Ask Peter: Can Other Countries Replicate the US Shale Revolution?

Energy independence has been a global priority over the past few decades, but not all of that black gold is created equal. The US has been able to capitalize on deposits of oil-bearing shale, so can others replicate this success with different types of oil?

The United States’ success isn’t quite copy and paste. Between private ownership rights ensuring personal gain, specific geological formations leading to huge deposits of oil bearing rock, and technical expertise, the US has flopped the nuts in this game of oil-poker.

There are some others that may have one or even two of these conditions, but there are plenty of obstacles they’ll have to overcome. Argentina is the outlier in all of this, since they have the shale, technical skills, and the government sets oil prices to ensure profitability for operators.

Here at Zeihan On Geopolitics we select a single charity to sponsor. We have two criteria:

First, we look across the world and use our skill sets to identify where the needs are most acute. Second, we look for an institution with preexisting networks for both materials gathering and aid distribution. That way we know every cent of our donation is not simply going directly to where help is needed most, but our donations serve as a force multiplier for a system already in existence. Then we give what we can.

Today, our chosen charity is a group called Medshare, which provides emergency medical services to communities in need, with a very heavy emphasis on locations facing acute crises. Medshare operates right in the thick of it. Until future notice, every cent we earn from every book we sell in every format through every retailer is going to Medshare’s Ukraine fund.

And then there’s you.

Our newsletters and videologues are not only free, they will always be free. We also will never share your contact information with anyone. All we ask is that if you find one of our releases in any way useful, that you make a donation to Medshare. Over one third of Ukraine’s pre-war population has either been forced from their homes, kidnapped and shipped to Russia, or is trying to survive in occupied lands. This is our way to help who we can. Please, join us.

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Israel and Iran Avoid War…For Now

Tensions between Israel and Iran have been escalating since the Hamas attacks in October, but are we going to see a full blown war between these two adversaries?

Between multiple bombings by Israel and a larger scale attack carried out by Iran, things were touch and go for a bit there. However, it appears that both sides are de-escalating the situation and will let off the gas for the time being.

Although the situation appears to be stabilizing, there could be some third party interference by a country who wouldn’t mind having a broader conflict break out…

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First, we look across the world and use our skill sets to identify where the needs are most acute. Second, we look for an institution with preexisting networks for both materials gathering and aid distribution. That way we know every cent of our donation is not simply going directly to where help is needed most, but our donations serve as a force multiplier for a system already in existence. Then we give what we can.

Today, our chosen charity is a group called Medshare, which provides emergency medical services to communities in need, with a very heavy emphasis on locations facing acute crises. Medshare operates right in the thick of it. Until future notice, every cent we earn from every book we sell in every format through every retailer is going to Medshare’s Ukraine fund.

And then there’s you.

Our newsletters and videologues are not only free, they will always be free. We also will never share your contact information with anyone. All we ask is that if you find one of our releases in any way useful, that you make a donation to Medshare. Over one third of Ukraine’s pre-war population has either been forced from their homes, kidnapped and shipped to Russia, or is trying to survive in occupied lands. This is our way to help who we can. Please, join us.

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TranscripT

Hey everybody. Peter Zeihan here, coming to you from Colorado. We’re gonna close the loop on what’s going on with Israel and Iran. in the aftermath of the Hamas attacks in October, the Iranians were needling at Israel, in order to just get some good PR in the Arab world in back home. of course, the Israelis were a little sensitive about that.

how about everything at the moment? and so when the, Iranians got a little bit too punchy, the Israeli slapped them down by bombing the Iranian consulate in Damascus and killing a large number of high ranking, leadership, for the IRGC. That’s their, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, which carries out a lot of the military operations in Syria and Lebanon and Interface’s Hezbollah.

I basically, Israel took out the entire leadership, in Iran. Couldn’t believe they went after diplomatic grounds to do it. So, you know, anyway, Iran was like, wow, wow. Okay, they’re a little sensitive right now. We need to dial this back because we were just having some fun. And clearly they’re treating this a lot more serious than we are.

So they sent all these, missiles and drones and artillery rockets into Israel as retaliation. But they telegraphed, their attack days ahead and actually provided the technical specs to the Swiss embassy, which passed it on to the United States so that the U.S. and the Brits and the Jordanians and the Israelis could basically just light it all up and, shoot them down one after the other.

And no one was hurt and no meaningful damage was done. the question then was, what’s next? Because the Americans were like, all right, hey, yeah, this is great. This is a great climbdown. You get to claim face, we get to say coalition is working, and the Israelis get to say that their Iron Dome missile defense works great.

Everybody wins. The only potential, for the ointment is looking at Israel. Are you okay? and Israel decided mostly was. So what happened this last Friday is Israel did a counter strike, on Iran. But the only thing that they took out was the air defense at a very specific military facility in Israel. Had just happens that military facility in Michigan was right next to the primary Iranian nuclear research facility.

so basically, the Iranians, the Israelis are like, yes, we’re not bro’s, but we’re cool for now. But just to underline the fact that we could have done so much more, even without any help from the United States. So at the moment, everyone is backing off, and at the moment it seems that no one in the Middle East is interested in a broader conflict, with the exception, of course, of the Russians, who would love it as a distraction.

Things I (Do and Don’t) Worry About: Global Internet

This is probably the scariest video I’ve posted for any of my Gen Z audience…that’s right, we’re talking about the one thing they can’t live without – the internet. So, just how vulnerable is the global internet?

Global internet connectivity is heavily reliant on trans-oceanic cables (sure, we have things like Starlink, but that has limited capacity to the traditional cable systems). These cable systems are fragmented and sequestered in nature, which create isolated regions. This means that there are specific points of vulnerability.

The bigger problem is that the locations of these cables isn’t all that hidden, so a group like the Houthis could target them with ease. However, the fragility of international connectivity can also be seen as a strategic advantage, because the US could cut communication channels at the drop of a hat…should they ever need to.

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First, we look across the world and use our skill sets to identify where the needs are most acute. Second, we look for an institution with preexisting networks for both materials gathering and aid distribution. That way we know every cent of our donation is not simply going directly to where help is needed most, but our donations serve as a force multiplier for a system already in existence. Then we give what we can.

Today, our chosen charity is a group called Medshare, which provides emergency medical services to communities in need, with a very heavy emphasis on locations facing acute crises. Medshare operates right in the thick of it. Until future notice, every cent we earn from every book we sell in every format through every retailer is going to Medshare’s Ukraine fund.

And then there’s you.

Our newsletters and videologues are not only free, they will always be free. We also will never share your contact information with anyone. All we ask is that if you find one of our releases in any way useful, that you make a donation to Medshare. Over one third of Ukraine’s pre-war population has either been forced from their homes, kidnapped and shipped to Russia, or is trying to survive in occupied lands. This is our way to help who we can. Please, join us.

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TranscripT

Hey, everybody. Peter Zeihan coming to you from Colorado. today is our latest entry in our ongoing series of things I do and don’t Worry about. And this one is both has to do with trans oceanic cables, which connect the continents in terms of the internet, we basically have a highly sequestered and fragmented system in North America, South America, Africa, Western Europe, Asia and South Asia and Southeast Asia.

all of these things are barely linked together. And to the degree that they are, that goes through a series of cables that go through predictable routes. So obviously, North America and South America are separate from the rest of the world by the Pacific in the Atlantic Ocean, but they’re also separated from each other, with the, Panamanian isthmus being the only point of connection.

And there’s a section called the Dorian Gap that has no roads, no rail, no pipe, no power. in terms of separating Europe from China, the Russian space has become a lot less reliable of late. And so while there are still cables across that zone, they’re not nearly as capable, as reliable as they used to be. There’s no connections between the Middle East and Africa because it goes through Israel, and that’s a connection that cannot be made.

and then South Asia and Southeast Asia have reasonable connections. Southeast Asia and China have reasonable connections. but the Himalayas stop any direct connections between South Asia and, say, China. And then, of course, countries like South Korea, Taiwan and Japan are either literal islands or functional islands. So it doesn’t take a particularly genius to find these cables and cut them, as the Houthis have already shown that they’re willing to do for some of the connections between southern Asia and Europe.

They’re routes that go through the ocean, through the Gulf of Aden, through the bad el Mandeb and the Red sea before crossing Suez and going on to Europe. so we’ve got this fractured system of 5 to 8, based on how you draw the line for connectivity systems that are linked by just a handful of cables. So it doesn’t take much genius to basically breakdown international trade in services.

the only way you could get things if the cables go down is something like Starlink, which is less than 4% of international traffic. Now, that said, that is hard to disrupt because there’s hundreds of Starlink satellites with more going up every week. if we ever get into a situation where the United States is in an information war where targets that transmit information being targeted, you can guarantee that Starlink is going to be nationalized.

As one of the first acts of the U.S government. We’re not there yet, thank God. Anyway, that’s the part I do worry about. The white part of don’t worry about is if we ever really are in a hot war with the near pure power, say for example, China. it’s not just would be disruptors like the Houthis who know where these cables are.

 

The U.S. government knows where each and every one of them is. In fact, they’re on maps. So if we get to a situation where there’s kind of a mass hacking attack from China, all we have to do is go out and cut the cables, because, let’s be honest, if we’re in a real war, the last thing that Washington is gonna be concerned about is whether or not internet connectivity and emails going back and forth across the Pacific at a high speed.

So this is something that is very easy to disrupt. And as long as you’re interested in a world that works together, that’s bad. But if we ever get to the point where it’s obvious that the world is not working together, it’s good because it means it’s easy to bring down in a matter of just a few days.

Things I (Don’t) Worry About: Water Wars

When people start talking about wars over water, everyone pictures tooth and nail, Mad Max-esqe fighting…but our imaginations might be getting away from us here. Allow me to paint a more realistic picture for you.

There are some practical limitations to water wars. Water isn’t easy to move and redirecting rivers or directional flows is time consuming, expensive, and hard to do. To add another layer of complexity to the mix, most water sources are held by countries of power (you know, water tends to help with things like food production, industrialization, growing populations, and military development). So, when a dry country decides it needs water, there’s often not much it can do.

Sure, there are always exceptions to the rule. Egypt depends on the Nile River, Central Asia relies on those diminishing glaciers, and the Middle East will have some choice words over dam construction. However, the majority of countries that lack water resources, simply cannot conquer or secure water from other nations.

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Here at Zeihan On Geopolitics we select a single charity to sponsor. We have two criteria:

First, we look across the world and use our skill sets to identify where the needs are most acute. Second, we look for an institution with preexisting networks for both materials gathering and aid distribution. That way we know every cent of our donation is not simply going directly to where help is needed most, but our donations serve as a force multiplier for a system already in existence. Then we give what we can.

Today, our chosen charity is a group called Medshare, which provides emergency medical services to communities in need, with a very heavy emphasis on locations facing acute crises. Medshare operates right in the thick of it. Until future notice, every cent we earn from every book we sell in every format through every retailer is going to Medshare’s Ukraine fund.

And then there’s you.

Our newsletters and videologues are not only free, they will always be free. We also will never share your contact information with anyone. All we ask is that if you find one of our releases in any way useful, that you make a donation to Medshare. Over one third of Ukraine’s pre-war population has either been forced from their homes, kidnapped and shipped to Russia, or is trying to survive in occupied lands. This is our way to help who we can. Please, join us.

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TranscripT

Hey everyone. Peter Zeihan here coming to you from snowy Colorado today. We’re going to do another one in the ongoing open series of things I do and do not worry about. This is one that I do not for the most part worry about, and that’s water wars. You’ve got to admit it’s a sexy idea. The idea that a country that is dry and desperate for water is going to march on another country to take it.

But a few things to keep in mind. You can’t take the whole hunter with you. Water is very bulky and very dense and very difficult to move and it clings to itself with friction. So pumping that is difficult. So you’re not talking about just conquering a river basin and somehow redirecting it. You’re talking about conquering the river basin and occupying it.

And for most countries, that’s a pretty heavy carry under any circumstances. So that’s number one. The bar is high. Number two, the countries that have water are the world’s major powers and the ones that do not have water are not major powers. Why? Well, they have water because if you have water, you can grow food. If you can grow food, you can industrialize yourself.

If you can industrialize yourself, you can build your own military without having to import a lot of equipment. And if you don’t have water, you don’t get to do any of those things. So there are very, very few places where you’ve got a dry country next to a wet country where there’s even a theoretical possibility of the dry country doing anything.

That doesn’t mean that there aren’t any exceptions. There’s just very, very few. Let me give you three. And really, that’s it. Number one, Egypt country that’s on the river. It needs the river to survive upstream. Ethiopia has been building some dams. I can see some scenarios where the Egyptians would spend special forces in to damage or destroy the dam.

The problem with that strategy now, though, so the dam has been built, the lake behind, it’s being filled. So if the dam were to go away, so would Egypt. So, you know, number two, Central Asia. The glaciers of Central Asia have been desiccated for about 50 years, ever since the Soviets built a series of water diversion systems in Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan to grow cotton in the desert because they didn’t want to be depended on American cotton or Egyptian cotton.

You fast forward that 50 years and the glaciers are pretty much gone and the flow and the rivers that I’m going through dry are falling precipitously and the whole area is desiccated. So I can see a scenario where a dry country, Uzbekistan, which has the third largest post-Soviet military marches in and just takes over Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan so that its own people have something to drink.

The third one involves the Middle East, and this is actually an issue of the West countries taking issue with the dry countries. There have been issues in the past in the Jordan Valley where various countries, most notably Lebanon, have built dams on rivers that would impede the flow to the Jordan. The Israelis have a problem with that. So they bombed the dams.

Similarly, you’ve got a wet country, Turkey and a dry country, Iraq and Syria, where the Turks have built lots and lots of lots of dams in southeast Turkey called the Grand Anatolian Project, in order to improve agricultural possibilities for the southeastern part of Turkey and provide an economic ballast to dissuade, say, Kurdish separatism. However, if you happen to be downstream in Baghdad, this is a bit of a problem in your places drying out.

But again, you’ve got a wet country, Turkey, doing things that are messing with the water table in a dry country, Iraq. And there’s not a lot that Iraq can do about it. So there are plenty of things that are worth fighting over in the world. Water is arguably one of them. But the countries that don’t have it don’t have the capacity to go get it.

So I don’t worry about that one.

Russian Hypersonic Missiles: Unstoppable or Skeet Practice for Ukraine

Today, we’re talking about the “unstoppable” hypersonic missiles that the Russians have been hyping up over the past few years. Spoiler alert: this is just the handy work of the hyperbolic-Russian-propaganda-machine.

The hypersonics in question are the Kinzhal and Zircon, which are indeed some advanced missiles. However, we’ve already seen instances of these being intercepted with existing defense systems, such as the US Patriot. There are also several other factors that help deconstruct this Russian lie including flight path limitations, reduced accuracy and warhead size due to high speeds, and vulnerabilities at lower altitudes.

Sure, these are advanced weapons that should be taken seriously, but these are nowhere near the game-changing level that the Russians have made them out to be.

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First, we look across the world and use our skill sets to identify where the needs are most acute. Second, we look for an institution with preexisting networks for both materials gathering and aid distribution. That way we know every cent of our donation is not simply going directly to where help is needed most, but our donations serve as a force multiplier for a system already in existence. Then we give what we can.

Today, our chosen charity is a group called Medshare, which provides emergency medical services to communities in need, with a very heavy emphasis on locations facing acute crises. Medshare operates right in the thick of it. Until future notice, every cent we earn from every book we sell in every format through every retailer is going to Medshare’s Ukraine fund.

And then there’s you.

Our newsletters and videologues are not only free, they will always be free. We also will never share your contact information with anyone. All we ask is that if you find one of our releases in any way useful, that you make a donation to Medshare. Over one third of Ukraine’s pre-war population has either been forced from their homes, kidnapped and shipped to Russia, or is trying to survive in occupied lands. This is our way to help who we can. Please, join us.

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TranscripT

Hey everyone. Peter zeihan here, coming to you from Colorado. And today we’re going to talk about hypersonic missiles in the context of the Ukraine war, what the Russians are claiming and what the reality of the weapons systems are. there are two hypersonic weapons systems, the Council on the Zichron that the Russians have been trumpeting around for about ten years now, since they were first tested.

in theory, the Kinzel can go Mach six to Mark eight. In theory, the Zichron can go Mach seven to Mark ten. and the idea is that when weapons can achieve these sort of speeds, there’s no reaction time that can be worked with. And so they can hit their targets. That’s it. It’s over. And so everyone has been really paranoid about Hypersonics getting into the system of late, because the fear is it’s going to obviate a whole generation of military technology in the United States, around the world.

not so fast. Let’s start with what is happening right now. so far this year, there have been a couple of dozen hypersonics fired off in Ukraine, almost all of which have been or intercepted. the Kindle’s, the US Patriot system has shown that it can easily handle a Kindle. And it was just in March that we got some debris.

We the Ukraine has got some debris from some zichron that they shot down, took them. Well, identify them because we haven’t really seen these in combat before. but the point is, preexisting weapon systems are perfectly capable of defending against these, new weapons. a few things you need to keep in mind when you talk about. hypersonics.

first of all, according to the Russians, there’s never been a failed test of a zichron. So, you know, from identification to development to testing to field testing to operation. Never one. And I’m sorry, I’m sorry. No, no, no, no, there are more failures with oatmeal than what the Russians are claiming with with supposedly their top of the line missile system.

That’s just not true. The Russians are doing something that’s called lying. But let’s assume for the moment that they’re telling the truth. What’s the second factor? The second factor is flight path. it sounds cool. You say I can hit Mach ten, but can you hit Mach ten when it matters? It appears that when these missiles are launched or launched from a supersonic jet that is already going Mach two or Mark three, and then they have several Mach ratings tacked on above that.

But these things are being launched a high altitude where there’s hardly any atmosphere. that means that they can be detected from a great distance away if they’re going to drop down to the surface to skirt radar, they hit thicker atmosphere and slow down considerably. In the case of the Kindles, we know they drop down below Mach two, which puts them well in the range of a normal missile that cost one tenth as much.

 

And again, this is moving at a speed that a Patriot is perfectly capable of intercepting. number three is accuracy in warhead. the faster you go, the more fuel you need, the smaller the warhead you’re going to carry. So the more important it is that you hit exactly what you’re aiming at as opposed to the general area.

Well, this is a problem for hypersonics in general, because the faster a missile goes, the more compressed the air running across it skid is, and it heats up to even turns into a like a little bit of like a plasma with ionization. Well, that scrambles sensors and that scrambles telemetry, which basically makes the missile blind and deaf. And so if the target moves at all, like, say, a ship, it’s going to miss, it’s going to always miss.

Which brings us to the fourth category, which is defenses. As mentioned, the Patriot has done pretty well against these systems in Ukraine, even when not operated by people who have been training on the systems for the last several years. But here’s the kicker. The US Patriots, as good as they are, are nowhere near the top of the line.

Air defense for the United States. It’s just the best that we can cram onto a truck. Static sites at U.S. bases or larger systems that are built under warships are much more accurate, have much greater reach, in fact, can even shoot down things in lower Earth orbit. which means that if you have a supersonic that’s launch from the sky as opposed to down low, you’re going to see it come in a far more than a mile away.

An existing substance are more than capable of taking it out. So does this mean we don’t need to worry about hypersonics? Well, let’s not overplay this. It’s a new weapon system, and if anyone can figure out how to make it work, it will be something that adjusts the battlefield. But so far, it’s certainly not a game changer. And so far, I am absolutely not concerned about the ones that the Russians are fielding.

Jets, Drones & Refineries: Europe Remembers Geopolitics

It looks like the Europeans may have figured out that Russia’s war plans don’t end in Ukraine, so more and more countries are beginning to send aid to the Ukrainians. The Americans, however, are still working through flawed economics and political considerations.

The Norwegian government has decided to send some F-16s to Ukraine, joining Denmark, the Netherlands, and others in providing military support. The most important shift we’re seeing in aid sent to Ukraine is that it is intended to be used on Russian infrastructure and military units…within the Russian border.

The Biden administration’s caution regarding Ukrainian targeting is based on flawed economic analysis and pointless political considerations. This has led us to a strange intersection of this war, where Europe is done limiting Ukraine’s actions in fighting, but the more commonly aggressive American stance is still lagging behind.

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Here at Zeihan On Geopolitics we select a single charity to sponsor. We have two criteria:

First, we look across the world and use our skill sets to identify where the needs are most acute. Second, we look for an institution with preexisting networks for both materials gathering and aid distribution. That way we know every cent of our donation is not simply going directly to where help is needed most, but our donations serve as a force multiplier for a system already in existence. Then we give what we can.

Today, our chosen charity is a group called Medshare, which provides emergency medical services to communities in need, with a very heavy emphasis on locations facing acute crises. Medshare operates right in the thick of it. Until future notice, every cent we earn from every book we sell in every format through every retailer is going to Medshare’s Ukraine fund.

And then there’s you.

Our newsletters and videologues are not only free, they will always be free. We also will never share your contact information with anyone. All we ask is that if you find one of our releases in any way useful, that you make a donation to Medshare. Over one third of Ukraine’s pre-war population has either been forced from their homes, kidnapped and shipped to Russia, or is trying to survive in occupied lands. This is our way to help who we can. Please, join us.

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TranscripT

Hey, everybody. Peter Zeihan here, coming to you from a very windy Colorado. It is the 16th of April, and the news today is that the Norwegian government has announced that they are joining the coalition of growing countries that is setting F-16 jets to Ukraine, specifically the foreign minister, a guy by the name of Aspen Barth, I’d, probably has said specifically he hopes and encourages the Ukrainians to use the jets that at the moment are being provided by a coalition of Norway, Denmark and the Netherlands, to stark to target infrastructure and military units actually in Russia proper.

In fact, his phrase was the deeper the better lot going on here to impact. So number one, to this point, the NATO countries have tried to limit the direct attacks by the Ukrainians with their equipment or with equipment that is donated, in order to prevent an escalation. But a few people’s minds have been tripped in recent days because the Ukrainians are now using one and two tonne bombs to completely obliterate civilian infrastructure and are going after aid workers, including, things like E-m-s services.

And this is really tripped the minds of a lot of people in northern Europe in particular, that this war is now gotten way too serious to have any sort of guardrails on what the Ukrainians can target. The French. Well, they have not weighed in on this topic specifically. They’re now openly discussing when, not whether when French troops are going to be deployed to Ukraine to assist the Ukrainians in a rearguard action.

And we have a number of other countries, especially in the Baltics and in Central Europe, that are also wanting to amp up the European commitment to the war. In part, this is just the recognition that if Ukraine falls, they’re all next, and in part is that the United States has abdicated a degree of leadership, both because of targeting restrictions and because there’s a faction within the House of Representatives that is preventing aid from flowing to Ukraine.

So the Europeans are stepping up. In fact, they’ve been stepping up now for nine months. They provided more military and financial aid to the Ukrainians each and every month for nine months now. And this is just kind of the next logical step in that process, which puts the United States in this weird position of being the large country that is arguing the most vociferously for a dialing back of targeting, by Ukraine, of Russian assets in Russia.

If you guys remember, back about three weeks ago, there was a report from the Financial Times that the Biden administration had alerted the Ukrainians that they did not want the Ukrainians to target, for example, oil refineries in Russia because of the impact that could have on global energy prices. And I refrained from commenting at that time because it wasn’t clear to me from how far up the chain it has come.

That warning. But in the last week we have heard national Security adviser Jake Sullivan and the vice president, Kamala Harris, both specifically on and on record, warn the Ukrainians that the United States did not want them targeting this sort of infrastructure because of the impact it would have on policy, and on inflation. Now that we know it’s coming from the White House itself, I feel kind of released to comment.

And I don’t really have a very positive comment here. There’s two things going on. Number one, it’s based on some really, really faulty logic and some bad economic analysis. So step one is the concern in the United States that higher energy prices are going to restrict the ability of the Europeans to rally to the cause and support Ukraine.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Most of the Europeans realize that if Ukraine falls they’re next and most of the countries with an activist foreign policy are already firmly on the side of an expanded targeting regime. The biggest holdout would be Germany, where we have an unstable and unconfident leader and coalition that wants to lead from the back, not the front, which I can understand, but most of the Europeans have realized that if we’re actually getting ready for an actual war between Europe and Russia, that’s not going to be free.

And higher energy costs are just kind of baked into that pie. So almost all of the Europeans have basically cut almost all Russian energy out of their fuel mixes already in anticipation for that fight. So argument number one, gone. number two, the idea that this is going to cause the war to expand in a way that will damage Ukraine more.

Well, one of the first things that the Russians did back in 2022, in the war, was target all Ukrainian oil processing facilities. They don’t have much left. So, yes, there’s more things that the Russians can do, but this is basically turned into a semi genocidal war. So it’s really hard to restrain the Ukrainians and doing things that are going to hurt the Russian bottom line that allows them to fund the war.

So that kind of falls apart. specifically, the Ukrainians have proven with home grown weaponry they don’t even need Western weapons for this. They can do precision attacks on Russian refineries, going after some of the really sensitive bits. Now, refineries are huge facilities with a lot of internal distance and a lot of standoff distance. So if you have an explosion in one section, it doesn’t make the whole thing go up like it might in Hollywood.

As a result, there are very specific places that you have to hit, and that requires a degree of precision and accuracy that most countries can’t demonstrate. But the Ukrainians have a specifically go after something called a distillation tower, which is where you basically take heated crude and you put into a giant fractionated column, if you remember high school chemistry, and if you can poke a hole in that, it’s hot and it’s pressurized.

So you get something that spurts out and based where on the verticality you hit. The products that hit are either flammable or explosive. So we’re including a nice little graphic here to show you what that looks like. the Ukrainians have shown that they can hit this in a dozen different facilities, and the Russians have proven that it’s difficult for them to get this stuff back online, because most of the equipment, especially for his distillation tower, is not produced in Russia.

And a lot of it’s not even produced in China. It’s mostly Western tech. So as of April 2nd, which was the last day we had an attack on energy infrastructure in Russia, about 15% of Russian refining capacity had been taken offline. In the two weeks since then, they’ve gotten about a third of that back on using parts they were able to cobble together.

But it gives you an idea that this is a real drain, because we’re talking about 600,000 barrels a day of refined product that just isn’t being made right now. That affects domestic stability in Russia, that affects the capacity of the Russians to operate in the front. And yes, it does impact global energy prices, but that leads me to the third thing that I have a problem with the Biden administration here, and that the impact on the United States is pretty limited.

the United States is not simply the world’s largest producer of crude oil. It’s also the world’s largest producer of refined product to the degree that it is also the world’s largest exporter of refined product. So not only will the United States feel the least pinch in terms of energy inflation from anything in Russia going offline, we also have the issue that the US president, without having to go through Congress, can put restrictions of whatever form he wants on United States export of product.

Doesn’t require a lot of regulatory creativity to come up with a plan that would allow to a limiting of the impact to prices, for energy products in the United States. And I got to say, it is weird to see the United States playing the role of dove when it comes to NATO issues with Ukraine. Usually the U.S. is the hawk.

Now, I don’t think this is going to last. the Biden administration’s logic and analysis on this is just flat out wrong. geopolitically, there’s already a coalition of European countries that wants to take the fight across the border into Russia proper, because they know that now, that’s really the only way that the Ukrainians can win this war.

Second, economically, you take let’s say you take half of Russia’s refined product exports offline. Will that have an impact? Yeah, but it will be relatively moderate because most countries have been moving away from that already. And the Russian product is going to over halfway around the world before it makes it to an end client. So it’s already been stretched.

Removing it will have an impact. But we’ve had two years to adapt, so it’s going to be moderate, though not to mention in the United States, as the world’s largest refined product exporter, we’re already in a glut here, and it doesn’t take much bureaucratic minutia in order to keep some of that glut from going abroad. So mitigating any price impact here for political reasons.

And third, the political context is wrong to the Biden administration is thinking about inflation and how that can be a voter issue, and it is a voter issue. But if you keep the gasoline and the refined product bottle up in the United States, the only people are going to be pissed off are the refiners. And I don’t think any of those people are going to ever vote for the Biden administration in the first place.

There is no need to restrict Ukrainians room to maneuver in order to fight this war. in order to get everything that the Biden administration says that it wants to be.

New Russian Tactics: Glide Bombs and Double-Tap

The Russians are employing some new tactics in Ukraine’s Eastern front that are adding to their ever-growing list of war crimes committed throughout this conflict. We’re looking at glide bombs targeting civilian infrastructure and Russia’s ‘double-tap’ method.

The intent behind the Russian glide bombs is to make specific regions in Ukraine uninhabitable. They are achieving this by targeting critical civilian infrastructure like water treatment plants and electricity facilities.

When the glide bombs don’t prove devastating enough, the Russians are also implementing a ‘double-tap’ method. This means they send an initial wave of attacks, wait until emergency services or repair crews can respond, and then send in another wave of attacks to wipe them out.

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First, we look across the world and use our skill sets to identify where the needs are most acute. Second, we look for an institution with preexisting networks for both materials gathering and aid distribution. That way we know every cent of our donation is not simply going directly to where help is needed most, but our donations serve as a force multiplier for a system already in existence. Then we give what we can.

Today, our chosen charity is a group called Medshare, which provides emergency medical services to communities in need, with a very heavy emphasis on locations facing acute crises. Medshare operates right in the thick of it. Until future notice, every cent we earn from every book we sell in every format through every retailer is going to Medshare’s Ukraine fund.

And then there’s you.

Our newsletters and videologues are not only free, they will always be free. We also will never share your contact information with anyone. All we ask is that if you find one of our releases in any way useful, that you make a donation to Medshare. Over one third of Ukraine’s pre-war population has either been forced from their homes, kidnapped and shipped to Russia, or is trying to survive in occupied lands. This is our way to help who we can. Please, join us.

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TranscripT

Hey, everybody! Peter Zeihan here, coming to you from Colorado, where it’s 70 degrees and snowy because mountains. Today, we’re doing a quick update on what’s going on in Ukraine, specifically on the Eastern front, where the Russians are beginning to use a couple of new tactics at a large scale. They definitely fall into the category of war crimes, but so many things that the Russians do these days are. Just to remind everyone, there are over 10,000 documented war crimes committed by the Russians in the conflict so far.

We hit that number well over a year ago. And that’s kind of the number where I stopped paying attention because it’s clear that’s just war crimes for war crimes’ sake at this point. Anyway, these two new ones kind of fall into that category as well. The first one is the use of their new glide bombs, Fab 1500, Fab 1005, 2000.

Basically, weapons that have a metric ton or more of explosive power and sending multiples of them into specific pieces of civilian infrastructure like water treatment plants and electricity-generating facilities with the intent of simply reducing urban populations beyond the ability to have industrial-level technologies. If the Russians keep this up, and they certainly have the weaponry to do it, they will be able to make large, large sections of Ukraine uninhabitable for the population densities that are there now.

The populations around Kharkiv, which is the third-largest city in the country, are the ones most at risk. And where it’s where the Russians have kind of started this shift to just complete obliteration of civilian infrastructure. The second one is something called a double tap. And it’s basically you send your missiles into an area where, you know, there’s a civilian population, and then you wait 30 to 90 minutes and you send another wave of missiles to the same location.

So the first is designed to destroy civilian infrastructure and kill people, and the second is designed to target the repair crews and the emergency services personnel and the aid workers. The idea is, if you can destroy enough of the human capital that allows Ukraine to recover from attacks, then their ability to fight the war might evaporate.

Clearly, these are some pretty nasty attacks. The double taps are something that was inspired by Islamic Jihad and Hamas in years gone by. For those of you who are Middle East buffs, you will remember that there were a lot of suicide bombs that matched this double tap strategy back in the early 2000s. Not much to say about these, except that it’s really hard to fight back against them.

Really? You need to have air superiority and extraordinary air defense and anti-missile coverage if you’re going to prevent these sorts of attacks. And the Russians have proven that they can do these attacks at scale. So the degree to which Ukraine would need external support in order to resist these sorts of assaults is high.

Iran Attacks Israel, Sort Of…

In the early hours of April 14, Iran – both directly and through its many proxies – launched the largest missile and drone assault on the Israeli state since at least the 1973 Yom Kippur war. It was quite a show.

The keyword here is “show”. I have never seen a military assault more telegraphed, choreographed, or bristling with advanced specific notice to ensure that the script does not result in escalation.

Here at Zeihan On Geopolitics we select a single charity to sponsor. We have two criteria:

First, we look across the world and use our skill sets to identify where the needs are most acute. Second, we look for an institution with preexisting networks for both materials gathering and aid distribution. That way we know every cent of our donation is not simply going directly to where help is needed most, but our donations serve as a force multiplier for a system already in existence. Then we give what we can.

Today, our chosen charity is a group called Medshare, which provides emergency medical services to communities in need, with a very heavy emphasis on locations facing acute crises. Medshare operates right in the thick of it. Until future notice, every cent we earn from every book we sell in every format through every retailer is going to Medshare’s Ukraine fund.

And then there’s you.

Our newsletters and videologues are not only free, they will always be free. We also will never share your contact information with anyone. All we ask is that if you find one of our releases in any way useful, that you make a donation to Medshare. Over one third of Ukraine’s pre-war population has either been forced from their homes, kidnapped and shipped to Russia, or is trying to survive in occupied lands. This is our way to help who we can. Please, join us.

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The Limits of Russia’s War Machine

Recent events in the Ukrainian War have shed light on the state of Russia’s ability to resupply its war effort. Even elite Russian troops are being forced to rely on older, reserve equipment—including tanks built well over half a century ago. Moscow’s deep inventory of Cold War-era materiel has kept Russian troops in the fight, but not necessarily fighting: a recent attack by Ukrainian forces in Zaporizhzhia eliminated most of a Russian airborne division fighting in tanks likely older than their fathers.

While Moscow has plenty of old equipment to churn through in its attempt to drag Kyiv back into its orbit, the same cannot be said for its ability to place more bodies on front lines. Russia’s post-soviet demography was already a mess before the war. Combined with hundreds of thousands of casualties due to the war, and estimates of up to a million fighting age men who have slipped out of the country, and Russia is facing a grim inversion of its WWII challenges: while it may have plenty of (aging, derelict) equipment with which to wage war on its neighbors, young men are becoming much harder to find and even harder to replace…

The result? Russia and its war machine have shifted strongly from expansion to maintenance—and all this narrowly balanced against competing Russian economic and political interests. While this does not mean that Russia’s war in limited to Ukraine, it does mean that the timeline for Russian action ends firmly well within the next decade. Does a shortened window of Russian capability mean a decreased likelihood of Russian aggression? Far from it, sadly. The bear’s back is against the wall, and they very much view the Ukraine War (and any follow-ons) as a fundamental war of survival.

Prefer to read the transcript? Click here

Here at Zeihan On Geopolitics we select a single charity to sponsor. We have two criteria:

First, we look across the world and use our skill sets to identify where the needs are most acute. Second, we look for an institution with preexisting networks for both materials gathering and aid distribution. That way we know every cent of our donation is not simply going directly to where help is needed most, but our donations serve as a force multiplier for a system already in existence. Then we give what we can.

Today, our chosen charity is a group called Medshare, which provides emergency medical services to communities in need, with a very heavy emphasis on locations facing acute crises. Medshare operates right in the thick of it. Until future notice, every cent we earn from every book we sell in every format through every retailer is going to Medshare’s Ukraine fund.

And then there’s you.

Our newsletters and videologues are not only free, they will always be free. We also will never share your contact information with anyone. All we ask is that if you find one of our releases in any way useful, that you make a donation to Medshare. Over one third of Ukraine’s pre-war population has either been forced from their homes, kidnapped and shipped to Russia, or is trying to survive in occupied lands. This is our way to help who we can. Please, join us.

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TranscripT

Hey everyone. Peter Zeihan here. Coming to you from Colorado. today we’re to talk about the reserves that the Russians are activating to keep fighting the war. at the end of March in Japanese province, the Ukrainians massacred a group of Russian forces that were part of the 76th Guards Air, assault Group. Now, the 76 has been fighting in the war for a while. 

they’ve been defeated a few times, but they’re generally considered some of the better Russian troops. they were part of the, the military formations before the war generally had the best equipment because they were some of the best troops. Well, when they came up against, Ukrainian forces this most recent time, they were fighting in t 55 tanks, which were tanks that were built right at the beginning of the Cold War back in the 50s. 

So these things have been considered by Russian standards, outdated by over a half a century. And yet here they are, being used by the elite forces. they don’t move as fast. They don’t shoot as far their armor’s thin compared to modern tanks. but most importantly, they require four people to operate instead of three. so, you know, much more manpower intensive for much less bang for the buck. 

the fact that these things are in use at all is a bit of an issue for the Russians. So, at the beginning of the war, the Russians had 12,000 tanks, of which about 2000 were in active service. the presence of the T 55 is in the hands of elite groups means that those original 20 tanks are now all, incapacitated or more likely, just flat out destroyed. 

Now, the Russians have very, very deep reserves. There’s another 10,000 to go. But as you dive into the reserves, you’re getting into older and older tanks. or that’s what it would logically seem, actually, they’re starting with the oldest ones first. The issue is that the T 50 fives had no optics. They predate optics. And so when you want to bring a new tank into service, you can throw some cheap optics and actually get it through the refurbishment process fairly quickly, where if you have a newer tanks, it’s 72 or something newer. 

Those had optics, but it’s been 30 years that they’ve been in storage, and so all the seals have gone and the wiring is bad. And so you need to replace something that was already there, as opposed to slap something aftermarket on it on the first place. that requires more advanced equipment, a lot of which the Russians don’t have anymore. 

And so the 270 twos and newer tanks take a lot more effort to refurbish. So the Russians are starting with the old, old, old tanks. but the bottom line here is that the entire pre-war tank, reserve is gone. And now everything that they put on is something that they’re having to update. the same goes true for soldiers, based on whose numbers you’re believing. 

That’s somewhere between 550,000 and 750,000 Russians have been killed or incapacitated by the conflict so far. Well, that is the entire pre-war army. And the Russians are having to put new people, recently drafted people into the field with minimal training. and this is now meaning that there is a problem with inflows. now, the Russians have not had a problem doing kind of a silent draft where anywhere between 15 and 45,000 people are, unofficially drafted every month. 

the Russians have flows of people to spare. but the source is not bottomless. At the beginning of the war, the Russians had about 8 million men in their 20s. Well, if you’ve killed roughly 600,000 or killed in capacity and 600,000 and another million of fled, you’re now down to about 6.5 million left. So if you look at the number of tanks that they’ve got in reserve, you look at the number of men in the 20s that they’ve got left. 

They can keep up this piece. They’ve been going for the last two years for probably another 5 to 8 years. And when that happens, they’re out of a gear. And they’re out of men. So that’s how long roughly the Russians have that they continue this war and any follow on wars. so we really are looking at the twilight of the Russian system here. 

But it also means that since there’s no longer resources that can be shuffled from other places in the Russian Federation, the Russians are now dependent upon this throughput for refurbishment, for training, for equipment coming from other countries in order to just to fight the war in the first place. So the situation in Ukraine for the Ukrainians isn’t great, but the Russians have now run out of stuff to reposition and they’re dependent upon that throughput. 

And that means economic and political factors, both in Russia and abroad, now massively affect the pipeline that allows Russia to keep men and equipment. And the front in the first place. So we need to watch the Russian space and the adjacent countries much more closely now than we have, because there’s no longer any depth to what the Russians can do. 

As soon as they get something, they throw it into the front, because if they don’t, the front gets empty. So it may feel that the Russians in the last month or so have had a bit of momentum. And they have, but they haven’t been able to capitalize on the breaking of the other Deka front. And in fact, the front has become static again. 

And so the Russians are doing attacks, like with the 76, to try to try to find a weak point, and the troops are just getting cut up and they just can’t maintain this pace forever. But we’re still looking at another 5 to 8 years. Okay, that’s it for me. Take care. 

Secretary Yellen Dumps Cold Water on Chinese Dumping

US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is fresh from a trip to China, and she is fired up. Well, perhaps as fired up as one can surmise the Secretary gets.

But first: China.

As long-time subscribers and readers well know, China’s demographic situation is in shambles. The Chinese Communist Party even admits it, which should be an indicator of how bad things are given the CCP’s creative and liberal license with reality. One of the several negative impacts of a shrinking population is a correlated decline in consumption. For an economy as dependent on industrial overproduction to fuel growth as China’s, this presents a stark and simple reality: the Chinese population will never, ever be able to fully consume Chinese industrial output.

China’s only option is to start dumping more product overseas, as slowing down output causes myriad headaches at home: shrinking economic growth, higher unemployment, exposure of the CCP’s rising ineptitude, etc. Chinese overproduction has already dramatically restructured the world of manufactured goods since China signed onto globalization in the 1990s. The US, its European and Asian allies have simply had enough.

This is beyond simple trade protectionism and market competition. From Boston to Brussels to Busan, there is a rising awareness and unwillingness to endure the various economic, national security and environmental costs of allowing Beijing’s economic imperatives to run roughshod over the world’s industrialized and emerging economies.

Enter Big, Bad Janet Yellen.

Whatever policy disputes one might have with the Secretary notwithstanding, she has a well-documented support of limiting barriers to international trade and the flow of goods. Simply put: Secretary Yellen is a fan of free trade and the general global economic lift associated with globalization.

But Secretary Yellen is not a fan of Chinese economic bullying and product dumping. Even before she left China, there were reports of threats of US trade tariffs and other barriers. The Europeans are at work with several policies of their own, and the Chinese Communist Party? Well…

Here at Zeihan On Geopolitics we select a single charity to sponsor. We have two criteria:

First, we look across the world and use our skill sets to identify where the needs are most acute. Second, we look for an institution with preexisting networks for both materials gathering and aid distribution. That way we know every cent of our donation is not simply going directly to where help is needed most, but our donations serve as a force multiplier for a system already in existence. Then we give what we can.

Today, our chosen charity is a group called Medshare, which provides emergency medical services to communities in need, with a very heavy emphasis on locations facing acute crises. Medshare operates right in the thick of it. Until future notice, every cent we earn from every book we sell in every format through every retailer is going to Medshare’s Ukraine fund.

And then there’s you.

Our newsletters and videologues are not only free, they will always be free. We also will never share your contact information with anyone. All we ask is that if you find one of our releases in any way useful, that you make a donation to Medshare. Over one third of Ukraine’s pre-war population has either been forced from their homes, kidnapped and shipped to Russia, or is trying to survive in occupied lands. This is our way to help who we can. Please, join us.

Support medshare's ukraine fund
Support medshare's global efforts