The BRICS Summit: Significant or Hoopla?

Have you ever seen a couple of 3-year-olds sitting on the playground talking gibberish and acting like they’re making life-changing decisions? Well, that’s what’s going on at the BRICS summit in South Africa this week.

BRICS comprises Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, and if you’re struggling to find some overlap between those countries…you’re not alone. With limited economic ties and diverse interests, this group of countries struggles to connect on anything meaningful.

To complicate matters further, BRICS is looking to add some new members to their ranks: Iran, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, Ethiopia and Argentina. I urge you to try and come up with a worse list of mid-tier countries to bring on if you want to expand your geopolitical influence.

The varying interests of the current and new members will likely halt any meaningful conversation. The practical significance of this summit and BRICS as a whole is – limited – to say the least. And if you were hoping this would shake up the global landscape, I’m sorry to burst your bubble.

Prefer to read the transcript? Click here

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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. Today we’re going to talk about the BRICS summit. It was originally intended to be a two parter, one during the summit and one after. But because programing got shot down yesterday. We’re combining this into one. So it seems to a little bit disappointed. That is why. And here we go. Hey, everybody. Peterson coming to you from the shore of Lake, where I have been visited by a whole bunch of goats.

They were very curious anyway. Today we’re going to talk about something that is in progress. And that’s the BRICS summit in South Africa. They’re trying to come up with a series of plans of what to do. They’re trying to consider whether they should let in new members. And odds are that this is just going to be a really stupid summit that’s going to amount to nothing.

But it’s still worth talking about because it’ll give you an idea of the architecture of the international system. And you never know. They might be able to pull something out of the fire. So the reason I have primarily been dismissive of the BRICS since the beginning is because it was never an organization. It was never a grouping that was founded by its members.

It was some finance guy who’s like, Look, we’ve got all this capital because the baby boomers haven’t retired yet. We should put it into bonds. And we’re some big bond markets. Oh, yeah, Brazil, Russia, India and China. That’s it. That’s all it was. And then taken to later, they led in South Africa in a in a fit of pique.

Nothing’s going on here. There’s never been any meaningful deal. They have formed a development bank, but now over 90% of the capital comes from China. And there are reasons for the BRICS to talk with China. It is a significant trading partner, but there’s no reason for them to speak with one another. Brazil, aside from exports to China, doesn’t trade with the rest of them at all.

Same with South Africa, same with Russia. India is a special case, and if there’s one country that doesn’t like China, that would be India. And, you know, every once in a while you’ll hear them talking about forming a global currency or a new alternative currency to challenge the dollar. And then they start talking about details and all falls apart.

So right now, India, China, South Africa and the BRICS own bank are on record saying that they’re not interested in a global currency. The only two countries are left are Russia, who thinks that everyone should use the ruble, of course, and Brazil. How can I qualify? Describe Brazilian foreign policies these days, especially on economic issues, kind of. Lodhi DA.

Not a lot of substance beneath rhetoric anyway. So the purpose of this summit is to bring in dozens of leaders from other countries and see if they can kind find something that they can all agree on. A history suggests the answer will be no and everyone is coming with their own list of grievances and desires. The Russians want everyone to sign up with them and boycott the West until the West agrees to give them their way on Ukraine.

Of course, Russia’s not included in that. Russia is still allowed to talk. The first is still how to to trade with whoever they want. The Chinese are hoping to get enough countries on board that they can then walk into Washington and demand trade concessions. They don’t care about all the other countries. They just want them for themselves. The Indians are there because they are more of a classic nine nonaligned power.

But as the Chinese become more rambunctious, the Indians have become more and more edging towards being in the American camp. So the normal rhetoric that you would expect to see out of the Indians just isn’t there. The South Africans who are hosting are pretending to be neutral in all this and say they don’t have an opinion. The Brazilians are very logical and that’s it.

We’re going to turn around here anyway. Why might this one spark? Why might this still matter? Well, if you look back to the Cold War period when we had the nonaligned movement, that’s what a lot of these countries are from. Not Russia, not China, but a lot of the ones who are now showing out, they saw themselves as not east, not west, not first or Second World, but is something else.

And they try to come together for a common thing called the new international economic order. And the idea was that the West should restructure their trade practices in order to benefit some of their former colonies. It didn’t amount to much at the time. Eventually it became known as the ACP group Africa, Caribbean Pacific, a former colonies of the Europeans who have a degree of preferential trade access when it comes to European markets.

But it never got the restructuring that they really wanted. The reason I’m even less optimistic this time around is because the interests of the groups that are showing up are far more diverse than anything that we had in the early post-colonial era back in the sixties and seventies. So if they do decide, if BRICS does decide to do something, it will probably be about expanding their membership.

And that would be one of the most effective ways that I can think of to make sure that BRICS never achieves anything at all because they don’t agree on any much right now. So this is going to be an unofficial two parter. We’re going to wait to see what comes out of the summit. And then I will let you know what I think about the new roster.

All right. That’s it. Bye. Okay, here’s part two. So BRICS did decide they wanted to expand to involve six members in the six countries they involved. Indicate to me that BRICS has no plans of doing anything useful in the future. Those countries in no particular order are Iran, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Ethiopia and Argentina. And I mean, honestly, folks, this is hilarious.

Okay, so let’s start with what the naysayers are going to say about how this does matter and explain why it doesn’t. They’re saying that because of the addition of the three countries in the Persian Gulf region plus Egypt, that this grouping, BRICS, now produces about half to 60% of global oil. And that means the downfall of the dollar, the formation of an alternate currency, the end of the petrodollar, divestment, the United States.

And it’s the end of an era. And, you know, the short version is absolute bullshit. Number one, Saudi Arabia does sell a few loads to China in yuan, and Russia does sell a few loads in yuan or rupees in order to get around sanctions. But the Russian system is kind of by itself. And as Russia follows no one, as with the Saudi Arabians and the Emiratis, that might be a little different.

Well, you got to look at why they’re considering doing anything in non-US dollars. They’re looking for a security guarantor. They’re afraid that the United States is going to leave the region. And if it does, they’re on their own. And since they don’t like to be outside of air conditioning, national defense is something they’re not very good at. So they’re basically open to all potential takers when it comes to not oil sales for sales sake, but as a way of getting into your security planning.

The Saudis have gone with the U.S. dollar for the last several decades, not because it was the global currency, not because they’re part of a caucus group that is basically with the BRICS. And they’re not in any sort of meaningful organization in which the U.S. and Saudi Arabia members, they have a bilateral relationship that was based on security, and that was the reason why they use the U.S. dollar.

That’s the reason why they bought refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast, because they saw the United States as the country that ultimately would bleed and die for them. And they’re looking for alternatives, not because they want an alternative, but because the U.S. is probably not interested in that role anymore. There are also right now trilateral negotiations going on among the Americans, the Saudis and the Israelis, in which the Saudis are seeking a Japan style security guarantee for themselves.

Now, they’re probably not going to get that. They’re probably going to get a lot of things that they’re after. But the bottom line is that for the Saudis, this has never been about the money. It’s never been about the currency. It’s about who’s going to take a bullet for them. And the Chinese simply lack the capacity to deploy at range in a way that the Saudis would be willing to accept and believe, especially since the primary foe that they’re worried about is none other than Iran, which is how it has been, added the BRICS as well.

That brings us kind of the second problem here. The the BRICS have realized that if you’re going to add a country like Iran, that is how should I say, has some firm opinions about security issues, for example, that it should be in charge of the Middle East. Well, then you have to add anyone else from that region at the same time.

Otherwise, you can never have any of them because the Iranians would do the vetoing. So that’s adding the UAE, Saudi and Iran at the same time. It guarantees that you can expand the organization in the future, but it also guarantees that on all significant issues, you now have members inside the organization that going to be in diametrically opposed positions forever.

So we already know that BRICS can’t have a meaningful energy policy because now you have a number of opposed powers Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabian, UAE, all in at the same time. What a shit show. Okay, next up, Argentina and Ethiopia. Ethiopia brings very little the table. It’s one of the ten poorest countries between per capita terms in the world.

It’s landlocked. It’s one of the handful of countries in the world that is not part of China’s one belt, one road, because even the Chinese like there’s no investment case there. So they added in in order to get a little bit of African flair into the organization. And that’s about it. Argentina is not poor. It has a entitlement complex in which it thinks that everyone should give it money and should never have to give any of the money back.

And the reason they applied for BRIC membership is they’re hoping to get Chinese money. It’s not that the Argentineans are anti-U.S. dollar in any meaningful way. It’s just they’re anti paying back their debts. And so they’re always looking for a new financial access point in order to leech off of it until it goes away as well. So honestly, you know, best of luck with those two because there definitely a drain on the organization and they really don’t bring much to the table.

Okay. Who am I looking to? Oh, yeah, Egypt. Egypt is basically a U.S. satellite state. The U.S. basically pays Egypt and Israel and Jordan, for that matter, to not go to war with one another. So thinking that there’s a security play here from bringing the Egyptians in. No. If anything, it’s a bit of a Trojan horse. It is a large developing country.

I would argue that the reason it got brought in is because of India, which still has a lingering love of the nonaligned movement in which Egypt was a reasonably potent player politically but economically. Strategically, I’m afraid not. All right. Is that everybody? Yeah, that’s everybody. When an organization expands, usually one of two things happens. Either one, you’ve got an overwhelmingly powerful single member that kind of decides how things go.

And that would be the United States and NATO’s, for example. Option number two is you expand it with each member, you bring in differing viewpoints, and eventually it paralyzes the organization from doing really much of anything. And the BRICS is definitely firmly in that category right now. This is really only going to amount to anything in the midterm now if one of two things happens.

Number one, the Chinese pay for everything, and that means subsidizing the existence of the Argentineans, as they believe they should be subsidized, which is a hefty price. And very, very poor countries like Ethiopia. The last time a major power tried to do this, it was the Soviet Union. It was the 1970s, and it broke the bank. So not very likely that the Chinese are going to pay for influence in places that they actually can’t control and don’t really bring them much if they did.

The second option is we could see this very, very rapidly expand to basically become the new nonaligned movement. Of course, it would be different this time because the Chinese very clearly have elements in mind and the Russians very clearly have some goals in mind. And it’s difficult to imagine a lot of the world’s middle and lesser powers following the lead of these two countries.

I mean, yes, a lot of the global south has not been interested in condemning the Russians for what’s going on in Ukraine. That doesn’t mean they want to follow them. And anyone who’s not blind realizes the Chinese has some very clear, very nationalist, very, almost hateful, domineering goals for the Chinese rise. And in that sort of environment, no one wants to be a pawn because all of a sudden the nonaligned movement is going to align with a global pull.

No. So where does that leave us? Well, I think if you look at what really went down at the summit, you get your answer. Chinese President Xi Jinping didn’t even show up to some of the opening ceremonies where he was expected to give a pole speeches. The Chinese don’t see this as a useful vehicle, except rhetorically, and that means you shouldn’t treat it as anything else.

All right. That’s it for me by.

Prigozhin Is Dead…But Who Did It?

Yevgeny Prigozhin, the leader of the Wagner Group, has reportedly died in a plane crash. The question that comes to mind isn’t why this happened (because Prigozhin’s hands were plenty dirty), but who did it?

Putin tops the list of suspects, but he is in no way alone on that list. Between the Russian military-industrial complex, the Ukrainian government, Belarus, and even the Americans, plenty of motivated actors would have liked to see Prigozhin go bye-bye.

At the end of the day, who knows if Prigozhin is dead? Reports coming out of Russia aren’t exactly “trustworthy.” However, if true, Prigozhin’s death would leave a void in Putin’s inner circle that would need to be filled.

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 everybody. Peter Zeihan here coming to you from Colorado. I was on my way back from a quick camping trip and found out that Yevgeny Yevgeny Prigozhin, who was the leader of that Wagner group that launched the Sudoku a few weeks ago, was supposedly on a plane that went down in Russia. His death is not a low probability outcome, considering his life choices and the people he surrounded himself with.

But I think it’s worth doing a little bit of reflecting because the the cast of characters who may have wanted him dead and had the ability to kill him is, you know, lengthy. So at the top of the list, of course, is Vladimir Putin, the president of Russia, who relied upon pagos and to do a lot of unseen thievery things over the years, most recently, including a meat grinder assault in Ukraine in the eastern city of Mahmoud, which killed minimum 30,000 Russian soldiers.

Some numbers are suggesting the number may be as high as 100,000. But God knows Russian data war, fog, propaganda. Don’t know anyway. When by launching a coup and publicly insulting the entire military industrial complex of the Russian Federation, obviously Putin felt that he had an ax to grind and somebody he had to snip. So obviously candidate number one, but hardly the only one.

Remember Prokop Prigozhin, the really don’t need to learn how to pronounce that anymore. Do it pagos him also pissed off the military industrial complex which executed this war broadly and competently. And the key thing to remember about the military industrial complex in Russia, there is a military complex and there is an industrial complex and they are not the same thing.

Nothing like it is here in the United States. In Russia, they’re very separate. The industry hard. The part where the weapons are manufactured. A guy by the name of Jim is off who is in the Putin’s inner circle is part of that. But that’s not where all the insults were directed towards the military proper. And the military is not not not part of the coalition that backs Vladimir Putin out of here.

Putin’s coalition is a combination of former intelligence operatives from the then KGB, now FSB, as well as organized crime. And that is yet another potential candidate to want him pagos and dead. Remember, that goes in came to Putin’s attention as a caterer who just happened to have some really obscene things to say about a lot of things that Putin liked.

And eventually that turned into face time with Putin, that turned to the money, that turned into state contracts that eventually created the Wagner military group. So there are no end of people in Putin’s inner circle in the world of organized crime, want this guy dead, either because he screwed them over or he was a stepping stone from them to get more of Putin’s ire, any number of reasons could play.

This is, after all, Russia. But of course, not all of the candidates as suspects, if you will have to be in Russia. The Ukrainians have their own reason to want pagos and dead because a lot of Ukrainians as part of the bargain would siege the polls are probably a little nervous about it because Ferguson and Wagner were supposed to relocate to Belarus after the coup deal was signed and they decided to settle right on the Polish border.

Belarus is another candidate, Lukashenko, who is the president of of Belarus, who’s kind of like the schnauzer of the former Soviet world, is the one who supposedly cut the deal between Putin and and after the coup. And if there’s anything we know about the former Soviet world, it’s that deals don’t hold typically until someone is dead. And so this could have been part of it the whole time.

And let’s not forget people for further abroad. Let’s talk about the Americans. You guys remember the troll factory? Prigozhin is the guy who founded that. He’s the one who was actually involved, bragged. I mean, this is this is not controversial. Russia bragged openly and publicly about interfering in the American presidential election between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. So, I mean, there are any number of people here who would love to see a bullet in this guy’s head or in this case, you know, smeared over the landscape in central Russia.

And, of course, this all assumes that the dude is actually dead. Yes. His name was on the manifest. Yes, he was on one of ten people who was on the vessel. But at the time of this recording, which is about 7 p.m. Eastern, they’ve only found eight bodies. So this is Russia, you know, a riddle and an enigma in a mystery and a cheese sandwich.

It’s even if he really is dead, this is still only the beginning of the story because it means that there is now an opening in Putin’s inner circle for another person who can be used to be a little bit of plausible, plausible deniability. Not only was this the guy who was involved in the little green men fiascos in 2014 in the original Crimea war, not only is this the guy who was interfering in U.S. elections, this is also the guy who’s led an operation in a dozen African countries where he’s accused of war crimes.

It’s too important of a role for the Russian state, especially now for the Kremlin to just be empty. Someone will step forward. The question is whether that someone is a friend of Putin or not. And that could be all kinds of fun. All right. By.

What Makes Texas So Successful

Today’s video comes from one of my favorite places in central Colorado – Elk Horn Pass.

Texas is known for many things – cowboys, bbq, oil, and who could forget the Alamo – but none of those are why Texas has been (and will continue to be) the fastest-growing state in the US.

Four big things have helped Texas climb to the top. Thanks to a low cost of living, Texans have been popping out babies left and right, contributing to strong demographic growth. Their proximity to Mexico has bolstered the Texan economy, trade, and manufacturing sector. Texas is a red state with blue cities, so residents can enjoy the perfect regulatory mix. And lastly, Texas has been able to attract businesses from other struggling states.

The past few decades have been great for Texas, but times are changing. Birth rates are falling, the cost of living is rising, immigration is falling off, and the business “stealing” model won’t be the same. This doesn’t mean Texas is collapsing (cities like Houston, El Paso, and Austin have bright futures ahead); things are just starting to slow down.

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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What Makes Vietnam a Valuable US Ally?

Biden recently announced that he’d be making a trip to Vietnam, which will likely occur in September when he visits other regional powers. But what makes Vietnam such a valuable asset to have in the US portfolio of allies?

Is it because they’re a major regional power? Or because they have a better demographic profile than others in the region? Sure, that factors into it, but it really comes down to positioning and attitude.

Due to geographic challenges, the integration process (and political unification) following the Vietnam War has been an ongoing endeavor. While there’s no brushing past the ‘history’ that Vietnam and the US share, that pales in comparison to their history with the Chinese. If there’s one thing all the Vietnamese can agree on…it’s that they hate China.

But let’s not forget that the Vietnamese bring more to the table than just a desire to crush the Chinese. They would be a solid trade partner with strong demographics, a sound education system, and excellent relations with other regional allies. Sounds like a damn good deal for the US. The only sticking point is the Chinese-style political system that still exists in Vietnam…

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

F-16 Fighter Jets: Updates to Ukraine’s Defense Strategy

Last week the Ukrainians got the news that the Biden administration issued the thumbs up for the Netherlands and Denmark to send Zelensky some F-16s. But this development is by no means black and white.

The F-16s come with some caveats. They won’t be arriving in time to impact the current counter-offensive, nor will there be enough of them in this first round. They’ll also need lots of logistical infrastructure to support them, so I wouldn’t expect this to impact the war effort until (at least) next year.

The green light on this first round of F-16s implies that the US (and other NATO countries) aren’t too far behind. And as the Russians dig themselves into economic isolation, the previously drawn lines around using long-range weaponry will continue to blur.

Prefer to read the transcript of the video? 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.

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

Transcript

Hey everybody. Peter Zeihan here coming to you from Colorado. Today’s the 18th of August. And the news is that the Netherlands and Denmark have received approval from the Biden administration to send their F-16 fighter bomber aircraft to Ukraine as part of the defense of works. There’s a lot of things that are packed in here. Let’s start with the most obvious one.

Even if these things start to ship today, they’re not going to be there in sufficient numbers or with the infrastructure to support it in time to have any impact on this fighting season. So the summer counteroffensive that the Ukrainians are fighting in an attempt to break the Russian position in southern Ukraine and Crimea, they’re not going to be able to help with that at all.

There’s more to having the jets than simply having the pilots. You have to have the logistical infrastructure to supply them with fuel, with spare parts, especially with munitions. And they have to be able to do all of the repairs and all of the maintenance within Ukraine proper. Now, we know for certain that the United States has been doing steps to accelerate this process over the last few months.

We know that there have been a number of Ukrainian pilots across the United States and databases system that have been training on the F-16s and getting flight time. But there’s going to be a lot more that it needs to be done in terms of the maintenance side of the equation. Okay. So that’s piece one. This is something that’s going to affect over the winter and then into next year.

Second, the players, the Netherlands and Denmark basically run almost exclusively American equipped forces. So there is no way that this came out of left field. Copenhagen and The Hague undoubtedly have been coordinating with Washington since the beginning on this. And if they’re doing it, you can bet your ass that they’re going to be any number of NATO countries up to and including the United States who are going to be following suit now that the seal has been broken.

It’s just a question of timing. Now, again, this is something that’s going to impact operations over the winter and into next year. Not right now. Third, what’s next? The next big step of what the Ukrainians have on their wish list that they haven’t gotten is longer range weaponry that will allow them to strike deeper into the occupied territories and in their mind, ideally even into Russia proper.

Now, the primary reason why this specific request has been denied so far by all of the Western allies is they don’t want to provoke the Russians to direct fight. But as the Russians move deeper and deeper into isolation and as it becomes becomes possible that this is going to be a broader conflict in economic terms, even if not a military warrants.

That argument has been losing luster in a number of places in the Western world. No one wants to start World War Three, obviously, but it’s pretty obvious who’s doing the raping in the genocide, and that is No. One on the west side of the line. So we are going to see longer range weapon systems. I don’t want to comment on which ones because there’s any number of things that could come into play.

And the argument that they cannot be used within Russia proper is weakening as well. Now it’s a political decision if they decide to remove that structure. But if you look at what’s been happening over the last few weeks, the Ukrainians have been provided with storm shadow missiles by the Brits, and that’s a longer range weapon system, more than capable of striking into Russia proper.

But the Russians have not once used it to do so. At the same time, the Ukrainians developed a number of weapon systems, including drones launched by special forces troops and suicide drones that are maritime in style to directly attack Russian targets within Russia proper. They don’t necessarily need Western tech to take the war to Moscow. And since we’re seeing this blurring of capabilities, the idea that simply because a weapon has a range that could be problematic, that automatically is problematic.

That argument is fading very, very quickly. There’s still going to be a lot of brackets on all of this. This is not going to something that’s going to change overnight. But now that they’re going to be getting NATO’s fighter aircraft that clearly have the capacity, if you put an extended range fuel tank on them to strike Moscow directly.

You got to ask yourself, what else can be pushed across the line at this point? And that’s the discussion that’s going to be happening in Brussels and London and Berlin and Paris and Washington quite aggressively over the next couple of months. And by the time we get to the end of the year, I have no doubt that in addition to longer range missiles, artillery systems and jets, there’ll be a whole phalanx of additional technology going to be handed over in order to help the Ukrainians out.

And for those of you say that this is costing the United States too much. Number one, check your math. With the exception of two Patrick batteries, every single other thing that has been transferred from the United States at this point has been spare parts and decommissioned equipment that we were going to have to pay to dismantle. So in many ways, the Ukraine war has saved us a lot of money.

And second, if you think the money has been stolen, you’re literally just making that up. Call your congressperson because they have every day a full list of every piece of equipment, how it was used, how it was transferred, and how much money to actually cost the United States. And anyone who tells you otherwise is lying to you. All right.

That’s it.

Making Life Hard for Chinese Tech

The Biden administration has issued its first wave of investment bans on the Chinese tech space – things like AI or tech with military applications. However, money isn’t the problem for the Chinese; the real kicker is losing access to American know-how.

This is only the first wave of capital restrictions placed on the Chinese, but they won’t be hurting for cash. For the last 30 years, the Chinese have restricted capital from flowing abroad, ensuring a bottomless supply of money at home. That’s why China has seen explosive growth over the past few decades.

The one thing they do lack is ACCESS. Without the know-how and connections American investment gave them, all those doors will slam shut in their face. Innovation will be stifled, and economic growth will come to a halt.

This is only the first wave of capital restrictions placed on the Chinese, but the long-term effects will be devastating. And to kick Xi while he’s down, he’ll just have to sit back and watch the tech sectors of the countries around him surge to the top.

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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Ukraine War Updates: Talking Strategy and Tactics

A Ukrainian soldier in the trenches

Things over in Ukraine are in a bit of a holding period, which makes getting these updates out consistently that much harder…and let’s not forget that most of the data we’re seeing is shaky at best. But here’s what I got for you.

There are a few things of note. Ukraine is sending small waves of special forces across the Dnieper River to wreak havoc on that region. These small attacks have been pretty successful, thanks to the Russians shifting their focus to the east. This change in Russian strategy is an attempt to draw Ukrainian forces and attention away from hot spots like Zaporizhzhia.

The big thing here is that Ukraine doesn’t necessarily have to punch through all of Russia’s defenses. If they can push them back far enough to cut supply lines in the north and south, then Crimea could very well be a lost cause for the Russians. The Ukrainians have proven they are fully capable of consistently hitting a target – a.k.a the Kerch Bridge – so this is a genuine possibility.

Remember that shaky data coming out of Russia, well it doesn’t really make a difference for us. At the end of the day, Russia is completely hollowed out and no longer operates as a normal economy. They’ll never quite recover from this, but that doesn’t mean it’s the end of Russia… it’s just the new status quo.

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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Why Should Northern China Worry About Flooding?

If you’re thinking, “There’s no way China’s situation could possibly get worse,” you may need to talk to mother nature about the rains and typhoons causing flooding in northern China.

To understand the problem, we need to rewind about 2500 years. The Chinese crop of choice was and still is rice (although corn and wheat would have been quite productive given the Yellow River’s sediment makeup and the region’s arid climate). To produce rice, you must precisely control when and how much water is introduced throughout the growth cycle.

They needed extensive government oversight and the physical infrastructure to control the flows of a river as big as the Yellow. This meant that the Chinese needed to develop a dike system. Fast forward to the present day, and you’ll see a system of massive and unfinished dikes throughout northern China.

This dike system prevents the silt and sediment from the Yellow River from spreading and dispersing naturally, which means it has had over two millennia to build up. As the Yellow River takes on water from the extensive rains and seasonal typhoons, these dikes are being pushed to their limits.

I’m not saying they will break this year, but it’s only a matter of time before they do. When that happens, you can expect catastrophic flooding that will destroy critical infrastructure and many people. But hey, that still doesn’t top the list of things China should be worrying about.

Prefer to read the transcript of the video? 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 everybody. Peter Zeihan here coming to you from the Golden Banner trail above Cannes Coral, which is a suburb of the Denver Metroplex. Today, we’re going to talk about water or specifically all the water that northern China has gotten of late, that heavy spring and summer rains. And they just got hit by a typhoon. And so there’s significant flooding through Beijing.

It’s already killed a few dozen people.

The key thing to remember about China is a lot of its government structures are a direct outcome of its geography. So the North China plain, where the Han ethnicity basically has its core of power, is a big, wide open area that is both drought and flood prone. The drought is normal climatic stuff. This is a semi-arid region, maybe roughly akin to a cooler version of Central Texas or maybe central Nebraska.

But instead of having kind of braided rivers that flow through it, it’s got one single mighty river, the yellow that originates significantly upstream. A couple thousand miles away that drains an absolutely massive watershed in an area that is soil type called the West, which is wind driven soils, very fine particulates. And that means with when this dry zone, a lot of it’s actually desert does get rain, most of it runs off, it carries a lot of silt with it.

And that’s why the Yellow River has its name. The salt is yellow by the time you get downstream to where everyone lives in the North China plain, it’s a raging torrent, but it’s a raging torrent with lots and lots and lots of sediment. Now, if you can capture that sentiment and kind of like the flood drive that you had in, say, Egypt or the American Midwest, you get incredibly productive farmland.

But that requires you growing things like corn, wheat and the rest. China’s rice country. Water management is very important. Rice has to have very specific watering conditions at every stage of its production. Otherwise, the crop is lost. Now, northern China, they don’t grow rice anymore. But after 2500 years of growing rice, that has set certain things into motion.

Specifically, they have to be able to control the river, otherwise the water will come or be not there at the time of its choosing, rather than the Chinese people’s choosing. And that requires a lot more organization at the state level, which tends to generate a stronger hand in terms of government and a requirement that you have everybody under a single house politically.

Otherwise, various factions will just attack the water works and destroy whatever the hostile power happens to be. Fast forward that 2500 years, wrestling the river into shape means basically building ginormous dikes down the entirety of its length for the entirety of civilized northern China. That means the silt has nowhere to go. So in the Midwest, one of the problems that we’ve seen after just 150 years of trying to do this strategy on the Mississippi is you get silt on the bottom of the riverbed.

That raises the level of water so that when one of those dikes does break, it floods an entire area. So a big thing that the Army Corps of Engineers have been doing over the last decade is leveling some of those dikes and turning some of the land to wetlands just to absorb the flood flows. This is at least two orders of magnitude more significant, the case of China, because you’re talking about the most dense human population footprint in the country.

And we’re going to rotate a little since you like this, so much so that shot over there or there. That is Red Rocks, Ampitheater. So if you ever want to see a good show in Denver, go there. I got a great view of downtown, the sunsets. Anyway, what this means now is that in China, you’ve got two and a half millennia of sediment.

And so every time there’s a flood, it threatens the entire dike system. And if you have a break somewhere, it’s much more big of a problem than you have in Mississippi, because after two and a half millennia of heavy sediment, the floor of the river, in many cases now above the ground level, surprising of the surrounding lands, meaning those dikes are two, maybe even three stories above the city’s.

And if they break the entire course of the river, you know, river goes by the path of least resistance crashes down into the populated zones. Now, that hasn’t happened this year. I’m not saying it’s going to. I’m saying that the Chinese really didn’t finish their dike system to the current level of absurdity until just about ten, 15 years ago.

They used to have floods regularly. They would kill hundreds of thousands of people. And in today’s environment, where the Chinese were facing every possible problem under the sun with their finance, their economy and their demographics, this is just one more thing you have to factor in, because when this breaks and physics tells us in time it will, they’re going to lose significant portions of some of their most advanced infrastructure, not to mention lots and lots and lots of people.

So whenever you see it raining West of Beijing, pay attention because it matters a very great deal. All right. Take care.

An Iran Deal We Can Live With

There’s finally a deal on the table between the US and Iran that everyone can live with…it even looks like Israel has given it the green light. So what does this deal actually look like?

On the surface, this deal looks like the US is getting back those American prisoners who were unjustly detained and releasing $6 billion of frozen Iranian funds. However, this isn’t just about a few people who got caught with dime bags; it’s about the broader relationship at hand.

We’re talking about Iran discontinuing funds being sent out to their militias, spinning down some of their enriched uranium, coming back under IAEA inspections, and in exchange, the US will enable them to sell crude abroad.

In no way is this a done deal, but some factors are helping to push this along. The big one is the Russian sanctions’ impact on Iranian crude exports and the overall financial situation, which makes the $6 billion offer sound pretty appealing.

We could be looking at the most productive stage of American-Iranian relations since the 70s; all it cost the US was $6 billion of someone else’s money. Sounds like a win to me.

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
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Why Can’t We Trust the Media?

Before I answer the question about what news sources I use, we must understand how the hell our society became so damn uninformed…

Propaganda only works when you have an uninformed society, and if you haven’t looked up in a while, we can’t even agree on what color the sky is anymore. So yeah, propaganda is doing just fine here in the States. But how did we get here?

It all started with the fax machine, which began eliminating the staff that once served as ‘fact-checkers’ for stories before publication. Then email came along and only exacerbated this issue, doing away with any auxiliary staff. It isn’t so much that biases went unchecked (although that happened in spades), but instead that there were fewer eyes and brains to ensure the story was actually correct. The opportunity for the less scrupulous among us to make their version of the world known crept in. (The technical term is “lying”.) And…a lot of people like that. Cue the entrance of charismatic individuals who woo people with deliberate deception.

So if you believe the sky is neon green (or if you’re tired of hearing that it is), maybe check out one of the following news sources: Al Jazeera, France 24, the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Straight Arrow News, or local stations. I’m not saying these are perfect, but they’ll get you going on a better path.

Why Can't We Trust the Media? (AKA Propaganda) || Peter Zeihan

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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