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Britain to lead coalition efforts in Strait of Hormuz- in the 1950's this part of the world was still part of the British Empire. Britain was the dominant power in Iran in 1900 and was also dominant in Turkey for a period after the First War in 1918 in Turkey. With the collapse of the Ottoman Empire Britain and France assumed a stewardship role over what is now Israel, Iraq, Syria. Only after the rise of Ataturk in Turkey in the 1930's were there independence movements and anti-monarchial movements in the region. Ataturk was an avowed modernizer who Europeanized Turkey, that was not so with the anti-monarchial movements in Iraq, Syria, which led to a great deal of unheavals and the wars we know today as Iraq war, Afghan war, Iran war. In Iraq and Syria it was a form of Soviet Communist/ Socialist  style movements that took power, and in Iran it came in the form of a religious movement based on Shia Islam that by the 1990's clashed with the socialist movements in Iraq and Syria. Syria and Iraq disintegrated costing the US dearly in resources and men, and the Afghan wars hurt both the Soviets (Russia) and the US. The Iran war may be the last of these wars as the US and Europe, and Russian Europe, China, India and Japan, close this chapter in their interactions to a region that is impervious to the kind of modernization that started in 17th century Europe with the Renaissance, in 18th and 19th century Europe with the Scientific Revolution, and in 20th century Europe with the Industrial Revolution, that was fervently desired in Russia, Japan, China and India as these ideas spread over western and southern Asia like wild fire and were adopted as emancipating and with a sense of wonder by the Asian people as their own.  The world may soon decide it can do without Hormuz. China Japan, and India can secure alternative supplies of oil from US and Russia, and ramp up their production of renewable energy to make Hormuz redundant by 2030 and- history. Germany already has shown the way - getting only 6% of imports of energy from that region. ...

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US naval blockade of Iran in Arabian Sea starts April 13 2026. US destroyed Iran's larger ships 158 of them, yet Iran also has a fleet of smaller attack boats which it plans to use in Hormuz. These are harder to detect and can be hidden in coves along the Iranian coast and used against ships. The US with its naval blockade is now prepared to do what it has done also in Venezuela, stop and interdict fast drug boats on the Venezuelan side in the Atlantic ocean. By blockading Venezuela in the ocean US is using its strengths, and stopping drug boats its ability to pinpoint traffic on the ocean. Similar capabilities are well suited to Arabian Sea and Red Sea on the open oceans and away from narrow Hormuz playing to US strengths and capabilities. Aircraft carriers and destroyers and the US Air Force is in a position to do what it does best control open seas like the British did in their heyday of the Royal Navy for most of 1750-1920. This avoids options of Hormuz itself with its narrow 15 mile gap of water between Oman and Iran too close to mountainous terrain on either side, and of the Kharg Island option which would require special forces to be backed up with more ground forces. This is the most viable option and the interlude of couple of weeks has given the president an opportunity to make a better choice for positioning the US forces where the US has its strongest points. What is lacking is the individual powers of Britain and France whose leaders Starmer and Macron have popularity below 20%. Yet the US is better off making good choices and not having these nations alongside. The posturing by European nations is limited to France and UK, as Germany and Italy are in sync with the US position. Much of the media operates as if the goal of preventing the spread of nuclear weapons to the Middle East is not important for long term peace for nations such as China and India with about 3 billion people and the billions of people of Asia, Latin America and Africa. For the first time in 400 years since 1600 as Asian civilizations began a long decline China and India have emerged in 2000-2030 into the kind of modern economies and societies that exist in Europe and the US. The last thing they need is the risk of destroying the Modern World with nuclear proliferation when it took centuries to get to the right opportunity after 1950 to modernize China and India. Xi's and Modi's generation are the first to experience modernization in Asia after Japan's experience. ...

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How to build a global port network with less cash- China's state owned Cosco and it's European ports network is an example of savy buying during financial crises, and when companies in Europe and the US were keen to make sales of ports. China simply integrated it into a vast exports network, using containerized terminal expansion modernization to build its manufacturing for export model. This was an extension of its domestic network where it added new port infrastructure to newly built rail and road connections.  India today is learning from this example. By 2000 the Chinese global export model was entrenched. It was also the year when the junior Bush president extended the wars of Reagan/Bush in Iraq of the 1980's to Afghanistan. China had a clear road ahead to build state of the art infrastructure of ports, logistics and exports over the next 10-15 years without any defense costs.  Piraeus in Greece south of Athens, a port concession acquired in 2004 Antwerp in Belgium (Austrian Netherlands), a minority stake in a container port acquired in 2008. In 2013 with sale of Terminal Link ports in a 49% stake deal by CMA of France holding 51%, China has stakes in Zeerbrugge and Antwerp, Busan South Korea, and Le Havre, Montoir and Fos in France, Xiamen in China, Miami and Houston in US. Rotterdam, Netherlands- Cosco acquired in 20126 a 35% stake in Euromax Terminal in Rotterdam from Hong Kong's Hutchison's Holdings for $125 million. Valencia and Bilbao majority  51% stake for $270 million, when JP Morgan paid as much as $950 million to ACS of Spain for these ports after the 2009 crisis led to Spanish divestments. Today in TEU's shipping containers China sends goods to Europe 10 times what it takes in through Spanish ports. Hamburg-In May 2023 Germany's Scholz overruled Habeck to let sale of 24.9% of Hamburg port to COSCO go through ...

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France has reacted faster to the economic crisis presented by the pandemic. It shielded its economy earlier with government support and household consumption has held up better. Its presidential system led to faster decisions than Germany's decentralized mode leading to some experts saying it should borrow this aspect from France. France also has 70% of its energy from nuclear, Germany by contrast depended too long on Russia and Merkel's decision to completely get out of nuclear and to let overconcentration of supplies of energy from Russia happen was a mistake. Merkel also supported the auto industry without anticipating changes taking place after the Copenhagen Climate conference in 2009 and preparing for the future. The auto industry has taken a hit in Germany as it relies too much on imported EV batteries from China and was slow to make the transition to EV's and hybrids. In fairness to the SPD's Scholz and Greens Habeck considering the economy handed to them by Merkel they had to scramble after the Russian war in Ukraine in the middle of the pandemic. Germany made it through in record 1 year's time to be independent of Russian oil and gas, a huge achievement. Over time Germany will recover as it makes a transition of business away from overconcentration in China, another of Merkel's and German business failures to develop a vision for the future. China's slowdown has affected Germany. Germany has to invest in other parts of the world including in India and Japan to diversify the supply chain. Overall score card would give Habeck and Scholz a lot better score, Merkel and German business leaders of the time a low score, and Frnce and Germany about the same score. France for a steady response, and Germany for the speed in which the oil and gas crisis handled considering also that both countries have a centralized and decentralized system based on their respective history and culture. ...

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Why China India Brazil see the old liberal order discussed at Davos Switzerland, based on the world in 1947 not reflecting growth of Asia in 2026, and not serving the working class or middle class. UK's Farage says it is about people at Swiss Ski resorts deciding what the world should look like. Today the Swiss cannot even take their trade arrangements with the US for granted after US tariffs on entrenched unfair dealings in trade with the US. There is a growing perception in the UK and US and many parts of Europe that this so called liberal order is not working for the people of these countries. China and India, Brazil, see that arrangements set in 1947 as part that order that is cherished by the folks at Davos, and not reflecting the growth of these countries in 2026. The attitudes at Davos may be the most at issue, with Swiss and French attitudes not reflecting the situation in France which is deeply divided between the rural parts of the country and the urban areas about the direction of the country and the need to make life better for the working class and the middle class. In many ways the people of the US and of Europe share this huge rural vs urban divide made worse by the deindustrialization and shipping of manufacturing overseas to Asia.  Looking back at US history provides better clues- many of the same improvements made by Lincoln as Republican, Theodore Roosevelt as Republican, Franklin Roosevelt as Democrat, JFK as Democrat have created the society Americans cherished for so long and was the beacon to the world, which is not about this so called liberal order but rational step by step corrections of course and improvement after improvement, and offer a pathway to the future better than the whole host of politics and politicians that failed America and Europe. ...

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Violation of international law or tacit approval of drug states and suppression of the election results in Venezuela- position taken by Oxford's Dill and Germany's Steinmeier is itself controversial. Merz's is realistic. For those concerned about international law is it restricted to any particular period? Then the British policy in China supported by the other powers Japan, Russia, Germany and France to suppress the Boxer rebellion in 1901 and expand Treaty ports that forced opium on China in the period 1850 to the 1930's was not just a egregious violation, horrendous violation of basic human rights on a scale unimaginable in modern times. Much of the prosperity of the Netherlands and Britain, France was achieved through such policy in Asia. Yet Oxford's Dill and Steinmeier have chosen not to look at European history and the Empires of Europe in Asia and Africa for 300 years since 1700. By comparison Venezuelan action comes after the great patience of well meaning people, and the silence of elites in the US and Europe about massive migration encouraged by the regime in Venezuela of one third of its population about 9 million people to neighboring countries including the US, and suppression of free elections, complete mismanagement leading to 150% inflation destroying its economy.  It was not only these elites in the US and Europe that were responsible through their silence, but also the Bush and Obama wars in the Middle East which sapped the resources of the United States. Why is this happening when the Venezuelan people are the main benificiaries of the action taken by the US president to send in its military. All oil sales revenue will no longer go to a corrupt "drugs" state but be used to directly help the Venezuelan people achieve a better standard of living, bring down inflation  and invest in modernization, in these unusual circumstance a program run by Bessent at US Treasury. Those who dislike the unconventional but well meaning style of the US president and his occasional poor choice of words, find every opportunity for criticism even ignoring facts and common sense. Under Chavez and Maduro the Venezuelan economy was simply mismanaged to the point of being destroyed and an affluent country reduced to poverty and inflation so bad that one third or 9 milllion people left for neighboring countries. On this Dill at Oxford and Steinmeier have only this to say- it is somebody's else's problem. we will remain silent. Similarly on introducing nuclear weapons in the Middle East -where most nation states have intermittent wars and economic mismanagement for the last 50 years the artificial states from the Ottoman Empire of Syria and Iraq, Libya, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, the Sudan every state impoverished by war and economic mismanagement - Dill at Oxford and Steinmeier in Germany also have only this to say- it is somebody else's problem not ours, we will remain silent. ...

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Russia uses SCO or Shanghai Cooperation Organization to present it's case on Ukraine saying a coup supported by the US and Europe was the root cause of the crisis, in other words an effort to turn a Russian language country against Russia with it's effort to delink from Russia and join the European Union. US seeing China as the main competitor is trying under a Republican administration to bring Russia back into the European and US fold. The Europeans Germany and France, UK under Macron, Starmer and Merz are pushing back and see it primarily from the Northern European perspective of a Russian threat as they have over centuries of rivalry in Europe since 1600. China sees Germany and German led EU as its main source of western technology, trade and capital needed for a state run capitalism to function effectively. Germany seeks to keep it's China relations on a even keel for its economic interests, so does China. In this situation it can be surmised that it is the Europeans that asked DJT to sanction India for buying Russian oil to cut Russian source of oil resource sales by $119 billion leaving China's $136 billion purchase of oil from Russia aside (knowing China would not cancel sales easily), to buy time till Germany can build up arms supply to Ukraine. India is buying time to make a gradual shift to stand with the US and the improved US-Russia relations under the Republicans can only help India gradually shift to where it always stands- with the English speaking people of the world, the US and Britain, a policy Gandhi firmly supported and which India as an ancient civilization of the Buddha and the Bhagavad Gita finds itself at home with.   ...

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It may come as a surprise that changing retirement age in France faced huge opposition yet was enacted into law for moving it from 62 years to 64  years in 2023,  but was never acted upon in China where it is 60 years. China raises its retirement age for men to 63 years from 60, to be done incrementally a few months at a time till 2040. For women it goes from 50 to 58 years, 55 years for blue collar workers. Why the hesitation. It appears that there is much age related discrimination in China so that many workers feared they would be laid off in their fifties and not get pensions till 60-64 years. This could have created much unrest as it did even in France where there is more discrimination for age than other parts of the EU.  When countries have aging populations do they have an alternative? How could they support pensions at 60 or 62 years as in France and in China? In China the social safety net is weak which leads to more resistance and caution by the government fearing unrest. Yet it is not the best time to tackle this problem as the economy slows, resources are constrained, and there is higher unemployment. ...

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Jean Raspail is the French author  of "Camp of the Saints" and of "Me Antoine de Tounens King of Patagonia," winner Grand Prize of the Novel 1981 Academie Francaise. Written by Raspail, the son of the Founder of Le Figaro French newspaper in 1973, Camp of the Saints is a book describing Raspail's extraordinary vision of how boats from Bengal would suddenly appear at French shores carrying millions of people from Bengal fleeing conditions of squalor and extreme poverty. 1971 was the year of the Bangladesh war with millions of refugees from Bangladesh at the time called East Pakistan pouring into India from Bangladesh, hit by massive floods the year prior, and then facing an army of occupation from West Pakistan's Punjab ethnic group dominated Army. While calling Raspail's Camp of the Saints "openly racist" Le Monde does not show the events described here as being entirely real- the squalid and the squalor into which Bengal had been plunged by a over a century of British rule in India that as Gandhi showed in the 1920's in "Young India" magazine spent most of the budget on policing, and very little on development except rail for logistics to hold the Empire together. On this the French Left or French Right or the European Left or Right is silent, preferring not to open up the similar situation facing China Hongkong, Shanghai as Treaty ports and Beijing after the Boxer rebellion, the Middle East with Sykes and Picot creating artificial states of Syria and Iraq, and controlling states of Iran and Egypt, and Indochina as French colony. It is not "racist" it only shows what Raspail might have seen on television at that time of the truly squalid conditions, including a famine in Bengal in 1944 that was aggravated by British policies. If Raspail imagined that boats from Bengal would arrive at the shores of France it is not something that is not connected to reality, it is the squalor and squalid conditions- except the reality the so called Right and the Left failed to say was a result of the centuries of colonization that made the region miss the Industrial Revolution. Western India around Bombay and Ahmedabad was far more developed by the 1970's and more so by 2003 when Camp of the Saints was republished. In 2026 Camp of the Saints is outdated. Northern India, Western India and Central India is in the kind of rapid modernization that happened in China, with bullet trains, ports and new highways, new industrial infrastructure, housing, going up every year under the Modi Government. In the paradox of today the Modi government is referred to as racist or religious right without reference to its essential condition, its very spirit of modernization based on science and technology acknowledging and revering the contributions of European nations and America. Bangladesh is eastern Muslim part of Bengal. West Bengal is part of the federal Union of Indian States, and has fallen into disrepair and industrial backwardness within Indian states because of the lack of the rapid modernization that India is going through, under mismanagement of the scale of Venezuela. Much of the media in the west does not report the scale of the mismanagement of some of the states in India that were built on the legacy of the early decades after independence of policy to slow down industrialization and corruption that destroyed infrastructure investment. The federal government of India and the states run by the party at the federal level in northern, western, central and north eastern India oppose migration to the US and Europe and are now growing at the fastest pace in the world, faster than China, growing at 10-12 percent a year. Bihar state in India is the home of Lord Buddha and the origins of Buddhist civilization of China and Japan. It has a population of 130 million and is growing at 22% a year in 2026. India needs its young people at home, even though it is willing to loan some of its technical people to Germany and Europe and the US. The Indian federal government policy and policy of these Indian states run under federal policy is to oppose migration and find jobs for millions in a rapidly modernizing economy at home. This then is the reality in India, as well as China, with 2.8 billion people. No one in India, not Gandhi if he were here today, not the government in the Indian federal union and states faults Raspail and others and calls them "racist," because of the extraordinary help first Japan, then China and now India receives from America and the European Union to develop and modernize quickly. In fact Indians look with admiration on the western leaders in science and technology, the scientists and inventors of Europe and the US, and are eager to emulate them in the future. And this is true also of the people of China, and reflects the aspirations of the new generation. ...

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DJT was asked if China's celebration of Victory Day with Russia recently in Tianjin had any message for the US. He said he did not see it that way, that US has good relations with China. In this context the Smithsonian Museum exhibit on military history of the US shows a real aspect of the World War II in loss of life- Russia 17 million dead, China 11 million dead, Germany 10 million dead, Poland 5 million dead, Japan 2.5 million dead, US 1 million dead, UK 800,000 dead. Russian and Chinese losses of 28 million dead are 15 times the losses of US and UK combined of 1.8 million dead. With the scale of losses of such magnitude Victory Day celebrations in Tianjin can be seen in the context of this shared history and major losses overcome as much of the world knows with US help. A sobering view is that the colonial powers Imperial Japanese Army, French and British policies caused famines in World War II leading to 6-7 million deaths in India, Indonesia and Vietnam which is 4 times the 1.7 million US and UK deaths. Views of China in the Context of the Ukraine War and Russia are very different in US than in France and Europe and are widening in differences in 2025. In the US as in this report in the WSJ China is seen as a trade partner and competitor with certain issues, many of China's university leaders and experts question the prospect of a long term alliance with Russia, and for DJT Russia is a nuclear power with which US seeks good relations and a political settlement of the Ukraine War. In France as shown in the article in Le Monde adjacent to this the European attitudes towards Russia throughout European history since 1700 of regional rivalry between France and Russia, Germany and Russia since 1900, Britain and Russia since 1700. FDR led the alliance with Russia against the Nazis and Imperial Japanese in the 1930's and 1940's. Herbert Hoover led the effort to bring relief supplies and aid to Russian in the period of the Civil War after the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917. With China America kept the government in China functioning as it retreated from the invasion by the Imperial Japanese Army in the 1930's and 1940's and the only hope with Gen. Joe Stilwell in China alongside Chinese leaders. ...

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The French under Macron commit to build a new aircraft carrier to come into service in 2038. This will be nuclear powered like the Charles De Gaulle, France's current aircraft carrier. U.S. carriers are also nuclear powered to reduce port stops for fuel. 

French and U.S. ships use American suppliers for some of the flight systems on carriers so that French aircraft and American aircraft can operate off of each others ships. For France it preserves "strategic autonomy" a policy France has pursued since Mr. De Gaulle. It also means tighter U.S. French cooperation with France being America's key ally in Europe. France has plans to increase defense spending by 4.5% and spends over 2% of GDP on defense like the U.S. 

India, Britain, China and Russia are the only other countries with aircraft carriers.

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Invest in China and visits to China promoted by PM Li Qiang with easier to get China visas is not getting the response China would have liked to get. Zero covid efforts and anti-espionage campaign has created some distrust. South Korea with 300,000 people in China has seen registration numbers drop to 200,000. Britain by half from 40,000 to 20,000, Japan by 10% from 100,000 to 90,000, and France by about 20% from 40,000. China gave out 711,000 residence permits to foreigners in 2023, a 15% decline over 2019, yet for short distance permits that include business travelers the drop was by about two thirds. 

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The coronavirus is making implementation of the U.S. China trade deal less likely as Chinese imports from the U.S. decrease and China's exports continue to grow. China's exports to U.S. decreased by $60 billion but increased to other countries by $70 billion in 2019.

As a result the Trump administration is shifting its focus to another approach. The new multilateral approach is to combine the effort with allies Australia, India, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and France. This would take the shape of a Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership to replace the old Obama period Trans Pacific Partnership which becomes defunct. The goal would be to build new supply chains with allies in Asia outside of China with the help of France and other countries that are wary of excessive dependence on China and have deep reservations of China's handling of the coronavirus outbreak.

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Macron returns to the Sorbonne, France's oldest University, for his second address to Europe, following th first in 2017, 7 years back. Then as now Macron presents a vision for Europe, with a unique role for France. Defense of the ideas and ideals of Europe built through centuries, in contrast to USA and China, and India, other centers of world civilization. It is worth a try to read the whole speech if you are a European or a friend of Europe, to get a sense of the European ideas that come from France, Italy and the Netherlands and Britain, and Germany. It presents ideas not just about defense, including Ukraine. Most of the speech is about how can Europe and European ideas be made to grow and prosper with all the changes happening in the world in technology, content that is less and less European for the children of Europe- less than 3% Macron says. How it can invest to meet the oversubsidizing that the US and China are doing, the investments that the US with Inflation Reduction Act for $1 trillion in spending and investment including chips and science, and the similar investments in China- how can Europe make investments of $1 trillion, and ways to generate the funding. And investing $1 trillion on a Europe wide basis with a plan and a set of goals to maintain European leadership in a world dominated by the US and China, and soon India. Macron says in 12 months plans have to be developed and set into motion for this new European effort. ...

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The Trump administration is looking at proposal to stop deliveries of new jet engines from the U.S. by General Electric Company for a new airliner being developed in China. There is concern that China may reverse engineer the CFM engines if sent to China for the Comac C919 jetliner. The administration may decide to not issue the license letting CFM International a joint venture of GE and France's Safran SA, to export the LEAP 1C jet engines to China.

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Germany Economy Minister Peter Altmaier says Germany expects a shallower recession. GDP in 2020  is expected to be down by 5.8% much lower than the 10-15% in other countries. Exports in June were up by 15% to China and down by 20% to the U.S. Economies of Spain and the UK are expected to see twice the decline in GDP in 2020. Italy and Germany are seeing a increase in manufacturing output, Spain and France a decline. 

Still Germany remains exposed to other trading partners than China, such as the U.S. and Britain, total exports are expected to be down 12% in 2020. About 11% of workers are using short term work subsidies to stay at home. Cases of the virus are surging in France and Spain. In Germany there is a surge but it is slowing since last week. Mr. Altmaier thinks Germany can avoid a second lockdown.

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Russian view at SCO Summit-"A fair balance in the security sphere" meaning a fair settlement on the expansion of NATO and EU that may threaten Russia, something Northern Europeans have not settled.  Le Monde covers this side of the Summit at Tianjin, a coastal city near Beijing in northeastern China. Over long periods of European history since 1600 Northern Europe including UK, Sweden, Denmark, France, Poland and Germany have contended with Russia and seen purely from this perspective Russia sees itself as a Northern European power and seeks to protect it's interests. Britain, Sweden and France have for the most part been on the opposite side since 1600. US under a Republican administration, and this is not just DJT, sees the larger interests beyond Europe of Asia and the American continent in addition to Europe, and seeks a diplomatic way out of the war in Europe.

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With the government goal of a $5 trillion economy in the next five years, India is expected to be the fourth largest economy in the world by 2026 after the U.S., China and Japan. India moved past France and Britain and will move past Germany by 2026, making the U.S. the only non-Asian economy in the top four. Britain is holding its own and its economy is expected to be larger than France's in five years.

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US Russia relations improve in 2025. The new national security document of US put out by the DJT Administration says that Russia is not a threat.  It sticks to migration and western identities when facing civilizational erasure over next two decades as key threats to the US. It poses questions for the European Union, Germany and France, yet also offers away out of the "mess" in Ukraine with the Russians saying NATO was too close to their borders as the real issue, and the US not aligning itself with NATO reducing big power tensions including nuclear arsenal expansion. Germany rebuilding the Bundeswehr and it's military offers a rebalancing of the military situation yet is not the long term solution to the Ukraine problem, NATO limiting it's role and the US limiting it's role in NATO offers a solution that preserves the long term interests of Western Europe(Germany, France, Italy, UK, Spain) and preserves world peace and dialogue. It also promotes integration of India and Russia into the world trade and world economy as it diversifies from the dominance of China in world trade and the world economy of the last 20 years of free trade that deindustrialized US and Europe. What this national security document does not say is that China's dominance in world trade and the errors of the US, Europe, Japan, Russia, India in world trading relationships and their economic approach that made this possible is the central issue and calls for diversification of supply channels in the world economy. This shifts the direction of the world in a peaceful direction where the US, Japan and Europe, India can compete in economic growth and trade with China on equal terms. ...

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US EU relations are on a better track with president Biden, yet tough talks on issues such as Russia and China, vaccines, climate change remain, and there is the uncertainty of new leadership in France and Germany with upcoming elections.

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The NYT shows women's World Cup Soccer countries and games in coming weeks. Brazil and France in Group F, Spain in Group C, Argentina and Italy in Group G, Portugal and the US in Group E. Vietnam, Jamaica, Morocco, Zambia and the Philippines have also made it to the soccer championship games in addition to China. NYT looks at each country team.

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This columnist opinion in Le Monde reflects the view in Europe that the US is in retreat, and in some quarters such as NYT that the new US foreign policy that sets the Monroe Doctrine as key aspect of foreign policy is a retreat- US setting the rules in the Western Hemisphere around democracy and governance. It says the US has set aside the ambition first proclaimed in 1945 and revived in 1991 after the fall of the Soviet Union. US administrations under Clinton and Bush took this posture after 1991 of dominant position but it did not reflect reality. US like Russia was dragged into many remote conflicts that had little to do with the standard of living, and economic advancement of the US. The US has a dilapidated infrastructure, broken healthcare system, and operates in a world trading system that has deindustrialized the nation and shipped out jobs and factories for 20 years, and worse is exposed to drug and people trafficking gangs in Mexico and Venezuela. The Monroe Doctrine 1823 asserted the US right to keep European colonial powers out of America, and it was possible only because the British also supported it in the 19th century till the US built up its Navy under TR and FDR. With Russia recognized as a European power the US is able to get its support for the US to tackle the situation in the Western hemisphere presented by drug and people trafficking gangs in Mexico and Venezuela. Tariffs are intended to get a new world trading system with new rules. Infrastructure building is underway on a scale that will far surpass China by 2030. This is not a retreat but an advancement for the Nation and the American people after three decades of failed policy. It lets the European powers Germany, France and Britain deal with Russia's requirement that NATO withdraw from its borders and recognition of Russia as a Northern European power. European history has shown that since 1700 that when faced with a majority of nations in Europe any dominant power in Europe is forced to negotiate a peaceful resolution of conflict because of it's limited resources to carry on a conflict. This should lead to a peaceful resolution in Ukraine, that allows rebuilding, and also gives the US an opportunity to rebuild its economy and standard of living for the American people. This will be a win-win for both the Russians and the Western Europeans, and both Latin America and the US, China and the US, India/Japan/Brazil and the US. ...

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Three tankers held off the coast of Mumbai by India's Cost Guard have been sanctioned for carrying Iranian oil. India stopped buying Iranian oil in DJT's first term 2016-2020. In his second term DJT wanted India to stop buying sanctioned Russian oil as a way to reduce funding for Russia's invasion of Ukraine now in its fourth year. India has stopped buying Russian oil as part of the goodwill effort to reach trade agreements with the US, EU, and Germany. The seizing of the oil tankers is part of a new effort by India to support bringing Russia to the negotiating table to end the Ukraine war. Russia has demanded Ukraine turn over Donetsk region to end the war, which is a major stumbling block as Ukraine says there are Ukrainians living in Donetsk region. Germany's increase in its defense budget and investment in its armed forces has led to Germany+ (Germany plus UK and France) acting as the chief supporter of Ukraine, after the US has taken more of a neutral stand. The US basically wanting to end the war in 2026 so that the US can address the situation in the western hemisphere with drug and migrant trafficking gangs in Mexico, Venezuela and Columbia, and rebuild its economy to bring back manufacturing from China. For India the guiding principle of its foreign policy is Gandhiji's thinking and advice for fairness and peaceful coexistence - it does not believe in a British inspired NATO expanding on the borders of Russia, and at the same time does not see how a war on a neighboring Russian speaking region is in Russia's continued interest for a fourth year with bombing of energy infrastructure to leave Kviv in darkness. Non -alignment was Nehru's not Gandhiji's idea- the ideas of respect and fairness are basic to Gandhiji's thinking and India will remain true to his ideas in world relations. One aspect of this change in world affairs is missed by all and the media, that is that with the EU and US+ Japan, and India+ Indonesia there is a population of 1 billion of western peoples, and about 2 billion of Asian peoples, for a total of 3 billion people. This is a region three times the size of China, which with its access to capital and technology, labour and good governance is in a position to industrialize and reindustrialize, and bring manufacturing/science and technology to the core of this economic region by 2035. An industrialized India with 2X-3X the size of its current GDP will still be governed on Gandhiji's ideas for world relations in 2047. ...

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Asylum hotel protests and illegal migrants in Britain filing for asylum at 111,000 cases in first 6 months costing $5.4 billion in first half 2025 alone. The Times of London says Starmer is cautious by nature, but strong action is needed going back to the source of the problem that illegal migrants do not belong in any European nation including Britain. The stark truth says Cowley in the Times of London is that having a battalion of British infantry on the coastline of France as it was during the Paris Olympics in France, is needed to keep the boats out of Britain with Britain moving out of the European Convention of Human Rights. That convention was not intended for this situation, just as the British system of justice was not intended for this situation for the people of other countries on other continents illegally migrating over oceans. Just as much as there is no Asian Convention of Human Rights for Europeans migrating over oceans to China, Japan or South Korea now industrialized nations with high standards of living and social protections for health care. ...

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The G20 declaration from Indonesia says that it "is essential to uphold international law and the multilateral system that safeguards peace and stability." It called the threat of use of nuclear weapons "inadmissable." It said "most members strongly condemned the war in Ukraine." Overall this was a major step forward with meetings between Biden and Xi, Trudeau and Xi of China, and discussions that led to Macron of France announcing his intention to visit China to get China to mediate for peace in Ukraine. It sets the path forward after Covid pandemic for peaceful cooperation in places other than Ukraine and efforts to bring the war in Ukraine to a close. The midterms in the US Congress also set the stage for Mr. Biden to offer a stable US participation after the volatile Trump years in peaceful competition with China, and growth in India, Africa, and other parts of Asia and Latin America.