Dmitry Grozoubinski Profile picture
Aug 8, 2020 4 tweets 1 min read Read on X
Thought exercise:

You're a UK Diplomat.

Asylum seekers currently in France, where their presence has at times been just as politicised, are trying to leave France to head to the UK.

Your job is to convince the French to help you thwart them doing so.

What's your pitch?
Note:
- Asylum seekers are not legally obligated to seek refuge in the first country they get to, and transit through a safe country is not grounds for refusing asylum under the UN Refugee Convention.
Ok, to answer some points below:

- Yes, the UK could pull out of the UN Refugee Convention, but that's not the current policy of HMG and diplomats have to work within that.

- Having a UK warship tow a boat to France without the consent of the French is an act of war.
Note:
- In case this needs to be clarified, but I'm not endorsing the Home Secretary's comments or the UK's approach to asylum seekers. My personal views on this are very different.

I'm simply trying to illustrate the difficulty inherent in her call to secure French cooperation.

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More from @DmitryOpines

Aug 9
1/ I guess (with no expertise) that one reason the Ukrainians may have gambled on Kursk is that the Russian army is at its weakest when having to react quickly.

That's when rigid top-down leadership, low morale, poor communications, terrible logistics and so on hurts the most.
2/ In Donetsk the Russians are playing to their strengths. It doesn't take a lot of coordination to slowly flatten one village after another with glide bombs until meat waves can seize it, then advance a kilometre and do it again.

It's grinding attrition. Warfare by spreadsheet.
3/ The Ukrainians could have sent these forces that are currently rampaging around Kursk to Donetsk instead, but maybe they felt the fighting there was too rigid, too constrained by terrain, defences and so on to make full use of their advantages?
Read 4 tweets
Jul 18
1/ Except Ukraine isn't in Russia's Sphere of Influence anymore.

That's the point.

You could argue Ukraine WAS in Russia's Sphere of Influence immediately after its 1991 independence from the Soviet Union, but Russia (not the CIA or Nuland's cookies) completely blew that.
2/ A Sphere of Influence is an area of the world where you can shape events even though you don't have any formal authority to do so.

A part of the world where your cultural, economic, clandestine, diplomatic and military assets let you shape local government decisions.
3/ Russia has spent the better part of the last three decades losing its Sphere of Influence because being in the Russian sphere absolutely sucks.

Moscow operates like an extractive mafia, draining resources while giving back very little.
Read 11 tweets
Jun 27
1/ Ukraine joining the EU, which everyone claims to want, will mean accepting Ukrainian agriculture flowing into the Customs Union without tariffs.

In that regard, EU unwillingness to face down its farmers over Ukrainian grain _now_, at the height of the war, is troubling.
2/ Ukrainian agriculture is only going to grow more competitive once it has won the war.

Beyond the peace dividend itself, investment will flow in, mechanisation will increase, facilities for meeting sanitary/phytosanitary requirements will be built and scaled.
3/ At the same time, the moral case for letting Ukrainians sell grain into Europe will never be stronger than it is today, when they are fighting for their own, and Europe's freedom.

If the EU can't win this argument now, it will only get harder during Accession talks.
Read 6 tweets
Jun 6
1/ In his great piece today Alan lays makes a case for why the UK should cease doing trade agreements as they'll deliver little value, and may imperil eventual re-joining or alignment with the EU.

I agreed with the facts, but disagree with the prescription.

🧵of my thinking 👇
2/ The facts I absolutely agree with:

First, no combination of free trade agreements, with anyone, will ever come close to offering the same trade benefits as membership of the EU.

It's like trying to offset shutting down the London Underground by improving bike lanes.
3/ Second, Alan is absolutely right that FTAs just do not tend to significantly increase the access of services firms to foreign markets.

The reasons for this are boring, but just trust me... no matter how many times the Trade Ministry puts 'digital' in their press release.
Read 17 tweets
May 18
1/ First and foremost, if it ever comes to a real jets, tanks and missiles shooting war with China, the paltry parcels of old tech the US is contributing to Ukraine will be completely immaterial to the outcome.
2/ A conflict with China will either be very small and contained, with both sides desperately monitoring escalation - in which case what the US has already will suffice, or a massive total war requiring production on levels that dwarf what's being sent to Ukraine.
3/ Even discounting nuclear weapons, a total war with China scenario is virtually impossible to 'prepare for' adequately unless the US is ready to basically put its economy on a war footing immediately.

Certainly you can't prepare for it by cheaping out on aid to Ukraine.
Read 11 tweets
Apr 30
1/ One of the common reactions to this was that the WTO rules compel the UK to introduce checks on EU goods.

First, well done everyone on knowing about the WTO and Most Favoured Nation. I'm proud and apologetic in equal measure.

Second, that's not entirely true (in practice).
2/ To oversimplify things, the Most Favoured Nation rule requires that you do not have different rules for different countries.

If your rules state that beef with Mad Cow Disease is not allowed you can't then say that actually Mad Cow Disease is fine as long as it's French.
3/ However, you do have a lot of freedom under the rules to differentiate how you enforce those rules based on your perception of risk.

North Korean toys are more likely to have lead on them than Canadian ones, so you can screen North Korean Transfirmors (tm) more thoroughly.
Read 9 tweets

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