EU Defense Promises Soar, “Turbocharging” Aerospace & Defense Stocks
European markets opened higher on Monday, with the Euro Stoxx 50 gaining nearly 1%, while defense stocks erupted amid expectations of increased military spending. The jump in EU defense stocks follows last week’s collapse in the US-Ukraine peace deal negotiations, prompting European leaders on Sunday to call for increased defense spending.
The Goldman EU Aerospace and Defense Index jumped 12.5% to a record high after European leaders met on Sunday to discuss increased support for Ukraine and broader security measures across the continent. Individual names skyrocketed, with Rheinmetall soaring 11.5%, BAE Systems jumping 13.5%, Leonardo 11%, and Rolls-Royce gaining 5%. France’s Thales jumped 11.5% and Dassault Aviation +15%.
JPMorgan analysts told clients earlier that events in recent weeks “turbocharged” their thesis of increased defense spending for EU states:
“There are 30 European countries in NATO, and we expect many of them will soon commit to much higher defence spending.”
In a separate note, Goldman analyst James Fitzsimmons cited thoughts from his trading desk about the surge in defense stocks:
“Seems breakdown in US/Ukraine talks have put the momentum behind a European initiative (UK + France) that could bring increased defence spending, security guarantees and a mineral deal. Equally stories coming from Germany on increased defence spending: “Economists advising the parties that will likely form a new government coalition estimate around 400 billion euros ($415 billion) are needed for the defense fund and 400 billion to 500 billion euros for the infrastructure fund, the people said.”
Goldman analyst Fahad Javid shared insights on how European nations plan to ramp up defense spending:
“EU Defence Spending – European leaders meet this week to agree on a common strategy for increasing defence spending and identifying the best ways to fund a structural shift in fiscal policy. Funding military spending through national debt would create tensions with the fiscal consolidation required by the new European fiscal framework. EU member states could borrow from existing EU institutions like the European Stability Mechanism and European Investment Bank. EU debt could provide stable funding shielding defence spending from idiosyncratic national factors. The EU could also consider establishing a new European funding programme in conjunction with strategic partners like the UK or Norway. We continue to expect the EU to use national debt, NGEU and a new funding facility, in that sequence.”
Chart of The Day: The structural increase in government spending ranges implies an increase in the structural deficit between 0.5% – 1% BY 2027.
Goldman’s Sven Jari Stehn, Filippo Taddei, and others examined the different funding options for increased military spending:
Stehn noted, “We expect the EU to gradually increase annual military spending to reach 2.5% of GDP by 2027 in line with different policy announcements.”
All it took was Turmp’s hard lining with Zelenskyy last week to get the Europeans to increase defense spending to adequate levels.
Late Saturday, D.C. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson ruled that President Donald Trump violated federal law in firing Hampton Dellinger, head of the Office of Special Counsel. Jackson’s decision is forceful, well-written, and challengeable under existing precedent. Indeed, it may have just set up an appeal that both presidents and professors have long waited for to reinforce presidential powers.
Appointed by President Joe Biden (and son of the respected liberal scholar and Clinton acting Solicitor General Walter Dellinger), Hampton Dellinger was confirmed by the Senate for a five-year term beginning in 2024. He sued after receiving an email with a perfunctory termination notice shortly after the inauguration. The various inspector generals were also terminated and, at the time, some of us raised concerns over compliance with underlying federal statutes. The issue was not likely the outcome but the process for such removals. However, while many objected to the Helter-Skelter approach to such terminations, there may be a method to this madness. Indeed, this ruling may be precisely what the Trump Administration is seeking as the foundation for a major new constitutional challenge.
Dellinger’s claim is based in large part on the Civil Service Reform Act, which provides that the Special Counsel “may be removed by the President only for inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.” 5 U.S.C. 1211(b). The notice gave none of these grounds for the termination even though “inefficiency” and “neglect” are a fairly ambiguous and malleable rationale.
Judge Jackson held that the firing clearly violated the controlling statute and that the Act itself was constitutional. She emphasized that, while there are grounds for presidents to claim the power for at-will terminations, those cases have tended to be offices that carry out executive functions. Jackson described the Special Counsel as an essentially harmless office vis-à-vis executive authority: “Special Counsel acts as an ombudsman, a clearinghouse for complaints and allegations, and after looking into them, he can encourage the parties to resolve the matter among themselves. But if that fails, he must direct them elsewhere.” She noted that earlier cases supporting the executive power to fire executive officials involved “restrictions on the President’s ability to remove an official who wields significant executive authority. The Special Counsel simply does not.”
Judge Jackson has a good-faith reliance on her narrow reading of existing precedent. However, it is far from conclusive and brushes over some striking conflicts with prior rulings of the Supreme Court. Jackson insisted that a contrary ruling would undermine the very point of the Special Counsel office: “its independence,” However, that is the very point that has irked both Democratic and Republican presidents for years.
In 1978, President Jimmy Carter objected on these grounds. The Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel explained that, “[b]ecause the Special Counsel [would] be performing largely executive functions, the Congress [could] not restrict the President’s power to remove him.” 2 Op. O.L.C. 120, 121 (1978).
It is unclear whether the current Supreme Court would agree with an exception for minor or de minimus intrusions. Many scholars and judges believe that a president either has Article II authority to fire executive branch officials or he does not.
Notably, there are only four single agency heads who were given tenure protection by Congress: the Directors of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), the Commissioner of Social Security, and the Special Counsel. In 2020, the Court ruled in Seila Law LLC v. CFPB that Congress had violated Article II by granting tenure protection to that sole agency head: “The CFPB’s single-Director structure contravene[d] [Article II’s] carefully calibrated system by vesting significant governmental power in the hands of a single individual accountable to no one.” Id. at 224.
Then, in 2021, in Collins v. Yellen, the Court rejected the same claim as to the director of the FHFA. That opinion came with directly opposing language to Jackson’s rationale. The Court found that Seila Law to be “all but dispositive” on the question and expressly rejected the argument that this would change depending upon “the nature and breadth of an agency’s authority.” The Court held that the “[c]ourts are not well-suited to weigh the relative importance of the regulatory and enforcement authorities of disparate agencies.”
Given these cases, lower courts clearly got the message – a message amplified by President Joe Biden who appointed Dellinger. On the third “independent” position, the Commissioner of Social Security, Biden’s Office of Legal Counsel declared that “the best reading of Collins and Seila Law” is that “the President need not heed the Commissioner’s statutory tenure protection.” Two circuits (the Ninth and Eleventh) have ruled consistently with that interpretation in favor of executive authority to remove such officers.
Ultimately, Dellinger can be removed even if this decision stands. The Trump Administration could have easily cited a basis like inefficiency or neglect. The question is why it decided not to do so. Clearly, it could just be a chainsaw approach to cutting positions. However, it may also reflect a desire for some in the Administration to challenge lingering case law limiting executive powers. In other words, they seem to be spoiling for a fight.
The reason may be Humphrey’s Executor v. United States (1935), which established the right of Congress to create independent agencies. It found that Congress could, without violating Article II powers, provide tenure protection to “a multimember body of experts, balanced along partisan lines, that performed legislative and judicial functions and was said not to exercise any executive power.” The Court in cases like Seila Law cited that precedent for one of the exceptions to executive power. It also cited an exception for giving tenure protection to “certain inferior officers with narrowly defined duties,” under Morrison v. Olson (1988). Jackson cited both cases and those exceptions in shoehorning the Special Counsel into a narrow band of quasi-executive positions.
What may be overlooked in the filings of the Administration before the Supreme Court in the Dellinger case was this line in a footnote: “Humphrey’s Executor appears to have misapprehended the powers of “the New Deal-era [Federal Trade Commission]” and misclassified those powers as primarily legislative and judicial.” It went on to suggest that the case is not only wrongly decided but that the Justice Department “intends to urge this Court to overrule that decision.”
Described by the Court as “the outer-most constitutional limits of permissible congressional restrictions on the President’s removal power,” the Trump Administration appears set to try to redraw that constitutional map.
That is why Jackson’s opinion may not only be expected but welcomed by the Trump Administration. It is hunting for bigger game than Dellinger and Judge Jackson just gave it a clear shot for the Supreme Court.
Trump Moves To Bolster Nation’s Lumber Supplies & Address National Security Risks
President Trump, who campaigned on a pledge to end the Biden-Harris regime’s “inflation nightmare,” sparked by out-of-control government spending, has signed multiple executive orders to begin the process of delivering emergency price relief to the average American household.
President Trump’s latest executive order directs his administration to investigate whether imports of timber, lumber, and related wood products threaten US national security under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act. The order also calls for measures to bolster domestic supply, aiming to reduce residential and commercial construction costs.
Here are the key points from the executive order titled “Addressing The Threat To National Security from Imports of Timber, Lumber”:
The US has sufficient timber resources but remains a net importer of lumber.
Foreign subsidies and dumping practices threaten domestic industry competitiveness.
The investigation will assess domestic production capacity, foreign supply chains, trade policies, and potential national security risks.
Within 270 days, the Secretary of Commerce must report findings and recommend potential actions, including tariffs, quotas, or policy measures to strengthen the US timber and lumber supply chain.
Last week, Trump told reporters in the Oval Office, “We are freeing up our forests … and we have an emergency order to do that,” adding, “We have more forest than almost anybody … we don’t need trees from Canada.”
JUST IN: President Trump says he is signing an emergency order to “free up forests” for more lumber production in the United States.
An influx of new, cheap lumber will drastically reduce the cost of new housing construction. LET’S GO! pic.twitter.com/Q4savP36ct
The executive order seeks to expand domestic wood production to lower construction costs. It is expected to roll back Biden-era timber and lumber ‘green’ policies, which have been blamed for increasing wildfire risks, harming fish and wildlife habitats, and driving up housing and construction expenses.
Snarled supply chains during the Covid era sent plywood costs through the roof.
In a Jan. 20 executive order, Trump ordered “emergency price relief” for Americans on housing costs and other living expenses…
“Many Americans are unable to purchase homes due to historically high prices, in part due to regulatory requirements that alone account for 25 percent of the cost of constructing a new home according to recent analysis,” the order said.
The emerging growth scare (read more here) may be enough to lower borrowing costs.
The White House stated in an earlier executive order that it is addressing Biden’s “destructive policies, which inflicted a historic inflation crisis on the American people.”
FedEx Unable To Provide Answers For Woman Who Shipped $20K Worth Of Gold And Silver That’s Gone Missing
A North Carolina woman is searching for answers after a $20,000 shipment of gold and silver coins vanished in transit.
Barb Kokotec told FOX13 she sent the package through FedEx, expecting delivery within days. Instead, four weeks later, it was allegedly stuck at the FedEx World Hub in Memphis, according to Fox 13.
“We’re out of pocket over $20,000 at this moment,” she said, describing the ordeal as “very, very stressful… That’s a lot of money.”
Kokotec shipped her gold and silver coins, along with silver bars, in late January, planning to sell them to JM Bullion.
“I noticed it wasn’t being delivered,” she said.
The Fox 13 report said that on February 6, FedEx informed her they had located the package, but by February 27, it was still missing. “It’s been three weeks,” she said.
FOX13 has previously reported on lost shipments at the FedEx World Hub in Memphis, including a Kentucky woman whose clothing orders went missing twice before finally arriving. But Kokotec said her situation is different.
“We just want what we worked for and earned and not to be out of pocket,” she said.
FedEx responded, stating, “We will work directly with the customer on this issue.”
The exposure of China’s secret police stations abroad highlights a significant threat to national security and civil liberties.
It is unsettling to learn that the Chinese regime is capable of operating covert police stations in foreign countries to monitor, harass, and control Chinese citizens living abroad—committing considerable resources to focus on those most critical of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
CCP shadow police operations came to light in June 2021, when nonprofit media group ProPublica revealed Beijing’s Operation Fox Hunt program. Initially thought to be some form of Chinese bounty hunter program, the United States and numerous other countries now see it as a global shadow police force. This program, ostensibly aimed at combating corruption, is now viewed as a front for targeting and coercing dissidents and critics of the CCP to return to China. According to the human rights group Safeguard Defenders, these activities are ongoing in more than 50 countries, including the United States, Canada, and several European nations.
On Feb. 12, the U.S. House Committee on Homeland Security released an updated “China Threat Snapshot,” detailing instances of espionage and transnational repression conducted by the CCP on U.S. soil. The report emphasized concern over the growing threat posed by these covert operations and their potential to undermine U.S. sovereignty and national security.
The most recent court case related to these activities took place in New York, where Lu Jianwang and Chen Jinping were accused of working on behalf of China’s Ministry of Public Security in violation of the Espionage Act in December 2024. The two men were arrested for allegedly setting up a secret police station used to track and intimidate Chinese dissidents living in the United States, with the aim of coercing them into returning to China.
Operations like that in New York have a chilling effect on the Chinese population throughout the country, stifling free speech and inhibiting individuals from expressing dissenting views about the CCP. As a result, the very principles of freedom and democracy that America stands for are threatened.
Additionally, these operations have significant implications for U.S. national security. The covert nature of these police stations makes them potential hubs for espionage activities. By gathering intelligence on Chinese dissidents and other targets, the CCP can gain valuable insights into U.S. policies and strategies. This intelligence can be used to influence U.S. politics, shape public opinion, and achieve strategic advantages in international negotiations.
The global response to the CCP’s secret police stations has been varied, with U.S. allies expressing concern and taking steps to address the issue.
Allied nations, such as Australia and the United Kingdom, have also reported similar covert operations on their soil. These activities have strained diplomatic relations and raised questions about how best to respond to China’s growing influence abroad. Similar to results from U.S. intelligence organizations, the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO) has identified multiple cases of Chinese interference, including the use of secret police stations to monitor and intimidate Chinese nationals.
In response, the Australian government has implemented stricter regulations and increased efforts to counter foreign interference. ASIO Director-General Mike Burgess has said that Australia will not accept any form of foreign interference and is dedicated to safeguarding the rights and freedoms of its people.
The UK has also taken steps to address this issue. British authorities have launched investigations into alleged secret police stations operating within their borders and have called for greater international cooperation to combat the threat. Then-Home Secretary Priti Patel emphasized the importance of collaborating with allies to safeguard citizens from foreign interference.
In Canada, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) has been actively investigating the alleged Chinese secret police stations. In October 2022, the RCMP announced that it was probing reports of these stations operating in the Greater Toronto Area, including locations in Markham and Scarborough. The investigations were expanded to include Vancouver and Montreal, where similar activities were reported. In June 2023, the RCMP reported shutting down illegal police activity connected to these stations in Ontario, Quebec, and British Columbia.
The United Nations has expressed concern over the reports of Chinese secret police stations operating abroad and the threat to undermine international law and human rights. Additionally, several member states from the U.N. Human Rights Council raised concerns regarding these extraterritorial activities.
In 2022, then-U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet called for an investigation into the allegations of harassment and coercion by Chinese secret police stations, and emphasized the need for transparency and accountability.
China’s secret police stations abroad represent a complex threat to national security, civil liberties, and international relations. In the United States, recent court cases and congressional reports highlight the urgent need to act to protect the rights and freedoms of Chinese nationals living abroad.
As all the affected nations grapple with the threat posed by the CCP’s shadow police stations, it is crucial for the international community to come together and develop effective strategies to counter foreign interference and uphold democratic values.
* * *
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times or ZeroHedge.
Topline: The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) sent $1.3 billion in foreign assistance to the Democratic Republic of the Congo last year, the world’s fifth-poorest country by GDP per capita.
The spending would be easier to stomach if the Congo was devoting all of its own resources toward caring for its people and still coming up short.
But new reporting from the Swiss magazine Die Weltwoche revealed that the country’s officials are splurging on their travel expenses. The Congo spent the equivalent of $488,000 on a six-night hotel stay during this year’s World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Key facts: The Congo delegation booked “several dozen” rooms at the five-star Hotel Quellenhof, even though there were only six official members in the country’s delegation to the Forum.
The tab works out to over $81,000 per night. The hotel describes itself as “a haven of peace where you can take time for yourself and your loved ones” and make “your holiday dreams come true.”
Switzerland’s delegation came under fire in 2023 for spending $128,000 on a hotel for the World Economic Forum, violating the country’s expense regulations, Die Weltwoche reported. The Congo, with much more limited resources, spent almost four times that amount.
The Congo is one of the 30 most corrupt countries in the world, according to Transparency International. At the World Economic Forum in 2020, the country booked 30 hotel rooms for almost $16,000, paid only $4,000, and then left Switzerland, Die Weltwoche reported.
Background: USAID funding for the Congo last year included humanitarian assistance, healthcare, “peace and security” bills and more. The $1.3 billion was funded through the Department of Agriculture, Department of State and USAID, with all funded managed by USAID.
President Donald Trump temporarily halted all foreign funding and shut down USAID, requiring federal employees to return home from the Congo. The funding freeze is blocked by a federal judge as of Feb. 17.
Summary: Rigorous oversight of foreign funding is needed if and when USAID reopens. American taxpayers should not be assisting governments who spend their citizens’ money on luxury resorts.
The #WasteOfTheDay is brought to you by the forensic auditors at OpenTheBooks.com
European Reality Check: Without The US There Is No NATO And No Ukraine
Is the rest of the world entitled to US money and US security? This is the question that’s never asked when the establishment media rages about Donald Trump’s opposition to continue the status quo in Ukraine. Consider for a moment the situation from the perspective of friends (allies).
Imagine a wealthy man is approached by his friends often for loans which these friends rarely pay back. He obliges out of generosity, but begins to suspect his friends are only interested in his wallet. So, he makes an announcement that he’s trying to get his finances in order and will not be lending any money for the next 90 days.
Do his friends respond with understanding? No. They call the man a criminal and cry endlessly about how their families will starve and the world will fall apart if he doesn’t keep filling their bottomless gullets with cash. They even suggest he is deserving of retribution for daring to ask them to support themselves.
With friends like these, who needs enemies?
This has been the core dynamic between the US taxpayer and the rest of the western world for many decades. The level of reliance that Europe has had on America is staggering. The amount of funding that crosses the Atlantic every year to keep “allies” well fed and protected is immense. Most of the population isn’t even aware of how unbalanced the relationship is between America and the rest of the world. To illustrate lets look at one aspect of the US vs European relationship: Defense spending.
Well before the fireworks at the White House between the Trump team and Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky European governments were increasingly discussing the possibility of an “EU army” and a NATO without US involvement. UK officials along with those in Germany and France have been playing with the notion of boots on the ground in Ukraine, an action which would no doubt precipitate WWIII with Russia.
Political leaders and media proponents have been flooding social media to show support for Zelensky as the new savior of the EU and many have suggested that Europe can easily fill the void that the US leaves behind. This is dangerous delusion.
For example, the US represents around 70% of the entire annual combined defense spending of NATO countries. No other nation comes close.
In 2023-2024, this expenditure amounted to over $860 billion. The closest NATO member in terms of budget for the alliance is Germany with $68 billion. NATO funding is included in America’s total defense spending package.
According to RAND Corporation’s Defense Spending Index, the US carries 47% of the burden share, vastly outweighing any other NATO member. While NATO’s official budget is $3.5 billion, this does not represent the burden share if NATO goes to war. Members with the largest armies and spending the most on defense will be expected to expend the most resources in a conflict.
The media consistently misrepresents the NATO spending imbalance by comparing NATO fees as a percentage of GDP. This is nonsense. The sheer amount of defense spending is what matters, not the ratio to GDP. When examined in true terms there is no argument to be made – The US is essentially the military cash cow for the entire western world. Without the US there is no NATO.
When it comes to Ukraine the waters are more muddy but the conclusions are the same; the US is expected to bear the brunt of the burden. US aid to Ukraine so far ranges from $120 billion to $180 billion depending on the source. Zelensky claims that $100 billion of this money “never reached Ukraine”. There is no verification of this either way. For now let’s assume Zelensky is misinformed.
A graph of total expenditures between the US and other western nations shows the EU with a large amount of aid, but take a closer look at military commitments and it’s clear that the EU has spent a minimal amount on Ukraine’s actual defense. The US is the primary provider of weapons, ordnance and other equipment used to actually fight the war. Without the US, Ukraine’s defenses will suffer an expedited collapse.
To be clear, Ukraine is not entitled to US tax dollars or US military aid. Europe insists that the war must continue even without US help, but their ability to fund and fight the war is limited. They would trigger WWIII in the process, and they would lose. The belief that more money or more armaments will prevent a Ukraine loss or land concessions to Russia is irrational. Ukraine’s biggest problem is manpower, not money, and no amount of money is going to triple Ukrainian forces on the eastern front.
A peace deal should have been negotiated a long time ago.
For now it appears that the European elites are frantically trying to rally public support around extending the conflict and forming a centralized EU military. This will take them years and it will never come close to the same funding levels that the US provided. Not to mention, younger native born Europeans have no interest in joining to fight.
The western split over Ukraine is a profound event in history. Some will say it was the moment the US “abandoned their allies” and let Russia win. Those with sense will say that this was the moment the US stopped contributing to the problem and offered a solution while Europe foolishly refused to listen.
Reuters cited unnamed sources to report that Israel is lobbying the US to keep Russia’s bases in Syria as part of a plan to counterbalance Turkish influence there. According to them, Israel fears that Hamas might relocate to Syria and then operate from there under Turkish protection, which could drastically worsen Israeli-Turkish tensions. They didn’t explain how Russia’s continued military presence in Syria could avert that scenario, however, nor how the US could convince Syria not to kick them out either.
Nevertheless, the little that was revealed sheds light on what Israel might have in mind, namely an informal trilateral arrangement centered on their shared interests in preventing Turkiye from dominating post-Assad Syria.
Should they fail, then Russia fears that Turkiye could hold its bases there hostage as part of some geopolitical blackmail scheme; Israel fears Hamas establishing itself there with Turkish protection; and the US fears the preceding scenario leading to a serious crisis within its allied network.
The first step towards protecting their corresponding interests is to ensure that Syria can rely on Russia as an economic and military counterbalance to Turkiye, which necessitates the US agreeing to let Russia maintain its military presence there. The prerequisite is getting the US to understand Russia’s crucial role in this respect, ergo the reported Israeli lobbying, after which the US would then have to convey this to Syria. That could take the form of assuring it that sanctions relief isn’t conditional on kicking Russia out.
An unnamed high-ranking EU official told reporters in late January that “We have already informed the new authorities in Syria that the normalization process hinges on removing all manner of foreign presence, be it military or some other tentacles. Three countries are present there, and Russia is one of them. So yes, we keep pressing them on this matter.” In spite of that, the EU just lifted some sanctions on energy, transport, and banking, thus suggesting that its position has unofficially changed since then.
This volte-face is either due to Israeli lobbying and/or US pressure, the first of which would show that the EU is still doing regional favors for Israel even after harshly criticizing its conduct in Gaza while the second would show that the transatlantic rift over Ukraine isn’t as serious as many thought. After all, it’s a major concession on the EU’s part to lift some sanctions on Syria even though Russia still retains its two bases there that the bloc demanded be removed as a condition for this, hence the aforesaid speculation.
With this precedent in mind, it can be concluded that Israel has already made progress on relieving external pressure upon Syria to kick Russia out, whether by lobbying the EU and/or the US, the latter with regard to having possibly gotten it to convince the Europeans about the importance of this. The next step is to then ensure that the terms that Syria requires from Russia for keeping its bases aren’t so onerous as to (perhaps deliberately at Turkiye’s behest) scuttle their talks on this issue.
It’s here where the spirit of the nascentRussian–US “New Détente” could see the US can explain to Syria that it wouldn’t object to Russia rebuilding some of its armed forces that Israel destroyed late last year within certain limits and conveying that Israel agrees to this as well. At the same time, the US can also convey that Israel might destroy whatever equipment Syria receives from Turkiye and could resume its years-long bombing campaign there against what it considers to be terrorists, in this case Hamas.
This carrot-and-stick approach might be sufficient for Syria to agree to scale back whatever onerous demands it might make of Russia in exchange for preserving its military presence, provided of course that the interim authorities are rational, though that can’t be taken for granted given their sordid pasts. Should this second step succeed, then the final one would be for the US to advise Syria on how to most effectively leverage its renewed strategic partnership with Russia for counterbalancing Turkiye.
Apart from allowing it to rebuild the Syrian Armed Forces within certain agreed-upon limits, this could take the form of offering Russia more energy and reconstruction contracts to expand its existing presence in these spheres, which can be explained to Turkiye on the basis that Russia has more experience. Even if Turkiye interprets this as a snub, its hands would be tied in terms of how to respond since any vindictive pressure upon Syria could counterproductively push Syria further away from it.
Through these means, Russia, Israel, and the US would advance their shared interests in preventing Turkiye from dominating post-Assad Syria, which could then result in more trilateral cooperation on other issues such as convincing Iran to reach a new nuclear deal with the US. There’s even the possibility of expanding their trilateral to include their shared Indian partner so as to form a quadrilateral for managing European, Mideast, and Asia-Pacific affairs if the “New Détente” leads to a new world order.
Israel knows which way the wind is blowing and will therefore do whatever is needed to ensure that its interests are safeguarded by key players in the global systemic transition. Unilaterally advancing these same interests could entail enormous costs and risks such as if it feels compelled to bomb Hamas militants sheltering in Turkiye’s Syrian bases should that worst-case scenario materialize. That’s why Israel prefers to find common ground with Russia and the US in order for them to help it with this.
While the Russian-US interplay in Syria is pivotal for protecting Israel’s regional security interests, the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) is pivotal for advancing Israel’s economic interests. That megaproject was frozen after October 7th but Israel hopes to soon revive it. The US also participates in IMEC while Putin declared that “[IMEC] will only benefit us” so this serves as yet another convergence of their interests with Israel’s and could justify expanding their trilateral into a quadrilateral with India.
For there to be any chance of that happening, the Russian-US interplay in Syria must first succeed in convincing that country’s interim authorities to maintain Russia’s military presence there, after which it must effectively counterbalance Turkiye with Israeli-advised US guidance. Only then might their trilateral move towards other issues, dependent in large part on the “New Détente” unfolding in parallel, and consider inviting India to join them in forming a “Big Four” that geopolitically reshapes Eurasia.
This article is the second in a series titled “India: The Next Five Years.” Conversations with subject experts, thought leaders, innovators, strategists, and diplomats will explore India’s foreign relations and its global outlook from 2024 to 2029.
India, the world’s fastest-growing economy, is also growing in its understanding of itself. As it does so, its “grand strategy”—the way it views its place in the world—is largely defined by China, experts say.
“China looms increasingly large in India’s strategic consciousness,” writes Dhruva Jaishankar in his recently released book, “Vishwa Shastra: India and the World.”
“Indeed, China’s rise is likely the primary factor influencing India’s grand strategy today.”
“Vishwa Shastra,” is a Sanskrit phrase that means “treatise on the world.” The book offers a consolidated, linear analysis of Indian foreign policy from ancient to modern times.
Jaishankar, who serves as executive director of the Washington-based Observer Research Foundation, told The Epoch Times in an exclusive interview that there are broadly five objectives to India’s “grand strategy.”
“Strengthening India at home, militarily and economically, is [the] number one priority. [Second is] ensuring a stable neighborhood, which has been a big challenge, but the neighborhood has always, again, been a first priority internationally,” Jaishankar said.
Maintaining a balance of power is India’s third priority. The fourth is to address legacy issues concerning India’s partition, which led to the formation of Pakistan and created larger regional consequences. The fifth is to advocate for India’s adequate participation in global rule-making institutions, he said.
These five objectives have largely defined India’s grand strategy since its independence in 1947. Today’s India has more opportunities and resources to achieve these objectives than it has ever had before, according to Jaishankar.
“India is less on the defensive than in the past. It has more resources than in the past. So that’s good in many respects. It has an ability to modernize. It has an ability to settle some of the issues in its periphery. It has the ability to bypass and isolate Pakistan and things like that.”
Articulating India’s Grand Strategy
Srikanth Kondapalli, dean of the School of International Studies at New Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), told The Epoch Times that every major power has a grand strategy that defines its trajectory, looking out 20 to 25 years. Along with its planning for economic, technological, and military development, the grand strategy details a country’s national ethos.
An expert on China’s foreign and security policies, Kondapalli said how much of a nation’s grand strategy is disclosed depends upon the purpose ascribed to it by that nation.
“For example, the Americans have the [Quadrennial] Defense Review and national security strategy. … The Russians have a strategy like this. The UK has one. China also articulated it in terms of national rejuvenation by 2049, and they have several steps—from up to 2021 up to 2035,” said Kondapalli.
India’s grand strategy has rarely been explicitly articulated, and various authors have attempted to express the country’s vision. Jaishankar’s work attempts to define India’s global impact, exactly 25 years away from the mid-century world. The mid-century is also the timeframe of China’s grand strategy of national rejuvenation, sometimes dubbed “Global China 2049” or “China 2049.”
Kondapalli cited “India 2020,” a 1998 work by India’s former president, A.P.J. Abdul Kalam and Y. S. Rajan. The book outlined a strategy for a developed India looking at the first two decades of the new millennium.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has expressed Indian strategy as “Viksit Bharat 2047.” The phrase “Viksit Bharat,” which means “developed India,” conveys the Indian government’s vision to transform the country into a self-reliant and prosperous economy by 2047.
Kondapalli described the areas defined under Viksit Bharat 2027 as “soft areas of the grand strategy.”
Meanwhile, many of India’s security-related issues are kept guarded and undisclosed, he said. A number of the undisclosed areas concern China.
Despite its possibilities, India faces many challenges to the achievement of its grand strategy. Looming large among them is China, which analysts define as a major challenge to India’s rise on the world stage.
Geography and history provide the context for the challenge from China. That’s according to Monish Tourangbam, director of the India-based Kalinga Institute of Indo-Pacific Studies.
“Since its inception in 1949, the Sino–Indian war of 1962 and its rise as a global power in the 21st century, communist China has influenced the conception and operationalization of India’s grand strategy,” Tourangbam told The Epoch Times.
Jaishankar said China challenges each of India’s grand strategy objectives.
“The biggest obstacle in each of these five objectives today, arguably, is China. So China is the biggest obstacle to India’s defense procurement, its technology policy, its trade policy, its industrial policy,” he said.
Kondapalli said that since 2009, India has viewed China as a “long-term threat” to its strategic plans. He defined a short-term threat as one within a timeline of five years, a medium-term as 15 years, and long term as one with a timeline of about 35 years.
It was in 2009 that the Indian position shifted to fighting a two-front war—meaning against Pakistan and China—“under the nuclear threshold,” he said, “because both are nuclear.”
“But this is the armed forces strategy, rather than national strategy,” he said, adding that India faces tremendous challenges from China from all other fronts.
Kondapalli said that within India’s grand strategy, the China factor is “uncertain or even negative” due to its territorial dispute with India. He said this dispute is long-term.
“This is not going to be resolved [in the short term]. So you have to factor China in the territorial dispute in the grand strategy,” he said.
Jaishankar cited active competition from China in India’s neighborhood—in countries such as Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Myanmar. Meanwhile, the balance of power in the Indo-Pacific has also been altered by China’s rise. India is working with other countries to counter that, he added.
Even in international institutions, China is trying to block India’s ascent, he noted.
“China is ultimately the main power most responsible for blocking, say, U.N. Security Council reform, India’s entry into the Nuclear Suppliers Group on certain trade issues, and things like that. There is a conflict of interest,” he said.
India’s role in global institutions is increasing. Throughout its 2023 presidency of the Group of 20 (G20) international forum, it played a crucial role in an expanded BRICS and in other platforms of global governance, according to Tourangbam.
However, China is using a two-pronged approach to challenge that increasing influence, he said.
“China’s challenge to India’s rise in global institutions is both ideational and material,” Tourangbam said. India’s democracy and its inclusive model of global governance make it appealing, he said. However, China’s sheer economic size and influence are a challenge for New Delhi to navigate in global institutions.
China’s grand strategy is to be number one: to replace the United States, in particular. Beijing also wants to be number one in Asia, Kondapalli said. But there are powers in Asia—India, Japan, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam—that can compete for that influence and do not want China to mitigate their footprint.
“China’s role in South Asia, Southeast Asia, where it wants to marginalize India, is not acceptable to India,” he said. India’s grand strategy will thus include countering the Chinese grand strategy vis-a-vis territorial issues and competition in Asia.
There are many elements of the strategy, he noted. One element is the QUAD alliance between India, the United States, Japan, and Australia in the Indo-Pacific. Another is Exercise Malabar—joint maritime military exercises between the QUAD countries. Another element is the individual Free Trade Agreements between India and various nations.
And yet another is the recent Modi–Trump meeting. Of that, Kondapelli said, “what transpired we don’t know.”
With its rapid economic growth, India is forecast to be the world’s third-largest economy by 2030, behind the United States and China.
Jaishankar described three global schools of thought—unipolarity, bipolarity, and multipolarity—viewed from the perspectives of the three likely leading global economies over the next two decades: the United States, China, and India.
The academic terms describe three systems of geopolitical power distribution. A unipolar world is dominated by one power; a bipolar world is dominated by two major powers, and in a multipolar world, power is distributed among several states.
India’s grand strategy needs to be understood in the context of expectations that it will make the list of top global powers in the near future, he said.
The United States “is number one,” Jaishankar said. “In an ideal world, the U.S. wants a unipolar world. It has a pure competitor in China today.”
Meanwhile, China—despite its long-term ambition for a unipolar world in which it is number one—acknowledges the bipolarity of today’s world. Its ambition to be the leading global power does not contradict that acknowledgment.
“When China says it wants a new type of great power relationship or talks of avoiding the Thucydides Trap, it is actually acknowledging a bipolar world, but asking the U.S. not to contest it,” Jaishankar said. The Thucydides Trap is the theory—popularized by Harvard scholar Graham Allison—that when a rising global power threatens a ruling one, war frequently results.
Further, “India, being number three, wants a multipolar [world],” he said. “So I think part of it just depends on where they sit.”
While China supports multilateralism on certain issues and forums, Tourangban said, its support is aimed at blunting America’s influence.
India, on the other hand, aims to create a more inclusive global order, he said.
“India wants to create an externally conducive security environment for its economic rise, and its support for a multipolar world order recognizes the interdependence of economies. Expanding its basket of economic partners, without jeopardizing its core security interests, lies at the heart of India’s support for effective multilateralism in a multipolar world,” he said.
With India’s imminent rise as the third largest global economy, a new global economic paradigm will evolve, according to Jaishankar.
The U.S. economy is currently worth over $30 trillion. The Chinese economy is worth over $19 trillion. India is currently the fifth-largest global economy. It is expected to steal Japan’s fourth-place spot in the next year or so. And, according to a report from S&P Global Ratings, by 2030, India is expected to surpass $7 trillion and become the world’s third-largest economy.
Nonetheless, “there [will] be a big gap between the U.S. and China, on the one hand, and between China and India on the other,” Jaishankar said. There will also emerge a big gap between India and everyone else on that list, he said. But precisely by virtue of that gap, India will play a leading role in a multipolar world, he said.
The situation will secure a unique place for India, Jaishankar said. India will guard that place to prevent its interests from being marginalized in decision-making by the United States and China.
“India will strive for a more multipolar world, which means a world where everything is not simply decided by the U.S. and China. I think that’s a great, good concern for India,” he said.
How India will secure and advance its interests in a multipolar world order will be a “test of fire” for India’s grand strategy, said Tourangbam.
When asked what role India would play in facilitating a multipolar world, Jaishankar listed a number of objectives.
Those include taking a leadership role in Southeast Asia, securing the Indian Ocean, connecting with its neighbors and with the Middle East, and using “carrots and sticks” to coax Pakistan away from supporting terror groups.
They also include managing India’s relationship with China in a way that promotes competition but doesn’t lead to conflict, according to Jaishankar.
Delving into this further, Kondapalli explained that India’s approach to multilateral forums is led by its interests.
Both India and China are a part of various common multilateral forums. It’s assumed that they are not there to discuss bilateral issues or sovereignty issues, he said. Instead, their involvement implies that problems can be resolved through confidence-building measures and peaceful strategies.
Multilateral forums can be useful for advancing bilateral issues. Kondapalli cited a subtle approach by India on multilateral platforms—one example being the meeting between Modi and China’s Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in Kazan last year. The two leaders decided to let their national security advisers discuss their territorial dispute.
“And then we saw some forward momentum in this regard,” he said.
Jaishankar emphasized that India’s thought leadership in a multipolar world would involve working with balancing powers, like the United States, Japan, Australia, and others, to “diversify and strengthen” supply chains.
It would also mean countering China by diversifying Indian strategic interests. Having many strategic or economic partners would ensure that if China threatened to cut off supply chains or investment, it would not unduly affect India, he said.
Putin Ally In Secret Talks With Trump Admin To Restart Nord Stream 2
A close friend of Vladimir Putin – and like the Russian president, also a spy – has been engineering a restart of Russia’s Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline to Europe with the backing of US investors, a once unthinkable move which according to the FT, shows the breadth of Donald Trump’s rapprochement with Moscow. According to the Nikkei-owned publication, the efforts on a deal were the brainchild of Matthias Warnig, an ex-Stasi officer in East Germany who until 2023 ran Nord Stream 2’s parent company for the Kremlin-controlled gas giant Gazprom.
Warnig’s plan involved outreach to the Trump team through US businessmenas part of back-channel efforts to broker an end to the war in Ukraine while deepening economic ties between the US and Russia.
If this was just some unilateral attempt to get the pipeline that was bombed by Western intelligence agents and assorited Ukrainian hangers-on back online, it would hardly be a surprise. However, according to the report it appears that at least several “prominent” Trump administration figures are aware of the initiative to bring in US investors, and they see it as part of the push to rebuild relations with Moscow.
While there have been several expressions of interest, one US-led consortium of investors has drawn up the outlines of a post-sanctions deal with Gazprom.
Meanwhile, senior EU officials have become aware of the Nord Stream 2 discussion only in recent weeks, and leaders of several European countries are concerned and have discussed the matter, although it is unclear what the prevailing sense on the ground within the corridors of Brussels. It is far easier, for example, to guess what Germany thinks about a return of much cheaper and far more abundant Russian energy if virtue signaling and politics were not an issue.
One of Nord Stream 2’s two pipelines was blown up in what now appears to have been a US attack in September 2022 that destroyed both pipelines of its older sister project Nord Stream 1. The other Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which has an annual capacity of 27.5bn cubic metres of natural gas, is undamaged but has never been used.
The latest plan would in theory give the US unparalleled sway over energy supplies to Europe, after EU countries moved to end their dependence on Russian gas in the aftermath of the invasion.
That said, the obstacles are considerable: a deal would require the US to lift sanctions against Russia, Russia to agree to resume sales it cut off during the war, and Germany to allow the gas to flow to any potential buyers in Europe.
“The US would say, ‘Well, now Russia will be dependable because trustworthy Americans are in the middle of it’,’” said a former senior US official, who was aware of some of the dealmaking efforts. The US investors would collect “money for nothing”, he added.
The talks come as the Trump administration races to seal a peace deal through bilateral discussions with Russia that have excluded Europe and Ukraine, spooking deep-state apparatchiks in European capitals who fear a US détente with Moscow could threaten the continent. Trump has promised deeper economic co-operation with Russia if a peace agreement can be reached.
Putin has talked up the economic benefits he says the US could reap with the Kremlin in the event of a settlement in Ukraine, claiming that “several companies” were already in touch over potential deals.
Nord Stream 2 AG, the pipeline’s Swiss-based parent company, received an exceptional stay on bankruptcy proceedings in January by at least four months.
According to a redacted court document, Nord Stream 2’s shareholder — Gazprom — argued that the new Trump administration, as well as the German election in February 2025, “presumably can have significant consequences on the circumstances of Nord Stream 2” to warrant a delay. The submission pointed to “complex geopolitical affairs” and the sanctions regime.
Warnig told the Financial Times he was “not involved in any discussions with any American politicians or business representatives”, adding that he was “following in this respect the rules [as a] US-sanctioned person”. Dmitry Peskov, Putin’s spokesman, said he had no information on any talks regarding the pipeline.
Warnig, 69, has said he became a close friend of Putin’s in the 1990s after setting up an office for lender Dresdner Bank in St Petersburg, where the then-unknown Putin headed the city’s foreign relations committee. The two became so close that Putin asked Warnig to put up his daughters at the banker’s house in Rödermark when their mother was seriously injured in a car accident.
Putin, who speaks fluent German, taught Warnig’s children to ski in Davos and invited him to his father’s funeral, according to a 2023 interview with the former Stasi officer in Die Zeit.
But Warnig called Putin’s invasion an “indescribable mistake” and resigned from the boards of two Kremlin-run energy companies after the war in Ukraine broke out in 2022. He told Die Zeit that he made a personal appeal to Putin to end the invasion a few months in and said the Russian president was so isolated that “the only person who can still say something to him is me”.
Warnig left Nord Stream 2 AG, the Russian-owned company that manages the pipeline, in 2023, but told Die Zeit that Gazprom’s chief executive, Alexei Miller, had guaranteed to cover its costs in the hope of saving what remained.
Joe Biden’s US administration sanctioned Warnig and Nord Stream 2 AG in 2022. Biden officials showed little interest in a proposal to buy Nord Stream 2 last year from Stephen Lynch, an American businessman with a record of working in Russia. Other potential investors have come forward since Lynch first expressed interest. The person with direct knowledge of Gazprom’s discussions told the FT that its advanced talks were with a different US-led consortium from Lynch.
Trump was outspoken in his criticism of the pipeline during his first term as president. It has become a symbol for those who blamed Germany and Europe, by extension, for relying too much on Russian gas and helping to finance Moscow’s military machine. But some of Trump’s team now see the pipeline, which runs from Russia’s Vyborg in the Gulf of Finland to Greifswald on Germany’s Baltic coast, as a strategic asset that can be leveraged in the Ukraine peace talks, according to administration officials.
That said, the complex ownership structure of Nord Stream 2 presents serious potential obstacles for any investment. Nord Stream 2 is 100% owned by Gazprom. But five European energy companies — Shell, Uniper, OMV, Engie and Wintershall — collectively provided around half of its $11bn construction costs through loans. All five European companies have written off those debts.
The German government in 2022 pulled the plug on the licensing procedure of Nord Stream 2 and never issued the paperwork required to operate it.
Ownership of the pipeline could in theory give US investors a leve r to control Russian gas flows to Europe, which is a key market for US liquefied natural gas exports shipped across the Atlantic in tankers.
But former senior US officials and western businessmen with experience investing in Russia said Trump and Putin’s sign-off alone would not be enough to get Nord Stream 2 up and running.
“I can’t imagine the board of any major US corporations saying, ‘Hey, let’s jump back into the Russian market’ right now, and the Russians know this too — they’ve seen these oscillations in American policy,” a former senior US official said.
“Europe still has sanctions in place, and Germany signing up for the rehabilitation of Nord Stream would cause huge rifts. Anything like that is a ways off.”
One can only wonder which three-letter agency said former senior US official worked for. Meanwhile, news of the report is – according to one of Goldman’s top traders – one of the reasons why the bank expects a brutal short squeeze tomorrow, to wit:
Tomorrow will be a painful short squeeze day, as risk assets are likely to rally aggressively not only on the crypto news flow over the weekend: I see 4 positive weekend news.
Putin ally pushes deal to restart Nord Stream 2 with US backing. Short EU natural Gas still in place.
US hints that tariffs on Mexico and Canada could be lower than 25%. Probably an EM risk rally.
Germany’s new gov are quickly setting up two 400bn special funds, one for defence one for infrastructure.
Bessent weekend interview focused on 1) lowering inflation via controlling 10y yields 2) Tariffs as a path dependent toll 3) Constructive on the relationship with China.
