Michael Weiss Profile picture
Apr 18 6 tweets 5 min read Read on X
America's "washing its hands" of Ukraine-Russia talks can mean several things. First and foremost, it would mean ending this Witkoff/Rubio fandango to attain (or impose) a Russia-favorable peace deal of some kind, which reportedly would include de facto ceding occupied territory to Moscow. But what else does an American walk-away entail? Some unresolved questions below:Image
1. It is a near certainty that no additional military aid packages will come from this administration once the Biden-era ones run out. But does that mean Trump will refuse to sell weapons and ammunition directly or indirectly to Ukraine? Does it mean he will actively slap end user restrictions on European countries from buying American kit for the express purpose of donating it to Ukraine? (Even Rubio alluded to Ukraine's right to bilateral agreements with other countries.)

Right now, Germany continues to supply Kyiv with Patriot missiles. Long-range air defense is one of three critical areas in security assistance where Europe cannot yet compensate for the absence of American platforms, the other two being rocket artillery and howitzer ammunition. So new European aid packages featuring U.S.-made hardware seriously matter. Does Trump's pivot to Moscow include his limiting U.S. arms exports to Europe, something that would grievously harm the American arms industry beyond the harm Trump already inflicted on it with his attacks on transatlanticism, NATO, etc.? Between 2020 and 2024, Europe overtook the Middle East as the largest region for U.S. arms exports for the first time in two decades. Now, this government is clearly not above economic own goals, but it'll nonetheless be interesting to see how it sells a new dawn with Russia -- one without a concomitant peace -- as the price worth paying for crippling the American military-industrial complex.Image
2. Does Trump lift some or most sanctions on Russia in the absence of a peace deal? He might in pursuit of rapprochement, but even here he'll find it difficult to give Putin everything he wants with the stroke of a pen. Some of the toughest sanctions, including those on Gazprom Neft and Surgutneftegas, are tied to Congressional notification/approval, thanks to Biden. Trump would also face some headwinds from Republicans on the Hill, who would not be happy with sanctions relief in exchange for nothing.

Moreover, Europe gets a vote.

SWIFT, which Moscow wanted its agricultural bank reconnected to as a precondition for a ceasefire, is based in Brussels. EU sanctions legislation is by consent. So far, there has been *no* indication the EU is considering lifting sanctions on Russia, whatever D.C. says, does or agrees to. The opposite, in fact, is the case: the EU has been discussing ways to increase sanctions on Russia in coordination with the UK: archive.ph/qsVfcImage
3. How does Russia benefit economically if the U.S. lifts most or all sanctions but the EU does not, or if the EU imposes new ones because the war continues and Russia commits further atrocities, such as the recent missile attacks on population centers? Well, it's complicated, and not in a good way for Moscow: archive.ph/N5gjhImage
In short, Europe is not some sideshow or afterthought to this conflict. It can do quite a lot on its own before or absent getting its own security portfolio in order, which is long overdue anyway. This is why the Trump/Vance campaign of bullying and abasing NATO allies proceeds apace. It is also why the GRU's sabotage operations -- arsons, bombings, assassination attempts, cyberattacks -- target the continent almost exclusively with the intent of frightening electorates into abandoning support for Ukraine. And it is why Medvedev, Solovyov, et al. are focusing their threats and vitriol on Europe. Splitting the U.S. from the rest of NATO is an accomplishment in its own right for the Russians. But they know they don't get the win they desperately want in Ukraine unless the EU rolls over the way the Americans are doing. apnews.com/article/russia…Image
And the longer that win is denied them, the more two things happen simultaneously, which makes it a dimmer prospect. The first is that Ukraine grows increasingly autonomous in its own defense capability. (Right now about 40%-plus of its military needs are sourced domestically, including and especially drones, which have fundamentally transformed the nature of this war.) The second is that European military procurement grows as European reliance on the U.S. shrinks. Allies of Ukraine, both in America and in Europe, should be encouraging both processes and acting as if Washington has already washed its hands of the war. /END

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More from @michaeldweiss

Mar 26
There is zero fucking chance this was "unclassified." theatlantic.com/politics/archi…Image
"This is when the first bombs will definitely drop." Image
LOL. Image
Read 6 tweets
Mar 21
Excellent analysis by Kiel Institute. Some conclusions track with what @JimmySecUK wrote for @newlinesmag here: newlinesmag.com/argument/can-e…Image
“To replace US aid flows and keep total support at the same level: Europe needs to double its yearly support to an average level of 0.21% of GDP. This is less than half of what Denmark and the Baltics are already doing and on a level of what Poland and the Netherlands do.”
“Currently, European governments contribute about €44 billion annually to Ukraine’s defense, or roughly 0.1% of their
combined GDP, a relatively modest fiscal commitment. To replace total US aid, Europe would need to increase its annual support to approximately €82 billion per year, or 0.21% of GDP —essentially
doubling its current financial effort.
the United States allocated just 0.15% of their GDP per year to Ukraine, European states the 0.13%, and the EU institutions just below the 0.1%.”
Read 7 tweets
Feb 22
This is an excellent and timely factsheet on Ukraine, U.S. v. European security assistance, and other misunderstood or lied about aspects of the war, by our friends at @TheStudyofWar. I'll summarize a few main points below, with additional sources of my own: understandingwar.org/backgrounder/u…
Russia's advances have slowed considerably in the last few months. It was taking, on average, 28 sq km per day in November; it took 16 sq km in January. Why is this? Russians are suffering severe manpower and equipment losses and Ukraine is causing them greater pain with its fleet of domestically sourced FPV drones, which now include fiber-optic wire-guided drones to evade electronic warfare. (Drones increasingly compensate for artillery shortages on the Ukrainian side.) Such is the state of Russia's army, its soldiers are now using donkeys to transport ammunition to the frontlines: independent.co.uk/news/world/eur…
Of course, Russia still has its own formidable capabilities and advantages on the battlefield, especially in glide bombs and drones: it, too, deploys fiber-optic wire-guided FPVs. But, as @Jack_Watling, one of the best military analysts of the war has noted, the "Russian military is massively underperforming, largely because of the poor quality of its [third big advantage] infantry and a lack of lower-level command and control." theguardian.com/world/2025/feb…
Read 14 tweets
Jan 8
New: After an eighteen-month investigation, @InsiderEng has uncovered new evidence suggesting that Russia’s GRU paid tens of millions of dollars to the Taliban in Afghanistan to target American, coalition, and Afghan military forces. GRU Unit 29155 was behind this operation. We have unmasked the officers and their Afghan agents. theins.ru/en/politics/27…
The program, per four former Afghan intel (NDS) sources we queried, averaged $200,000 per killed American or coalition soldier. There were smaller allowances for killed Afghan troops. One former official estimated that Russia paid a total of approximately $30 million to the Taliban via the scheme.Image
We confirmed much of what the NDS told @InsiderEng using data exfiltrated from three different Unit 29155 operatives' email boxes. From there we assessed the travel patterns of the Afghan couriers/liaisons, matching their presence in Afghanistan with several noted Taliban attacks on U.S., NATO or Afghan targets.Image
Read 14 tweets
Dec 19, 2024
New "Karl" thread, with @holger_r: 🧵
"The situation on the frontlines has not significantly changed in the last month. For UA, the most difficult area remains the southern part of the eastern front—Pokrovsk and Kurakhove. RU continues to advance there, but very slowly and at the cost of heavy losses."
"Some bloggers claim that Kurakhove has already fallen into RU's hands, but it seems that this is not yet the case. UA continues to resist, but after some time, RU will take the town. Pokrovsk is farther away, and urban battles there could last a long time. There is no real threat of RU capturing it within a couple of months."
Read 38 tweets
Dec 5, 2024
Breaking: The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence has released an unclassified report into the IC and its work on Havana Syndrome, or Anomalous Health Incidents. From the first lines of the executive summary: "It appears increasingly likely that a foreign adversary is behind some AHIs."Image
Last March @InsiderEng and @60Minutes concluded a yearlong investigation pointing at evidence that Russian military intelligence -- specifically GRU Unit 29155 -- was likely behind AHI. You can read that here: theins.ru/en/politics/27…
Read 6 tweets

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