Category: Europe

Russia and Ukraine Plan to Restart An-124 Production.

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I think that it is cool.

For most of the forces out there, what they need is strategic airlift capability, not tactical, and honestly, the An-124 pretty much owns the field, and will for the foreseeable future, as the only potential competitor in terms of size, the A-380 is far more restricted in terms of airports, if just because with its low wing, it will Hoover debris off an austere strip.

As the article notes, Anotov has some real problems, noting the fact that the An-70, which is a great tactical airlifter*, is languishing, and wondering if Russia’s United Aircraft Corporation might be looking at a corporate takeover.

*Once you replace the avionics with western equivalents, and allow one of the large western turbine manufacturers to license produce with higher quality materials to improve reliability.

US May Prevent Shipments Eurofighter Typhoons to House of Saud

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It appears that the issue here is not technology transfer, but the corruption allegations swirling around the deal that have put the transfer at risk.

The Department of Justice has problems with the roughly $1 billion in “consultancy fees” to Prince Bandar, aka “Bandar Bush”. See here, here, here, here, and here for my earlier thoughts on this.

I don’t see anything happening to Prince Bandar until after January 2009, because of his remarkably close ties to the Bush clan, and truth be told, I don’t see anything beyond embarrassment happening to him until the violent revolution that seems inevitable in the lands of the House of Saud.

British Court Says Prince Bandar Bribery Probe Closure Illegal

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It appears that Prince Bandar, nicknamed “Bandar Bush” for his closeness to the Bush clan, may not have been quite as successful as he though in shutting down the bribery investigation against him.

The basic deal is that Bandar netted billions of dollars (a quick Google shows £1 billion, you do the math) in bogus “consulting fees” in order to “facilitate” the £43bn Al-Yamamah arms deal.

The Serious Fraud Organization was looking into the deal, and was near to getting Swiss bank account information, when Tony Blair shut it down, probably there was a threat that the sales of 72 Eurofighter Typhoons would be canceled if there were further investigations.

The OECD, an international corruption watchdog, condemned the termination of the investigation.

It’s unclear from the story whether this ruling means that the investigation will restart, but Labour is taking no chances, they have a draft law in Parliament that would allow, “an Attorney General to close down such investigations as he or she saw fit on ‘national security’ grounds”.

Economics Update

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The average consumer is smarter than Alan Greenspan and the rest of the economic glitterati, because consumer sentiment dropped to a long time low (also here).

In energy, gasoline prices have hit another all time high, and oil prices seemed to have settled comfortably about $110/bbl.

That being said, it’s not just oil imports, inflation in non-energy imports in March surged 1.1%, with a year over year increase of 5.4%.

That 1.1% number is the largest jump ever recorded.

There is a smidgen of bright news, the Fed’s excrement for cash exchange program did not sell out this time, with only $33.95 billion of the $50 billion offered being taken.

In real estate, we have US banks killing the no down payment loan, which is long overdue. Even with a small amount of skin in the game, home borrowers tend to be much better risks.

Housing is tanking overseas too, with UK mortgage rates going up, despite BoE rate cuts, so they are pushing on a string there too.

But’s it’s not just us Anglo-Saxons, because Dutch home sales are tanking too, and let’s not talk about Spain.

Also, GE released earnings, and they sucked, which surprised the experts, but not me.

People are scared and not buying stuff. GE makes stuff. Any questions.

A Good Commentary on Russia

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Boston Globe columnist James Carroll looks at what might be driving Russia’s hostility to recent NATO actions, and comes to the conlusion that it’s completely justified:

  • The dissolution of the Warsaw Pact was accompanied by a buildup of NATO.
  • Mikhail Gorbachev was assured that if the USSR accepted the reunified Germany’s presence in NATO, there would be no further eastern expansion of the alliance.

Carroll quotes George Kennan describing NATO expansion as, “the most fateful error of American policy in the entire post-Cold War era.”

The list of countries that have invaded Russia in the past few hundred years includes, “Poland, the Ottoman Empire, Sweden, Austria, France, Great Britain, and Germany”, though he leaves off the US’s direct military participation in White Russian revolts of the 1920s.

I would argue that Carroll does not go far enough.

If one looks at the Hart-Rudman Commission of the late 1990s looking at coming threats to America, and the behavior of Lynne Cheney, who continuously called for an immediate military strike on China, and resigned when she was created like a crazy aunt by everyone else, inclucing other Republicans, and juxtaposes it with the report that Francis Fukuyama said that “There was actually a deliberate search for an enemy because they felt that the Republican Party didn’t do as well“, I think that this is actually a deliberate strategy.

The Republican party needs an external enemy to succeed, and that this actions taken recently, particularly the missile shield, are part of a deliberate attempt to recreate the Cold War for partisan political gain.

Bush Gets Missiles at NATO Conference

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Well, it appears that Bush has managed to browbeat the Europeans into accepting an ABM installation spread across Poland and the Czech Republic, despite the fact that he pissed them off of by publicly lobbying for the admission of Georgia and the Ukraine to NATO, despite the fact that there had been a previous agreement not to do so.

The marvelously named Duck of Minerva makes the point that Bush was talking out of both sides of his mouth, on the one hand claiming that the missile shield is not intended to be used against Russia, and on the other claiming that the membership of Georgia and the Ukraine, “would send a signal throughout the region that these two nations are, and will remain, sovereign and independent states.”

If they need membership to be protected against Russia, then who do they need protection against?

The answer is that this is a deliberate attempt to antagonize Russia, because it is believed to play well for Republicans. Lynne Cheney has been lobbying for recreating what was the Soviet threat for political advantage since the early 1990s.

It’s all the fault of those damn Eskimos!!!

Of course, once again, the Greeks appear to be compensating for what must be the smallest penises in Europe, vetoing Macedonia’s entry into NATO.

Let’s get this clear:

  • Macedonia was never a part of Greece.
  • Alexander the Great was not a Greek.
  • The people of what was then Macedonia did not speak Greek, except for the aristocracy, who were educated in Greek, and might have spoken Greek with more facility than Macedonian.
  • Greece was conquered by Macedonia, by Phillip of Macedon, and then Alexander took over the known world.

Any questions?

Mo Tanker, Mo Tanker, Mo Tanker

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I think that I missed a couple of things from the March 10 Aviation Week issue that I need to address now, specifically some rather telling comments in the “Hometown Hubris” article.

Interesting stuff:

  • IBoeing’s proposal was, “far too risky and expensive”. The 767-200LRF “Frankentanker” used the, “767-200 airframe; over-wing exits from the -300; floors, doors and structurally enhanced wings from the -300F; a cockpit, tail section and flaps from the -400ER, a completely new and not yet produced configuration.
    • By comparision, the A-330 proposal was nearly identical to the Australia tanker currently in test.
  • Boeing felt that, “Air Force purchase of tankers capable of hauling large amounts of cargo could jeopardize Boeing’s already tenuous C-17 production line”.
    • It’s worth noting that Boeing has already purchased long lead C-17 items for 10 airframes in the expectation of more orders.
  • Boeing did consider the 777, and considered pitching both the 767 and 777, but decided on pitching just the 767. There are claims that someone “discouraged” submittal on the 777, but no name or time are given.
  • The U.S. requirements were similar to Australia’s. The Australian defense forces wanted a tanker that could refuel 3+ fighters, and carry maintenance crew and spares to a distant Pacific airport. The smaller airports of Europe and the Middle East were not as important in their scenarios.
    • The 767 could not do this. You would need a 2nd freighter to carry crew and spares.

Now I get it. They pitched the 767, and not the 777 because they thought that the latter would compete with the C-17.

Additionally, to the degree that there was a short field requirement, the 777’s short field performance is lacking, with its wing optimized toward the cruise efficiency end of the spectrum,

Note, the boom is not rocket science. McDonnell Douglas developed their own in the 1970s, and Airbus is testing theirs for Australia as as I write.

Time for Your Weekly Tanker Saga Update

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First, lets start with my analysis. As soon as Airbus proposed the A330, Boeing knew that they were facing a larger, more modern, and more capable plane.

They stuck with the 767 for a very simply reason, they believed that they were God’s gift to tankers, and commercial clients still wanted to buy the 777, so they thought that it was more convenient.

First, Boeing has filed a formal protest on the award, which is as surprising as the sun coming up in the morning. (See here, here, and here.)

Needless to say, Democrats are using this to take shots against John Mccain (Read a fantastically funny riff on the politics here)

Truth be told, the first deal to lease was corrupt, with DoD and Boeing officials going to jail over the deal, and. McCain was right to challenge the deal.

A lot of the problem for Boeing is that they were unbelievably arrogant and unresponsive to the DoD:

“The Boeing team was not responsive and often was not even polite,” said Loren B. Thompson, a defense analyst at the Lexington Institute in Arlington, Va., based on conversations he said he had with defense officials. “Somehow that all eluded senior management,” Mr. Thompson said. “They were not even aware there was a problem.”

Add to this that Boeing’s record in defense contracting is worse than that of Northrop Grumman in terms of being on time and on budget, and that they had an inferior product, and this was a done deal.

Boeing was hoping to rest on its laurels, and the fact that much of the Congress would flip out over the choice.

Of course it doesn’t help that McCain campaign staffers lobbied for EADS.

Additionally, one of Boeings arguments, that EADS was ill equipped to create a working boom (boom and probe primarily used by the USAF, and products developed for the USAF, everyone else uses hose and drogue), was not accurate. They were already developing a boom for Australia (I guess for their F-111s, the F-18s use hose and drogue).

Furthermore, EADS was motivated to move work to the us, because they wanted to take advantage of the cheap dollar. That’s a reason that all the A330 freighter assembly will be moving to the US. It’s cheaper for them now.

For what it’s worth, The Council for Citizens Against Government Waste (CCAGW) has issued a statement supporting the deal, so it met their snif test.

Boeing has now released the specifics of its complaint against the process:

  • That the formula used to rate the competitors was changed at the last minute.
  • That this changed favored EADS by making range and payload more important, and ramp space requirements less so.
  • That they failed to give Boeing credit for its commercial airliner experience.

My comment on the last point is that the DoD took a look at your contracting performance with them and decided that you sucked.

France On Diplomatic Offensive in Africa

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Nicolai Sarkosy is intends to renegotiate its military relationships in Africa, along with changes in economic policies to better involve African nations in world economic negotiations.

This is an artifact of the collapse of US Diplomacy brought about by Bush unilateralism. It has created a diplomatic vacuum that France intends to fill, and is just one area, beyond Roberts and Alito, where the damage done by Bush and His Evil Minions™ will last for years.

Russia Rules Out Punitive Actions Against Kosovo

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The Russians believe that a declaration of independence is a bad thing, but they have ruled out sanctions against Kosovo.

This is a very positive development. One of the political imperatives in Russia is that it sees itself as a “Protector of the Slavs”, particularly those who subscribe to Orthodox Christianity, such as the Serbs.

They are behaving moderately because they recognize reality, and because, despite what the “very sensible people” in Washington say, Russia is not looking at reestablishing the USSR or the Warsaw Pact.

Their hostility toward the current path in US policy is because they feel that US policy is hostile towards them.

News Flash: Europeans Conflate Efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Support Neither

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Robert Gates is surprised and alarmed by this attitude. I say, “Well, Duh!!!”

It’s painfully clear that Afghanistan was shortchanged for the invasion of Iraq, and that the US is unable to support both efforts fully, so this means that European aid with operations in Iraq actually does free up US resources for operations in Afghanistan.

The European public has realized this for some time, as have the governments.

However, those in power realize that saying, “You’re on your own, Jack,” will shatter an alliance that they see as valuable.

The support of the European public American military operations anywhere is a rapidly wasting asset, and the stupid, disasterous war in Iraq is at its core.

Dutch to “Officially Discourage” The Wearing of Veils

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The original measure was to ban the burqa in government offices and schools, but they are now going to officially, “discourage the wearing of burqas in public. …. by trying to persuade institutions such as schools and public transport companies to impose their own bans, a stop on the garment will also be imposed for civil servants.”


a Burqa.

In the story above, Freedom Party leader Geert Wilders, referred to a burqa as a “Penguin suit”. So it’s clear that Wilders is a bigoted ass.

However, I am not conflicted on this. There is a difference between a Hijab (head scarf) and a burqa or niqab (which is similar, except that you can see the eyes).

Ignoring the security issues, which to my mind are minor, complete face covering changes the basic interaction in society, and makes meaningful and peaceful interaction difficult, if not impossible.

That being said, the banning of head scarves, such as is proposed in Spain by the opposition Conservatives, sounds to me like plain old bigotry and fear mongering.

ECB Eschews Rate Cut

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The European Central Bank (ECB) has decided not to cut interest rates, but instead fucus on minimizing Euro zone inflation (here and here)

Given the different financial situations in Europe and the US, the Euro Zone is not having a housing collapse, this is not surprising. Additionally, the ECB does not have a portfolio is just controlling inflation, unemployment is not a part of its mission.

This does, however, limit the Fed, as it places yet more downward pressure on the US Dollar.

It’s Official, We are Insane

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A number of former defense officials from NATO Countries, including former JCS Chairman, and son of a Waffen SS member, John Shalikashvili, have recommended that NATO should reorganize to allow it to incorporate nuclear first strikes into it’s tactics.

Calling for a major change to Nato’s approach to defending its members and their interests, the authors of the report, which has been handed to Nato and Pentagon chiefs, said the first-strike use of nuclear weapons was a “indispensable instrument”.

I’m sorry, but anyone who says, “The first use of nuclear weapons must remain in the quiver of escalation as the ultimate instrument to prevent the use of weapons of mass destruction,” is simply, and deeply nuts.

The fact that this is not just laughed out of NATO and Pentagon HQ is an indication that something is truly broken about the way we think.