Yves here. A few months back, John Mearsheimer pointed out (IIRC on Judge Napolitano), that even when Russia won the war in Ukraine, the war in a broader sense would be far from over. The sore losers in the Collective West would be sure to keep trying to mix things up with Russia in places like Kaliningrad, Transnistria, Central Asia, the Baltics, and of course by terrorism.
Here we see the very much diminished UK try to use the geographic position and rabidness of Estonia to its advantage. But as a Japanese colleague once said, “Marrying two sick dogs does not produce a healthy cat.”
By Andrew Korybko, a Moscow-based American political analyst who specializes in the global systemic transition to multipolarity in the New Cold War. He has a PhD from MGIMO, which is under the umbrella of the Russian Foreign Ministry. Originally published at his website
The possible deployment of nuclear-capable F-35As there, which could be equipped with US air-to-ground nukes since the UK no longer has its own, would give London a leading role in managing the joint Arctic-Baltic front against Russia that’s expected to remain even after the Ukrainian Conflict ends.
Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur told the Postimees newspaper after last month’s NATO Summit that his country is interested in hosting nuclear-capable F-35As from its allies, with the outlet suggesting that the UK could deploy some of the 12 that it plans to purchase after they’re transferred. The UK’s other announcementthat it’ll join NATO’s dual-capable nuclear aircraft mission raises the chance that these jets could be equipped with US nukes since the UK no longer has its own air-to-ground ones.
The Wall Street Journal explained how “U.K. Shifts Nuclear Doctrine With Purchase of U.S. Jets”, which could lead to it obtaining the aforesaid nukes from the US, while Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov declared that Estonia’s readiness to host nuclear-capable jets from any NATO country poses an “immediate danger” to Russia. All this follows Russia’s Foreign Spy Service warning in mid-June that the Brits and Ukrainians are cooking up two false flag provocations in the Baltic to rope Trump into the war.
Seeing as how it was assessed in late April that “Estonia Might Become Europe’s Next Trouble Spot”, it’s therefore likely that they’ll let the UK deploy nuclear-capable F-35As at Tapa Army Base, where it already has some troops as part of its largest overseas deployment. Putting everything together, it can therefore be concluded that the UK is actively expanding its sphere of influence in the Baltic on anti-Russian pretexts and via associated means, with Estonia playing a leading role by hosting its regional forces.
The Baltic front of the New Cold War is connected to the Arctic one due to Finland joining the alliance in 2023 and Russia responding by building up its forces along their border to deter NATO-emanating threats from there. This joint front, which is expected to remain tense even after the Ukrainian Conflict ends, will also see the construction of the “EU Defense Line” that’ll stretch along Finland’s, the Baltic States’, and Poland’s eastern borders with Russia and Belarus as a 21st-century Iron Curtain.
It’s within this context that Trump reportedly plans to pull some US troops out of Central & Eastern Europe (CEE), perhaps in exchange for Russia reducing its own presence in Belarus (possibly including its tactical nukes), as part of their plans to build a new European security architecture. Be that as it may, the “EU Defense Line” – which includes new border fortifications and the deployment of extra-regional countries’ forces like the UK’s and Germany’s – ensures that the EU-Russian security dilemma will persist.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov recently said that the EU is becoming an extension of NATO, which is confirmed by these countries’ role in the “EU Defense Line”, their reaffirmed commitment to Ukraine during the latest NATO Summit, and the EU’s €800 billion “ReArm Europe Plan”. Therefore, the abovementioned security dilemma is also a NATO-Russian one, which might dramatically worsen even if there’s a mutual Russia-US pullback of forces in CEE should Trump give air-to-ground nukes to the UK.
The risk of World War III breaking out by miscalculation would remain sky-high in that event due to the ambiguity about whether every British-piloted F-35A that takes off from Estonia (even just for training) is equipped with American nukes as part of a first strike sneak attack. This dark scenario can only be averted by Trump refusing to give the UK air-to-ground nukes, but even if he declines, NATO-Russian tensions will still remain even after peace in Ukraine due to the increasingly British-led Arctic-Baltic front.
Our fate truly seems to be in the hands of the mentally ill, isn’t? I guess that using American F35s and nukes are the only practical way for the British to feel important especially as the California National Guard seems almost a peer military power to the UK.
But just what are the strategic goals of the European Union and NATO? They don’t have the ability to threaten Russia aside from using nukes and Russia, despite its military advantages, simply can’t conquer the whole of Europe. Are the politicians suffering from insufficient ego gratification, or do the European corporations need to raise their dividends, using an arms buildup to do so, despite the growing economic strain?
Re: Mental illness. Had an interesting discussion with someone over the weekend who was lamenting that the root of great malaise of modernity lies in child rearing, the wealthy relying on nannies (with a high turn over), the less well off having both parents working and even when they can afford child care, those sectors having a high over and very young children at that crucial stage simply not getting the right kind of early development attention to allow true empathy to develop. It struck a chord regarding the bizarre behaviour of the current generation of western leaders who seem to have something missing.
As for the strategic aim for the EU, there doesn’t appear to be one, the only good that seems to come from it these days are small consumer victories like demanding standardised phone chargers and stopping airline overcharging for carry on luggage, the kind of wilful belligerence they have reminds me of the small guy in packs of drunk male teenagers who would nip forward to give someone from another pack a sneaky dig before retreating back to their larger friends.
I wonder what is the reality behind the “UK sphere of influence”. After all:
1) The article states that the UK obtains its entire airborne nuclear armament from the USA (both F-35 airplanes and the atomic bombs they can carry). Which means that the USA will ultimately have decision power regarding their deployment and utilization, and even whether the UK is allowed to acquire them at all.
2) Actual forces being deployed on the border with Russia are German (Baltic states) and French (Romania). The UK is nothing much in Europe without NATO.
3) It is the EU that is planning, and has the weight, to set up a €800G fund for rearmament, while the UK is scraping the bottom of the barrel to send 5G pounds to Ukraine.
4) Diplomatically, the UK no longer counts. And economically, now that it is outside the EU, it is reduced to play a subaltern role (see the trade agreement with the USA).
I tend to think that the supposed British clout is entirely derivative — British power (or what remains of it) being a front for the USA, NATO, or even the EU. I suspect that Estonia (and probably thus far Ukraine as well) views it in exactly those terms — the British presence is only worthwhile as the whole of NATO is presumed to stand behind it.
This piece is highly speculative.
Don’t take it too seriously.
Starmer committing to buying US warplanes to brown tongue Trump and considerably expand UK nuclear capabilities was done without any prior political discussion let alone scrutiny, and leaving the materiel under US control to avoid compromising the NPT is entirely performative.
Apparently SKS’s own cabinet didn’t know he was going to play this card.
The political fallout from this has not even begun to settle.
I lived in East Anglia when we had US nuclear planes some 45-50 years ago, and even then the Yanks were only tolerated / welcomed for the local employment and spending they brought.
Almost everyone was fearful of the everyday Cold War hazards in those days, as we were living in the main target zone under Reaganism on Airstrip One.
These days local MPs would lose their seats for endorsing such nuclear expansion, and there is already pushback. Labour are highly vulnerable with key marginals here, and electoral politics will be part of the eventual equation – some five to ten years down the road.
Nor should you underestimate continuing residual British influence. The UK still sits in the Security Council, (acknowledgedly a risible edifice) and occupies 6th place in terms of world economies, despite the self immolation of leaving the EU, and 15 years of destructive financialisation of the economy, continued adherence to neoliberal macroeconomics and persistent dire levels of investment.
The post colonial era still exists, though much is soft power outside the US sphere of influence, and will be further eroded by Labour government foreign aid cuts.
As far as NATO goes, there is not a single member in Europe who now trusts the USA to observe Article 5, so there is no option diplomatically but to expand conventional armed forces, in case the expected forthcoming declaration of a US state of emergency really does instal 47 as 48,49 and possibly even 50 if his internal organs hold out.
Over reliance on US largesse and their massive weapons industry is declining, and will be over within a decade.
Incidentally the ECB’s strict neoliberal monetarism has meant that, as well as the UK, Eurozone countries also are in increasing deficit in terms of infrastructure investment, hence services and productivity growth, and the reinstatement of the Stability and Growth Pact will continue to damage national growth, including in Germany, and create additional unemployment across these 20 countries, which includes Estonia and the Baltics currently with unemployment between 6.5-8%, so not too good domestically. The Eurozone is moribund economically.
The politics of unemployment tends to encourage the rise of right wing populist parties, (possibly excepting Iberia) so is high risk for the EU liberal elite, but neoliberalism is currently rock solid and embedded in the Euro and its supporting institutions. Banksters don’t tend to recognise democracy or relinquish power easily either. Crises are usually good for quick profits.
Those banksters in the Baltics are well known as a route for efficient money laundering for the Russian oligarchy, so sustaining the status quo has some merit for Putin.
Looking this from Baltic-Arctic perspective, UK and Estonian elites are a match made in hell: one still desperately needs to feel like being of importance and the other was so totally caught in the -let’s-crush-Russia-hubris and made so many [family blog] moves towards Russia it’s scared out of it’s mind for the coming retribution (once Russia’s hand are free from the Ukraine mess).
As for the rest, namely Norway and Finland (yeah, nobody really cares about Sweden), it’s been long known that UK’s “arctic capabilities” are an embarrassment and more than likely a total hindrance for the rest of the “NATO’s arctic front” – even the British officers admit this.
I’d say it’s more likely in the medium-term future for the Estonians to “join” the Russian Federation than anyone enduring a nuclear war for their behalf.
Meanwhile, I’ve seen statements by politicians from Spain, Italy and Slovenia that maybe NATO is not the security solution these countries need or are willing to pay for. Something one did not see only a year ago.
Another potential flashpoint is the so-called shadow fleet of tankers carrying Russian oil through the Baltic. Obviously they cannot get insurance from the west, hence the west considers them ‘uninsured’. And the oil is subject to western, not UN, sanctions, and therefore of dubious merit, to say the least. Sweden, Germany and the Baltic states are puffing up their chests and threatening to seize ‘uninsured’ vessels, that are ‘sanction-breaking’. Something the Russian navy and airforce are unlikely to allow to happen. All it will take is some British hothead to tell the Swedes to ‘do it’, or in Starmer speak, ‘don’t you dare get cold feet’, as he warned Swedish prosecutors over the Assange ‘rape’ case. Perfidious Albion, as ever.