ER Editor: We do recommend Larry Johnson‘s video commentary below on the state of military and intelligence play in the Empire.
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Can NATO Survive a Loss in Ukraine?
LARRY JOHNSON
Killing off a bureaucracy — whether civilian or military — is nigh impossible. But the impending defeat of Ukraine on the battlefield by Russia presents one of those watershed moments in history where the raison d’être of NATO will be exposed as a fraud.
Much has been made in recent months about NATO’s supposed growing strength by citing the addition of Sweden and Finland as new NATO members. But this is illusory.
The Swedish Armed Forces are made up of 24,400 active personnel, 11,400 military reserves, 21,500 Home Guard and 5,200 additional conscripts yearly into the Reserves (set to increase to 8,000 conscripts yearly by 2024) as of 2022.
Finland, with an annual defense budget of 68 billion dollars, has 24,000 active duty soldiers but claims reserves of 870,000.
In other words, Sweden and Finland could provide a total of 10 brigades (assuming their current active duty personnel are activated and fully deployed under NATO’s command). This is a “nothing burger.”
The once mighty British Army and Navy have been transformed from a lion into a toothless, nasty chihuahua. The U.K. is failing to meet recruitment goals and its current strength — roughly 75,000 soldiers — would barely fill the Manchester United football stadium. When you consider that 50,000 Brits fought in America during the Revolution of 1776 and were defeated by a threadbare group of Colonial rebels, you get some perspective on the impotence of the current British force.
To make matters worse, the U.K. is pleading poverty with respect to its ability to supply more tanks, storm shadow missiles and artillery shells to Ukraine. In fact, all of NATO’s major European members have stripped their warehouses bare in the futile effort to supply Ukraine. If NATO decided to enter the fray in Ukraine, the Brits would be hard pressed to send 6 combat ready brigades.
NATO’s problems go beyond its inadequate military resources. The very political consensus binding NATO together is coming apart. The recent verbal sniping between the French and the Germans over whether to commit NATO troops to Ukraine is emblematic of a much deeper rift. Based on a recent meeting in Germany, hosted by Scholz and attended by France’s Macron and Poland’s Tusk, Macron was compelled to walk back his insistence on sending more NATO troops to Ukraine.
NATO is a mess yet Western leaders and NATO commanders continue to indulge the fantasy that they are ready and capable of carrying out a combined arms military conflict with Russia. They are not.
Russia sent a deadly reminder of this fact in the form of an Iskander missile that hit a site in Odessa filled with French, Poles and Georgians. U.K. Defense Secretary Grant Shapps cancelled a planned visit to Odessa in the wake of this strike. He probably needed an underwear change and decided it was better to stay home rather than risk becoming cannon fodder.
ER: This story about an Iskander missile strike on Odessa last Friday passed us by. Here it is, with geography reminder below that (Youtube video via Hindustan Times):
Russia attacked Odesa with Iskander ballistic missiles on 15 March – photo
ER: This report doesn’t mention the French, Poles and Georgians. It was obviously a strategic strike.
The following video is a compilation of Russia destroying NATO equipment delivered to Ukraine. The stuff burns well.
I discussed some of these issues in my weekly chat with Nima.
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