
Trzaskowski recalled that Poland is the only NATO member that spends "almost 5% of its GDP” on defence, making it "a role model in NATO and the EU". Poland will spend more than 4% on defence objectives in 2024, with the prospect of spending as much as 4.7% in 2025.
Europe must rearm
Following the election of Donald trump, Simon Whistler says Europe Needs To Wake Up, Now, to the threat from Putin.
Excerpt:
Because thanks to the sacrifice of countless Ukrainians we still have the tiniest window of opportunity to get our shit together to all do what Poland and the Baltic states have done and hike defence spending into the stratosphere. Because if European leaders fumble this, the consequences are not going to be limited to Trump trolling them on X: instead they'll be in the form of broken buildings and burned out streets or artillery booming over European cities and to return to our continent's darkest chapters.
[Europe must either rearm] or else prepare for a world in which a country a fraction of the economic size and manpower of the EU gets to dismember our continent and decide our fates at the barrel of a gun, and if that moment ever comes don't say that nobody warned you.
In truth we should have done this in March 2022. But now is better late than never.