Commentary
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Hi, everyone, Peter Zion here coming to you from Orlando. Again, I just wanted to take a couple of minutes to talk about what’s going on in Germany, I’ve had a lot of people write in with some less than kind things to say about the Germans, because they’re not providing what is perceived to be the appropriate level of weapons support to the Ukrainians. There’s a strategic reason for that. But I wanted to talk about the economic sacrifice that the Germans are making right now. Now, unlike the United States, which is relatively agnostic about where we get our industrial inputs, the Germans have to have a plan because they don’t have any of that local. So what they do is they cut deals with the Russians to bring natural gas in it large volumes and reasonable prices, that provides not just the basis for their entire electricity sector, but also their entire manufacturing sector, because that of metric that natural gas is processed into petrochemical goods, which are then the basis of manufacturing. So if something happens to the natural gas flows, the entire German manufacturing model fails. Now back on September one, the Russians cut off supplies through the Nord Stream pipeline, excuse me, getting over laryngitis. And told the Germans publicly that until you cease participating in the NATO coalition supporting Ukraine, and until you lift all sanctions, we’re not turning this back on. This was 40% of their supply. And that meant that the Germans had to replace that 40% with marginal suppliers. And so natural gas prices in Germany have gone through the roof to the point that it’s no longer economically viable to generate electricity, or the petrochemicals that undergird the entire economic model. The Russians basically told the Germans, you can be modern and industrialized, and neutral, or you can choose to be Western and lose everything. And the Germans went with Option B. And now that Nordstrom has been blown up, there’s no going back, even if we had a government shift in Germany and Russia today. So we are looking at nothing less than the complete collapse of the German manufacturing model in just the next year or two. So could the Germans have done more with weapons maybe. But the sacrifice that they’ve chosen to make is higher than what anyone who else who is supporting Ukraine has done? Now, even with the bombings that we had a couple of days ago, and key of the German consulate got hit by one of those missiles. And the Germans sat up notice that real quick and I’ve already delivered air defense systems to the Ukrainians. So now that the damage is done economically, and they know exactly what’s in front of them and what’s at stake. I think we’re going to see a lot more of this moving forward. So Germany may very soon be not just the country that is sacrificing the most, but one of the countries that has also donated the most. Okay, that’s it for me. Until next time, bye.
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In addition to the facts, we believe it’s vital to hear perspectives from all sides of the political spectrum. We hope these different voices will help you reach your own conclusions.
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We know it is important to hear from a diverse range of observers on the complex topics we face and believe our commentary partners will help you reach your own conclusions.
The commentaries published in this section are solely those of the contributors and do not reflect the views of Straight Arrow News.
Peter Zeihan
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