The Year of the Fire Horseshoe strikes again

Friedman is right

My school, a top research university, gives us access to an institutional AI bot, HopGPT. As an experiment, I just asked it for the most important *academic* works on WWII. It gave me a list of 8 books. The first was Churchill, followed by David Irving, then Primo Levi. We are so, so screwed

I finally found an article where pretty much the only word I understood was Žižek. Please don't make me have any positive thoughts about Žižek, this is a very unfamiliar feeling

The only downside of having already canceled my WaPo subscription a while back is that I can't do it now.

Things keep getting weirder. The author of this email, the "woman named Masha" is a former Putin's Nashi youth movement top activist with quite likely connection to sanctions evasion and other shady stuff.

A stunning statement by former head of the IDF, Bogie Ya'alon. He references the words of Y. Leibowitz, who stated in 1967 that the end result of the occupation will be the fostering of 'judeo-nazis'. Settlers who believe in Jewish supremacy. “Prof. Yeshayahu Leibowitz was right and I was wrong.

2026 being the Year of the Fire Horse means that horshoes are going to be on fire

Years ago I did a liberation of Auschwitz thread on the other platform. Time to redo Jan. 27, 1945 Soviet troops liberate Auschwitz. What happened? How? The Western Front is studied minute by minute, the East a black hole. The strange thing, though is that many documents are declassified and online

Amid everything else, a brief note to announce the CFP for the 2026 Summer Workshop in the Economic History and Historical Political Economy of Eurasia. If you are an economist, historian, or political scientist working on Imperial Russia or the USSR, please consider applying. July 17–18, Paris.

Well, it's interesting times to be teaching at a place that sees transatlantic relationships as its core focus

Trump is not a "mad king" and we shouldn't be calling him that. He didn't come to power because of inheritance or conquest, we as a country elected him. The "mad king" language leaves us off the hook when this is on us all, and we should own it.

I review @efinkel.bsky.social’s Intent to Destroy: Russia’s Two-Hundred-Year Quest to Dominate Ukraine (Basic Books, 2024), a timely and compelling contribution to the scholarship on the historical roots of Russia’s war against Ukraine. 📄 Read the review here: doi.org/10.1093/psqu...

2026 is going to kill sarcasm

An EU Territorial Integrity Best Keeper Prize is as good idea as any, just sayin.

Somehow this "controlling Venezuela's natural resources helps an average American logic" reminds me of an old Soviet joke. A Jew phones an anti-Semitic organization: - Is it true that Jews have sold Russia? - Yes. - Could you please tell me where I can get my share?

I know nothing about municipal services in Berlin. But something like that would be rare, indeed almost unthinkable in Ukrainian cities whose old, underfunded infrastructure is being bombed, shelled, targeted by drones and hit by missiles on a daily basis. State capacity has many faces, here's one

The "willing" of this coalition are not even sure if they are willing (let alone capable) to guarantee their own security, so who the hell are we kidding here

One of the uncomfortable lessons of the last years is that when politicians say scary things, they usually mean it. They aren't being cynical, just make stuff up as they go or simply engage in coercive diplomacy. We would love them to do this all, but we aren't that lucky. It's likely gonna happen

It went unnoticed given everything that is going on, but as of last week Russia officially legislated April 19 as the Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Genocide of the Soviet People by the Nazis and Their Collaborators. It was a day of commemoration before, now it is officially a genocide by law

So, as of January 2026, how many divisions does the Rules-Based International Order have?

Can we please stop these naive arguments about drugs vs. oil. It is absolutely obvious that BRICS expansion is the real cause

Just imagine being an IR Realist this morning

And then ICE will capture and deport Maduro

And then what?

No matter how it ends, the biggest winner of this is Putin.

Wow, those perfidious drug boats managed to drag themselves quite far inland

Folks who understand Iran: on a scale of 1-10, how dangerous is this wave for the regime?

2025 Roundup: It hurt

I find the thought of Ukraine's attack on Valdai deeply troubling. It's like harming the most sacred shrine and pilgrimage site that the believers in the NATO Expansion Fault Gospel, the worshipers of the Constructive Engagement religion and the practitioners of Russian gaslighting have ever had!

I am not sure how exactly "strong", "security" and "guarantees" go into the same sentence as their expiry date , but that is probably just me. Also, Putin plans on living until he is 150

I give up

Are you excited for the next round of stupid, outrageous, and inconsequential waste of time to get us all busy and embarrassed for the next 24 hours?

I would really love to see how Mearsheimer spins this

Happy Greatest Geopolitical Catastrophe of the 20th Century Day to all who celebrate!

Damn. People, somehow I finished a new book. It reads well too. So relieved. It's always good to finish stuff. Stay tuned.

Christmas came early to the Russia scholars with Santa declassifying the Bush-Putin meeting transcripts. That's 2001. Ukraine is Russian land, simply given away for no reason, as if USSR had not collapsed and there was no Ukraine independence referendum. And, long before the 2008 Bucharest Summit

All I want for Christmas is no more stupid peace plans

Wouldn't it be nice to sit back and wait for the Russian economy to implode. But are we ready for the non-trivial possibility that, choosing between collapse and massive escalation Putin would choose to escalate. No, this is not an argument for appeasing Putin, it's an argument for preparing for war

NATO and American imperialism made him do it.

"The emergence of Witkoff as envoy to the Kremlin is partly a story of Putin maneuvering to nudge aside America’s diplomats and clasp hands with its billionaires." Because the billionaires lack experience, can be manipulated. and have obvious conflicts of interest.

Everything in this story is remarkable, besides this part: "For three hours, Putin hosted Witkoff, who took notes as the president gave a lecture on the 1,000-year history of Russia" They are so lucky that we are so stupid. Gullible. Unprofessional. Corrupt. Naive.

Between people of whom we know nothing, I presume

The indefatigable @mikeeckel.bsky.social watched it all so that the rest of the sane world won't have to. We still have no idea if he is going to invade NATO, but at least we know that he is in love. A useful info, as far as Kremlinology goes

On The Historical Unity of American and Venezuelan Oil

It never went away, it was just mostly kept outside of the educated middle class bubble to which most secular Jews now belong so they had less personal experience. What changed is the willingness of our peers and elites—political, intellectual, economic, cultural, academic—to let it back in

#BBCNews - Sudan's RSF trying to cover up mass killings in el-Fasher, researchers say www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

A very special end-of-war deal. Terms and condition apply.