Terrible precedent …

So, the acronym for the agency previously known as the Department of Defense should now be pronounces as follows:

Mark your calendars: We don't know what the 🇫🇷 govt will look like, but we do know that on Nov 18 🇩🇪 & 🇫🇷 will co-host a European Summit on Digital Sovereignty in Berlin. bmds.bund.de/aktuelles/pr....

Want to know Trump’s anchor posture on 🇺🇦 ? Where you stand is where you sit: his front bench is the VP Vance, Sec Rubio & his in-house Putin-Versteher, Witkoff - the same 3 he put in charge of security guarantees. Even meeting w the Ukrainians, his Ukr point, Kellogg, is 2nd row

“Root causes” defined = Ukraine as a democratic country independent from total Russian subservience. That is what “root causes” means. That’s what Putin wants to “address”. It’s as simple as that. No matter how clinical and academic “root causes” might sound.

Incredible show of unity and force by Europe.

🗣️ Rebuilding Ukraine Simon O'Connor in podcast conversation with @rebeccawire.bsky.social @tysonbarker.bsky.social & @eribakova.bsky.social on how the EU and international partners are helping to finance recovery and support reconstruction in a conflict zone. 🔗 Listen here: buff.ly/qK69HFK

🎙️ Rebuilding Ukraine: international support, defence and recovery @rebeccawire.bsky.social talks to @tysonbarker.bsky.social @eribakova.bsky.social & Simon O’Connor on the delicate balance between urgent wartime needs and planning for a resilient, post-war economy. #EconSky Listen below:

What exactly is this cross branding supposed to mean? Is the chicken injected with acid?

Today is Germany's first Veterans Day. It's hard to underestimate the tectonic shifts that had to happen to bring about. In important milestone toward honoring & understanding the 🇩🇪 veteran experience. www.dw.com/de/so-feiert...

My interview with the Kyiv Post on what the Merz Washington visit could mean for Ukraine. www.kyivpost.com/post/53764

My interview with the Kyiv Post on what the Merz Washington visit could mean for Ukraine. www.kyivpost.com/post/53764

After returning from Russian captivity, the Ukrainian Defender learned that he had become a grandfather to a baby girl, Yaryna, who is three months old. Look how his hands are shaking as he absorbs the news... Bless them. #StayWithUkraine 📹: Mezha/Facebook

Germany has overtaken Japan as the world’s largestt crediter www.t-online.de/finanzen/akt...

Against the backdrop RU bombs & diplomatic bad faith, the 🇺🇸 🇺🇦 Reconstruction Investment Fund came into force today. As Mustafa Nayyem & I write in @lawfaremedia.org today, with it, the Trump Admin has now effectively taken an ownership stake in Ukraine’s success. www.lawfaremedia.org/article/char...

Against the backdrop RU bombs & diplomatic bad faith, the 🇺🇸 🇺🇦 Reconstruction Investment Fund came into force today. As Mustafa Nayyem & I write in @lawfaremedia.org today, with it, the Trump Admin has now effectively taken an ownership stake in Ukraine’s success. www.lawfaremedia.org/article/char...

Former 🇺🇸 Amb Bridget writes why Trump’s Reset 5.0 policy amid Russia’s full scale invasion led her to resign from government service eu.freep.com/story/opinio...

Of course the devil is in the details but we have to: 1) admire the ambition of the Merz govt & 2) ask whether Trump’s approach is more effective than the so-called Atlanticists (it seems like it is). Perhaps what the Euro-Atlantic relationship needs is indeed more hard ball. on.ft.com/3SAG3jU

Merz invited Trump visit to 🇩🇪. DJT only visited officially once in his 1st term, to Hamburg for the 2017 G20. my advice to 🇩🇪: think pomp & tradtion (ex. Potsdam or Bavaria) rather than the austere rickiticki modernity of Berlin’s govt quarter. Sounds stupid but matters www.dw.com/de/news-komp...

Funny. Because I have been thinking how much Trump’s approach to demolishing the dollar’s role in the global economic system reminds me of Truss-economics. In a nutshell: Use policy to decimate your credibility.

At SAIS in 2007, I took an 🇫🇷 politics class taught by Phil Gordon, about Mitterrand's warnings about the "Albanian economic model” - the isolated, protectionist, dictatorial, repressive state under Hoxha’s regime. It feels a bit like Trump took all the wrong lessons from the Albanian model.

On Berlin’s Savigny Platz. Couldn’t agree more.

For this “Liberation Day,” I liberated myself from Twitter. I also liberated myself from my remaining Tesla stock (had to sell low)

Here's what Witkoff is: a billionaire 💰💰💰. That makes him a Trump admin “principal,” a net value based near-peer in Trump’s world. Other “principals” incl Bessent, Lutnick & Musk. Others- frmr Senators, generals, Congressmen - they’re staffers. Vance is a staffer. www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article...

🇫🇷National Assembly voted 288 to 54 for a resolution to strengthen 🇺🇦 support & seize all frozen Russian assets. (All mainstream parties supported; La France Insoumise (LFI) & some Communist MPs voted against; The National Rally (RN) abstained) www.lemonde.fr/politique/ar...

This bald eagle was 3-D printed in one of 🇺🇦 Skyfall's 27 factories by one of its 1K 3D printers - Europe’s largest 3D printer fleet. Skyfall is produces 7K large-scale bomber drones a month & 7K Vampire drones a day. This bald eagle was given to me in Nov 2024 in appreciation for 🇺🇸 assistance.

Germany is actively discussing the seizure of the full $300B corpus of the Russian sovereign assets #CafeKyiv

The option of caucusing with the Democrats - the only party in Congress that still cares about 🇺🇸 power, influence, & our allies in the world - remains immediately available to you, sir. After all, you swore an oath to country & Constitution.

"We need to think about more durable solutions" than just sending European peacekeepers to Ukraine...." Meloni remains a staunch pro-Ukraine leader & is thinking creatively about what security could look like. kyivindependent.com/nato-could-e...

A tragic statistic out today that almost 29% of Ukrainians now view the US as a hostile nation while only 13% view it as friendly.

Ukraine's meaningful future - their fight started in Winter of 2014. It continues today.

Will SFRC Chair Risch (R-ID) release a statement tomorrow on the third anniversary of Russia’s full scale invasion? Does he have the key convictions that led him to vote for the 5th Supplemental for Ukraine just 9 months ago? My guess is unfortunately no. www.idahostatesman.com/opinion/edit...

The Europeans have literally weeks to become an autonomous power. It is not outside the realm of possibility that Trump could zero out 🇺🇸 troop presence in Europe imminently. No more “wake up calls”. Time to get dressed.

My BBC interview post-MSC: 3 pts: 1) this is only beginning; 2) for 🇪🇺& 🇺🇦, if ur not at the table, ur on the menu; 3) history is full of city names (Budapest, Minsk) where Russia lied abt its commitments. Team Trump needs to think how not to add "Riyadh" to the list www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ymz9...

Europe excluded - if you're not at the table, you're on the menu. UKR seems tenuous. This is careening off the rails (& Kellogg, the ostensible UKR-RUS SR, excluded. Waltz, Rubio & billionaire Steve Witkoff (Middle East SR?) will lead talks for the Trump admin.) www.politico.eu/article/trum...

As a fmr finance minister, Scholz goes down a rabbit hole abt the Ukr military's size & how 🇺🇦 economy can't bare the cost long term (only possible indirectly now through EU, US, IMF budget support). A natural follow-on: so what role could the €300B RSA in preserving the 🇺🇦 military porcupine #MSC2025

Scholz provides qualified support for Von Der Leyen's proposal for a debt break exemption for defense expenditure. He brings up that any fiscal exemptions need to be concentrated on capabilities, not pensions (Side eye to Greece) #MSC2025

Lots of bad in this Trump-Putin call readout. 1)Trump falls into Putin’s narratives on Russia (“Great History” & all that). Overall tone is very 2018 Helsinki. 3) notes all the 🇷🇺 lives lost in WWII.. what about 🇺🇦 lives? 3) mentions the people he asked to lead negotiations. One person missing…Kellogg

While surprising that Hegseth said the US isn’t withdrawing American troops on his first visit to Europe, let’s not kid ourselves. It’s a “when” not “if” proposition. www.tagesschau.de/inland/regio...

A well-sourced NYT art. on Trump's interest in 🇺🇦 critical minerals w pts on lithium & titanium. Interesting: Treasury Sec, Scott Bessent, is in Kyiv today. He, not Kellogg, is the 1st Trump Adm official to visit the country. (1/7) t.co/MSs6RVuuDs

Kellogg will be in Kyiv for his first visit on Feb 20 after the MSC kyivindependent.com/to-receive-f...

It's almost as if they knew that Tetra Tech, one of USAID's leading subcontractors, was going to suffer the aftershock of a Trump administration assistance bloodbath.... www.gurufocus.com/news/2686170...

I agree with HFAC Chair Mast. He articulated it perfectly in Feb, 2023. It's important that he & RM Meeks hold the Trump admin's feet to the fire on how to win over Putin, "a brutal dictator hellbent on undermining democracies across the world."

A useful reflection on Merkel's 16 years in office best described in one German phrase: "verspielte Gelegenheit." To paraphrase Buddenbrooks, sometimes when a star looks to us like its burning its brightest, it has already burnt out blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/2...

Of the Frontier 5 (🇷🇴 🇲🇩 🇸🇰 🇵🇱🇭🇺) to Russia’s war on Ukraine, Romania has been the silent hero, reorienting its infrastructure, trade, energy & defense from a country on Europe’s fringe to become a crossroads of 🇪🇺 econ & security (w lots of $$$ €€€ for Romanians) Now this guy wants to blow it up 👇

Trump's gonna Trump. Germany's gonna Germany. German national energy company Sefe (formerly known as Gazprom Germania) bought 58 cargoes of Russian LNG through the French port of Dunkirk last year — more than six times the figure in 2023. www.ft.com/content/81f6...

Watch this space: Early reporting that Trump likely to plan to cut the 🇺🇸 troop footprint in Europe, particularly Germany where he wanted to reduce US troops in 2020 by 12K from around 35K to 23K (Biden quickly put to rest in 2021). www.stripes.com/theaters/eur...

For those interested, here is a comprehensive snapshot of 🇺🇸 security assistance as of the final day of the Biden Admin from the State Departement’s Pol-Mil bureau. www.state.gov/bureau-of-po...

Some interesting insights into 2025🇺🇦 from the 🇺🇸 private sector: 1) 77% expect U.S. support to stay the same or increase in 2025; 2) 61% believe a ceasefire is likely in 2025; 3) 82% plan to maintain or increase investment in 2025. chamber.ua/news/seventy...

Livestream Ukraine House at Davos 2025 here👇 - covering all the right topics - Ukraine’s defense industrial bass, tech innovation, capital markets development, critical minerals & raw materials and use of Russian sovereign assets in 🇺🇦reconstruction www.youtube.com/live/IWcZEe1...