I added another couple of news sources to my daily routine. At first it was just an idle sort of curiosity and as a way to easily add French reading comprehension to my every day habit. Getting back in touch with someone who actually speaks French makes the effort worthwhile and anyway, the language is quite beautiful and brings a little more creativity and culture to my life which is otherwise rather austere. The built-in traduction on smartphones these days is ridiculously good for learning. But after a few days of reading (particularly, getting re-familiarized with reading) I've noticed a secondary aspect has risen to the forefront.
Each media stream in each country is gathering and putting forth certain stories as their front page article. BBC: Ukraine. Le Monde: the French elections (which seems to be somewhat of a shambles). Washington Post: Arbery's case. Of course particularly the first of these weighs quite heavily on the global mind so it is mentioned in all three newspapers.
The Ukraine situation seems strange. There is so much posturing on both sides. A global "he said, she said", if you will. I mentioned to K the other day that the Russian military build-up shown in maps by the media felt similar to how I would conquer cities when I played Civ. One would have to be actually blind/a willful idiot not to perceive the presence of so many troops as a threat. It was a little odd that the first message broadcast seems to have been from the US and not from within Europe, although maybe it was determined earlier and just not widely circulated by the media that I consume until the American voice came forward. The US is currently putting forth one message (Russia is a threat), and Russia putting forth another (We're just "training" and by the way NATO, you're the threat), with UK mumbling something lamely in agreement with the US, and EU states like Germany and France sort of floundering around trying to keep the peace. It must be terrifying to be living there, under the shadow of such uncertainty. It's also a little strange to me that there's no discrete proof of anything, just hearsay and anecdotal evidence being spread around. Maybe this is because the solid proof is classified and cannot be shared with laypeople. I guess there is actually concrete proof or this wouldn't have been magnified to the point that leaders of different countries are meeting in flurries of activity.
Speaking of these maps. The counter-message from Russia is that NATO has been expanding their member states to encroach on what were formerly Russian-controlled satellite states under the USSR. This is true (based on a map showing NATO expansion since 1997) but most importantly these expansions are not that recent. NATO membership chronological order below:
1949 – Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, United Kingdom, United States.
1952 – Greece, Turkey
1955 – Germany
1982 – Spain
1999 – Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland
2004 – Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia
2009 – Albania, Croatia
2017 – Montenegro
2020 – North Macedonia
So what is really triggering this military movement? Why wait until 2022? There must be some advantages to the current scene.
Meanwhile two news articles from the French media give different perspectives of what's going on. First, a glimpse into Ukrainians living in France - they interviewed parishioners of a church. I don't think I've ever really seen a major news source interviewing church members unless it was some story directly related to church affairs. Perhaps because secularity and the separation between church and state is more distinct in the US/UK media? Anyway it was interesting. Nothing particularly unexpected - a lot of worry, uncertainty, some defiance, exhaustion. As humans are. The other article was about European gas reliance on Russia - one of the major reasons why Germany was putting forth a very waffly image for a few days while some sources were trying to pressure them into making a clear statement about the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline. Well this article was now indicating the US is trying to offer an alternative source of natural gas to Europe. To liberate them from reliance on Russia, they say. Coincidentally also a very lucrative agreement should it come to pass. This article was a little skeptical and I can see why. Right now the US is still trying to regain its global image after the previous presidency. This might be the first major global move of the current one to repair those fraught alliances, but it is also coming in the context the dual (economical, political, military) threats of Russia and China and the intention of strengthening the historical Western alliance. Like they say, echoes of the Cold War rise back to the surface.
Maybe the gas pipeline reliance is one of those gambles. According to the Wall Street Journal (quoted by Le Monde), the EU sourced 40% of their gas from Russia in 2019, 22% from Norway, 7.2% from Algeria and 4.6% from Qatar. That's huge political and economic leverage unless they develop alternate sources of energy quickly.
(I also read an article today in BBC about them finally scrapping a "golden ticket" to citizenship - apparently there was a fast-track to UK citizenship for a rich person who invested over 2 million pounds in the country. It was even expedited for higher tiers of investment, 5 million, 10 million... If this policy doesn't open the floodgates for corruption I really don't know what does. What were they thinking? Meanwhile the Brexiteers were busy muttering about unwanted migrants seeking asylum...)
Global politics is so intriguing. So many threads - massive in scope - dragging along our tiny little lives. All these posturing have made the price of gasoline fluctuate massively in the past week or two. A week ago it was $3.25 at the Shell. Yesterday it was $3.55. That is a huge increase (and I pay attention since I am always commuting these days). Have to fill my gas every ten days or so. So there's no escaping the price increases.
3:22. Thoughts done for now I guess. I should try to get more sleep.
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