The EU has imported less LNG in the second half of 2023 then 2022. LNG is just more expensive then pipeline gas, so it is the first to go. Furthermore the EU has relativly little electricity generation from coal and most of it will be replaced by clean electricity. Heat pump sales are also rising quickly, with a lot of countries in the EU phasing them out. So gas consumption is going to fall and with that LNG imports.
VW is loosing sales in China, that means they have to cut production anyway. The entire Chinese car market is in massive trouble right now, as demand has fallen due to economic problems in China. VW claims to have isolated the China business financially. So they are supposed to be able to move out relatively easily. At least they were warned since years, that they have to move out of China and if they failed well bad management hurts.
This year is going to be rough for Putin. Ukraine targeting oil infrastructure, worker shortages, infrastructure failures, the wealth fund running out and so forth. Sanctions are indeed working.
The problem is that defence is a massive advantage in war in general and thanks to drones in this war especially. Basically as long as Russia attacks, they are going to have massive losses. Due to the US not sending aid, it looks like Ukraine is going to remain unable to launch a large scale offensive. Russia has not been able to really break through either. So the best case for Ukraine is that Russia attacks, but fails and looses as many soldiers and material as possible until Ukraine might be able to break thorugh or Russia is giving up. If Ukraine holds out somewhat well, they are able to destroy a large part of the old Soviet stockpile. If the Democrats win the next US election, then Russia would be in a worse spot militarily and Ukraine gets the support to attack again.
So high losses are still good for Ukraine, if Russia stops attacking, they might built up enough strength to really break thorugh later.
Israel is accusing 12 UNRWA employees to have taken part in the Hamaz raid on Israel on December 7th. That would make them active terrorists. Furthermore Israel is saying that about 190 UNRWA employees are members of Hamaz or the Islamic Jihad. That would be 0.6% if true. As for the Bundeswehr or German Police, you would see everybody suspected of terrorism being suspended immediately. This is looking especially bad, as the IDF seems to have found a large bunker system used by Hamaz under the Gaza HQ of UNRWA. If this turns out to be true, that really makes the entire organization look bad. I am very certain the Bundeswehr would be dissolved, if they would find a hidden Neo Nazi terror organization bunker under the HQ of the Bundeswehr.
Honestly surprised the UK is as low as it is. I would have though Londongrad would have created a small group of super rich owning most of the country.
Die CDU regiert mit den Grünen in NRW, BW, Sachsen, Brandenburg und SH. Sie regieren ohne die Grünen in Berlin und Sachsen Anhalt. Natürlcih gibt es auch noch Bayern. Also für viele CDUler sind die Grünen in Ordnung und mit der FDP kann er wahrscheinlich nicht reagieren, also muss er mit SPD oder den Grünen regieren.
Die Grünen anzunerven war dumm von ihm. Es hat nur die AFD stark gemacht. Ich hoffe das hat er verstanden und er sieht die AFD als die NSDAP die sie sind.
That is the "no limits" friendship between Russia and China. NThat is "no limits" to the Russian wealth China is willing to extrect from China as long as they do not have other better options.
Die Grünen wollen bei der nächsten Wahl wieder gewählt werden. Dazu muss die Wirtschaft halbwegs stimmen und dazu braucht es jetzt Investitionen. Die FDP weiß dass, aber für die FDP hat noch nie Politik gemacht um gewählt zu werden, sondern um Reiche noch reicher zu machen. Deshalb ist es für sie egal ob sie oder die Union gewählt wird. Deshalb macht sie jetzt gerade einen groß auf Schuldenbremse und macht öffentliche Investitionen und Wahlgeschenke praktisch unmöglich. Die Grünen versuchen jetzt irgendwie Schulden machen zu dürfen, damit die Wirtschaft an Wahltermin wieder wächst. Dazu unterstützen sie FDP Politik. Die FDP macht da aber nicht mit. Also versucht man mit den Gewerkschaften und einigen Unternehmen, die dringend Geld brauchen eine Gruppe zu gründen um bei der Wahl Verbündete zu haben.
Willkommen im neoliberalen System. Man kann nur regieren, wenn man der Wirtschaft dient, denn die besitzt die Presse.
In October Russia had 3500 or so good conditioned tanks in storage. Then obviously the tanks in active service, which should be a similar number. So very roughly 7000 tanks total and they lost 6000. Obviously the also make new ones, but only 200 or so per year. So they are slowly running out of tanks. However the real limitation seems to be that they are unable to repair good conditioned modern tanks in high numbers, so they might run out sooner.
So numbers are going down, but they are not out of tanks and it probably will take a year for them to really start to feel the losses.
Belarus just had a popular position candidate for presidential elections. When the results were shown it ended up in huge protests in the country, which very well might have removed Lukashenka from power. The reason they did not was Putin sending his troops to crush it.
If you have something similar in Russia today, you have the army fighting in Ukraine, the economy is in a dumpster fire, Ukraine and the West are going to help the protestors and there is nobody to march in and crush the protests. In addition to that the number of different armed groups in Russia has increased a lot and chances are some are unhappy with Putin. Wagner marched on Moscow after all.
So best choice is to not have an election at all. However that chance is gone now. Calling it off would make Putin look like he knows he would loose. So he has to fake it and the best way to do it is to have no actual competitor, who could win besides him.