Coffee Break: Across the Pond

A weekly roundup of the things happening in Europe that they don’t like to talk about

Bulgarians are protesting against the forced adoption of the Euro: People in Europe are slowly coming out against the EU.

The leading candidate in the first presidential round of the cancelled Romanian election has been arrested as he travelled to submit his candidacy in the election re-run, where he is the current favorite. The so called ‘hard-right TikTok messiah’, Călin Georgescu’s vision of neutrality and working with all parties was deemed contrary to European ideals and so they had him labelled as an anti-European Russian apologist. Subsequently, the election was cancelled on the orders of the EU commission (who also said they’d do it in Germany too if the electorate didn’t deliver the right result) on the spurious grounds that Russia had interfered with the election because of a Tik-Tok based digital campaign. This campaign had nothing whatsoever to do with Russia and neither did it have anything to do with Călin Georgescu himself (who said that he doesn’t even use Tik-Tok), in fact it was the work of the current Romanian ruling party themselves, but the European Court of Human rights refused to overturn the decision of the Romanian Constitutional Court (the judges there being political appointees put in place by the current ruling party).

Even the runner up in the cancelled election has come out against the ruling: “Today, the Romanian State has brought democracy to its knees,” said Elena Lasconi, “The economy is collapsing, democracy is being destroyed and the country is heading for anarchy.” And now Musk has weighed in (in case you are having trouble accessing the site via that link then try this one).

Don’t forget: All of this is because Georgescu is against building Europe’s largest NATO base in Romania, thus making his country the primary target in any conflict with Russia.

Plus Ça Change, Plus C’est La Même Chose: After the collapse of the inept ‘Traffic Light Coalition’ led by Olaf Scholtz, the Germans went to the polls to elect a new government. Turnout was high (>80%) buoyed up by a fearful electorate that were desperate for a change. As the results came in commentators were juggling party numbers in order to form a coalition.

It was all about the numbers needed to ensure that the AfD didn’t become part of the government. The ruling elites did everything just short of banning the party (it came close) to intimidate them but still they retained their popularity. Alice Weidel, the AfD leader, didn’t come across as particularly radical in her interview with Elon Musk,  in fact her policies came close to what the CDU’s should have been. The end result of all this anti-AfD skullduggery, including ensuring that the breakaway (from Die Linke) BSW was deprived of publicity and a debate platform (and possibly a Bundestag seat – they got around 4.97% of the vote and needed 5% to get a seat), is that the very same people who the electorate thought they’d voted out have just come back in again, only with a different figurehead.

In order to understand why the AfD is regarded as a Neo-Nazi party we need to look at the electoral map, together with a map of Germany to provide bearings.

The AfD’s heartland is the old East Germany (minus Berlin and Leipzig). The area has never caught up economically since reunification and a lot of violent Neo Nazi groups took root there, causing a significant rise in heavy handed police and state repression.

So what concerns the German elites isn’t the party itself, but their supporters. And no doubt some of them are fascists but there are an awful lot of people there that are not and they’re demanding change. As it happens, the AfD has now become the official opposition, which means that not only are they difficult to ban, but they can sit back and watch as the rickety coalition, based on numbers rather than a meeting of minds over ideological differences, falls apart. If you want to find out more about conditions within Germany then listen to this podcast hosted by Peter Lavell at RT and to understand more about the parties, then watch this video by the Duran (Note: it is long but thorough).

Now You Can Repay Us For The War We Started: The minerals deal in the Ukraine, which is really just a heads of agreement (full text), is close to being signed after pressure was put on Zelenskyy to heal the rift with Trump (this was first written before that Press Conference). Leaving aside the fact that the country will have few to no assets left fully under its own control to allow for economic reconstruction – especially given that outside Investors and local Oligarchs already own a great deal of the best farmland, its  prime resource accounting for 40% of its exports – the deal still may not be as good as it seems for the US. For a start, the rare earth deposits are not there in viable quantities, many of them lie under areas controlled by Russia and the French also want them. But the most glaring problem of all is the legality of any document signed by an illegitimate President, who has already served out his term and currently rules under martial law.

And does anyone believe for one second that the Russians would let the US take effective control of Odessa?

European and US Energy prices: You can get a quick snapshot of the competitiveness of an economy by looking at their energy prices – for example look at what Britain charges its Industrial users for Electricity. Many of the disparities between the prices are due to tax policies, such as Net Zero adjustments and to pay green subsidies. And there are various other local factors; for example, the price of Diesel in the UK was the result of a decision by the government to discourage its use – after previously promoting it as a better choice than gasoline because you get more miles per gallon with a diesel engine, classic bait and switch.

The lower prices of electricity in France are due to their extensive use of nuclear power. It is expected that electricity prices will start to rise there due to the price of raw uranium increasing after they were ejected from Niger (they used to pay around 90c per pound from their mines in Niger, the current spot price of yellowcake uranium is $56.48 per pound) and maintenance issues across their reactor fleet due to their age.

The following are all in $US and represent the average price, so the actual pump prices may differ depending on the locality within the country.

Speaking of energy, the Baltic minnows (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania), decided to disconnect their electricity grid from the Russian grid. Russia supplied the base load supplies (to help with peak demand) and to synchronize the frequency.  They have, instead, connected to the European system. The changeover event was the subject of a rather surreal video featuring Ursula von der Leyen.

What happened next was a surprise for nobody, except the EU apparently (or maybe they just don’t care, the narrative is more important than the grim realities in the EU) – Price explosion in the Baltics after disconnection from the Russian grid. The wholesale MWh prices increased dramatically immediately after the changeover as you can see from the table below. The thick line marks the transition.

And they’re still rising. The knock-on effects could be seen almost immediately, with Estonian businesses being forced to shut. The biggest user of electricity in Estonia, the Estonian Cell pulp mill in Kunda, has ceased operating due to surging electricity costs (they ought to move to Russia, it’s not far and the feedstock they use – wood – is cheaper there). Meanwhile, people living the European dream in the Baltics are stocking up on candles.

Ursula made a big deal that the changeover was due to Russian energy blackmail. Which, if it were true, may be grounds for the severing of ties, but is it? Back in the early days of the Special Military Operation, there were two separate strands of dual pipelines that went under the Baltic Sea connecting Germany to the Russian gas fields: Nordstream 1 and Nordstream 2. Nordsteam 1, the older of the two, was already pumping gas but Nordstream 2, although filled with gas, needed German official authorization to start operations.

Under intense pressure from the Biden administration, the German government refused to let it start. So only Nordstream 1 was de jure but not de facto capable of supplying the gas Europe desperately needed.

The problems were compounded when Europe, under pressure from Janet Yellen, decided to confiscate all of the Russian assets currently residing in Euroclear. These assets, over $300 billion worth, were mainly payments for previous deliveries of gas and other commodities.

What made it worse was that every time the Russians were paid in dollars they were seized, which meant Russia was supplying gas for free.

Understandably miffed, the Russians stated that in future they wanted to be paid in rubles, since that was the only way left to be paid at all. This became blackmail point number one: The Russians are deliberately holding up deliveries of gas with impossible demands.

Blackmail point number two came when the turbines that supplied the pipelines were due for scheduled maintenance. These turbines were made by a division of a British Company, Rolls Royce, which was subsequently taken over by a German company, Siemens. Even though they were built in Britain they were serviced in Canada and the Canadians simply refused to hand them back after the service due to sanctions. In the end a workaround was conceived, between Germany and Canada, whereby the turbines were delivered to Germany and they were to forward them to Russia. The problem was that from the Russian viewpoint the paperwork wasn’t correct; meaning they were shipped with a dubious chain of custody and so the Russians wouldn’t accept them. Remember, they suffered the experience of the CIA sabotaging exactly this type of turbine in Siberia back in 1982 (using technology they supplied via Canada), leading to a massive explosion that was visible from space. And the CIA may even be linked to this pipeline explosion that killed 575 people (181 children) and injured over 800 more. So, they have a right to be cautious.

Then there were the breakdowns, which caused further outages, such as an oil leak on one of the turbines, which caused Gazprom to reduce the supply further. The Europeans said that the leak was no big deal but the Russians, understandably, were concerned that the loss of lubricating oil could cause the turbine to seize and catch fire: something you REALLY don’t want on a major gas pipeline. And the EU megaphoned that it was yet more confirmation that Russia was trying to hurt the European economy by reducing the gas supply.

This is Putin’s rather tart reply to the accusations.

You can read a full report on the Nord Stream turbine saga here.

As a bit of background, Deutsche Welle, the venerable public broadcaster in Germany produced an English language podcast back in 2022 on how Germany would cope without Russian gas. It’s worth a listen if you’ve got an hour to spare as it confirms that the elites knew the problems the disconnect from Russia would cause but they went ahead anyway.

What’s Happening With The Italian Grimaldi Shipping Company as it suffers its 6^th serious fire on board one of its vessels in the last few years?

What Made the British Establishment So Angry at Leaving the EU? This is a bit dated (it was Margaret Thatcher’s favorite TV program), but as Sir Humphrey Appleby, the deep state civil servant, said, the policies have been successfully used over the last 500 years, so why stop now. And so, they never did.

And now consider how the UK is playing the EU off against Russia.

Prepare Yourself For A Shock According to a newly declassified report, produced by the Institute for Defense Analyses for the US Defense Department, Israel really does have nuclear weapons. Will the release of this report affect the possible resumption of talks on the Iran JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action) aka The Iran Nuclear Deal?

Why Is Putin So Popular in Russia? Even though he has obviously failed to become a proper dictator (Golden Rule: you only need to be elected once), he still enjoys popular support that Western politicians can only dream of:

It just might have something to do with this; where, he arranged, through his presidential fund, for talented young musicians to study away from the horrors of the war in the Donbass and then ended up on the docket at the ICC.

You can read the full story here.

Or possibly this: where he drove himself around Mariupol, a short time after the Neo-Nazi Azov battalion, who had terrorized the city for 10 years, were defeated to see how the reconstruction was going. As a matter of interest; many of the civilian construction workers there were from the DPRK – so there really were North Koreans near the front lines in Russia.

Or it could have been this: where a little girl lined up for hours to see Putin when he visited Dagestan and ended up not seeing him. So…

Then again, it could be this:

Compared to:

If you want to know how this manifests itself in terms of the actual cost of living in the two premier (and most expensive) cities:  here are the up to date numbers on the cost of living in New York Versus Moscow. The tool on the website can be manipulated to compare less costly cities (even in other countries) to provide you with a fuller picture.

As a quick snapshot: according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the monthly recommended minimum amount of money for food per person per month in the US is $504 and in Russia it is $178.