Another Big Win For Putin!!!

[Domingo Halliburton]

Russia warns of 'risks' should Sweden join Nato

Published: 18 Jun 2015 08:33 GMT+02:00


A top Russian official has told a leading Swedish newspaper that the country would be likely to face military action if it were to join Nato.

Nearly one in three Swedes think the country should join Nato, a major poll suggested last month, up from 29 percent of Swedes in 2013 and 17 percent in 2012.

The shift in public opinion is largely credited to a rising fear in the Nordic country of a potentially aggressive Russia. Sweden’s security service Säpo recently stated that the biggest intelligence threat against the Nordic country in 2014 came from its eastern neighbour.

On Thursday, Russia's ambassador to Sweden, Viktor Tatarintsev, hit out in an interview with the Dagens Nyheter daily at what he called an “aggressive propaganda campaign” by Swedish media.

“Russia is often described as an attacker who only thinks of conducting wars and threatening others. But I can guarantee that Sweden, which is an alliance-free nation, is not part of any military plans by Russian authorities. Sweden is not a target for our armed troops,” he said.

However, he underlined that if Sweden were to abandon its alliance neutrality and join the Western military organization, Russia would adopt “counter measures”.

“I don't think it will become relevant in the near future, even though there has been a certain swing in public opinion. But if it happens there will be counter measures. Putin pointed out that there will be consequences, that Russia will have to resort to a response of the military kind and re-orientate our troops and missiles. The country that joins Nato needs to be aware of the risks it is exposing itself to,” he told DN.

READ ALSO: Russia blames Sweden for Ukraine crisis

Swedish-Russian relations have been under strain lately, following increased military presence in the Baltic Sea.

In September 2014 two SU-24 fighter-bombers allegedly entered Swedish airspace in what the former Foreign Minister Carl Bildt called "the most serious aerial incursion by the Russians" in almost a decade.

The following month a foreign submarine was spotted in Swedish waters, although the Swedish military was unable to determine where it came from.

“I think that there is a new security situation in the Baltic area and in the Baltic Sea,” Sweden’s Defence Minister Peter Hultqvist told The Local on the day the sighting was confirmed.

He has also announced that the country's navy is upgrading its fleet of ships in order to improve its ability to locate rogue submarines in Swedish waters.

 

[88m3]

U.S. Ousts Russia as Top World Oil, Gas Producer in BP Data
by Rakteem Katakey
June 10, 2015 — 5:01 AM EDTUpdated on June 10, 2015 — 9:10 AM EDT

Four pumpjacks are silhouetted as they operate at the site of an oil well outside Williston, North Dakota, U.S., on Thursday, Feb. 12, 2015.


Photographer: Daniel Acker/Bloomberg


The U.S. has taken Russia’s crown as the biggest oil and natural-gas producer in a demonstration of the seismic shifts in the world energy landscape emanating from America’s shale fields.

U.S. oil production rose to a record last year, gaining 1.6 million barrels a day, according to BP Plc’s Statistical Review of World Energy released on Wednesday. Gas output also climbed, putting America ahead of Russia as a producer of the hydrocarbons combined.

The data showing the U.S.’s emergence as the top driller confirms a trend that’s helped the world’s largest economy reduce imports, caused a slump in global energy prices and shifted the country’s foreign policy priorities.


“We are truly witnessing a changing of the guard of global energy suppliers,” BP Chief Economist Spencer Dale said in a presentation. “The implications of the shale revolution for the U.S. are profound.”

The other major shift BP’s report shows is China’s energy demand growing at the slowest pace since the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s as the economy slows and the country tries to reduce its reliance on heavy industry.

“Growth in some of China’s most energy-intensive sectors, such as steel, iron and cement -- which had thrived during China’s rapid industrialization -- virtually collapsed in 2014,” said Dale, a former Bank of England chief economist who joined BP last year.

Economic Change
In the U.S., the boom in oil and gas production has started to change the economy profoundly. Cheap fuel has seen manufacturing return to the U.S. as the country produced about 90 percent of the energy it consumed last year.

Last year, imports equaled 1 percent of GDP, according to BP’s data. In 2007, just before the financial crisis, U.S. energy imports accounted for about half of the current account deficit of 5 percent of GDP.

Shale drillers from Exxon Mobil Corp. to Chesapeake Energy Corp. spent about $120 billion last year in the U.S., more than double the amount five years earlier. The surge in output and a slowdown in global demand have pushed crude oil prices down about 40 percent in the past year.

Lower Prices
The lower prices will force some producers to shut in “frothy activity” at some shale fields in the U.S. but most output can work even at current prices, BP Chief Executive Officer Bob Dudley said in London on Wednesday. The number of rigs drilling in shale fields are down by half from an October peak and may stabilize by the end of the summer, he said.

“The shale revolution hasn’t run out of steam in the U.S.,” Dudley said.

The U.S. increase in oil output last year, helping it to overtake Saudi Arabia as a crude producer, was the first time a country has raised production by at least 1 million barrels a day for three consecutive years, BP said.

Among other producers outside the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, Canada and Brazil also reported record production last year, prompting OPEC’s policy shift of ditching price support for defending market share.

On the demand side, countries outside the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development accounted for all of the net growth in global consumption of 0.8 million barrels a day, or 0.8 percent, last year, BP said. Chinese consumption growth, though slower, still jumped 390,000 barrels a day, the biggest increase in the world.

Oil consumption in developed nations dropped 1.2 percent, the eighth decrease in the past nine years. World natural-gas consumption grew 0.4 percent last year, compared with the 10-year average of 2.4 percent.

The world’s coal use also increased 0.4 percent, slower than the 10-year average annual growth of 2.9 percent, with consumption in China almost slowing as the nation seeks to cut pollution and use more gas for power generation. Coal’s share of primary-energy consumption fell to 30 percent.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...reece-s-june-30-deadline-to-make-imf-payments

 

[Domingo Halliburton]

Russia angered by freezing of accounts in Belgium and France

MOSCOW (AP) — The Russian government on Thursday strongly condemned the freezing of Russian accounts in France and Belgium as part of an effort to enforce a $50 billion judgment for the destruction of the Yukos oil company.


An arbitration court in The Hague, Netherlands, ruled last year that Russia must compensate the former shareholders of Yukos, which was destroyed in a politically driven legal onslaught that also sent its chief executive, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, to prison for 10 years.

The Foreign Ministry on Thursday summoned Belgium's ambassador and warned that Moscow would consider taking similar action against Belgian accounts and property in Russia if the accounts of the Russian companies and diplomatic missions in Belgium were not released.

Russian Economic Development Minister Alexei Ulyukayev said his government would challenge the seizures, considering them illegal, but he also acknowledged that Russia must be prepared for similar action elsewhere. He repeated that Russia had no intention of paying the $50 billion.

Tim Osborne, director of GML, a holding company created for Yukos' five major shareholders, said the judgment was "rolling out" in France and Belgium, with the expectation that it would continue in Britain and the United States.

He said France and Belgium have frozen multiple bank accounts linked to the Russian government, beginning more than a week ago in France and on Wednesday in Belgium. He did not know the number of accounts or their balances, but said he expected GML would ultimately be able to recover the funds.


"It'll take years but it'll get done eventually," Osborne said.

The Foreign Ministry said it issued a protest to Belgian Ambassador Alex Van Meeuwen, describing the freezing of the accounts as an "openly unfriendly act and gross violation of the recognized norms of international law."

The accounts frozen in Belgium include those of Russia's embassy, its missions to the European Union and NATO, and of a number of Russian companies, the ministry statement said. It made no mention of the seizures in France.

Ulyukayev said the amount of Russians funds frozen in France and Belgium was "insignificant," but he gave no specifics in remarks carried by Russian news agencies from St. Petersburg, where Russia's annual investment forum opened Thursday.

The frozen accounts in France include those of Russian companies held in the French subsidiary of Russian state bank VTB, Russian news agencies reported, citing VTB. No details were given.

The Permanent Court for Arbitration ruled in July that the Russian government had used tax claims to take control of Yukos and silence Khodorkovsky, who had used his vast wealth to challenge the power of President Vladimir Putin. After Khodorkovsky was arrested at gunpoint in 2003, Yukos was dismantled and the main assets of what had been Russia's largest oil producer were taken over by state oil company Rosneft.

 

[☑︎#VoteDemocrat]

POLITICS15:01 JUN. 21, 2015
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Lithuania to become first country to arm Ukraine against Russia
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Vilnius says other NATO members should follow Lithuania's example



Lithuania's ambassador to Ukraine says Vilnius is ready to start shipping defensive weapons to Ukraine to help the country stop Russia seizing more of its territory.

Marius Yanukonis told Ukraine's Channel 5 that Lithuania wanted to be the first country to openly arm Ukraine and hoped it would set an example to other NATO countries which he said should follow suit.

The move came as US Senator John McCain, during a trip to Kyiv, piled more pressure on the Obama administration saying the US must do more to deter Russia from escalating its military operations in Ukraine. McCain said that the US must arm Ukraine without delay before Putin became more emboldened.

John McCain, Republican US Senator: "The House of Representatives feels the same, overwhelming majority of American people feel the same. I can't answer for the president of the United States and his administrations, except to say that I know that this is shameful, shameful that we would not provide them with weapons to defend themselves. They are fighting with 20th century weapons against Russia's 20st century weapons. That's not a fair fight."

NATO has been holding military drills across several Eastern European countries in recent weeks as a way of reassuring NATO-member countries there unnerved by Russia's invasion of Ukraine; but Kyiv is hoping for more US support.

Last week the US Congress passed the National Defence Authorization Act (NDAA) which includes a provision that would give President Barack Obama's administration USD 300 million for Ukrainian security assistance if Obama signs the bill.

US military advisors are already training the Ukrainian military. About 300 US paratroopers arrived in Ukraine in April to train Kyiv's National Guard.

Britain has already sent military personnel to train Ukrainian troops, while Canada and Poland have pledged to send 200 and 50 instructors respectively this year. But Western countries with the exception of Lithuania have so far declined its requests to supply weapons.

 

[88m3]

Every time I say or read Russia I chuckle.

 

[FaTaL]

Wound they really attack Sweden?

 

[88m3]

 

[Futuristic Eskimo]

The fast one wasn't fast enough

 

[88m3]

The fast one wasn't fast enough

I guess not

 

[88m3]

Charlie Rose is talking to Putin now on WLIW21 at the recent economic forum in St. Petersburg


@Futuristic Eskimo @The Real

 

[88m3]

EUROPE

Flexing Its Military Might, Russia Is Pushing Sweden Into NATO's Arms

By Ezra Kaplan

June 22, 2015 | 5:05 pm
Sweden will face military "counter measures" from Russia if it decides to shift from its history of neutrality and join the NATO alliance, according to Russian Ambassador Viktor Tatarintsev. In recent months, Sweden has found itself in the middle of a Russian escalation of force as tensions between the West and Russia have bled into the Baltic Sea.

"I can guarantee that Sweden, which is an alliance-free nation, is not part of any military plans by Russian authorities," the Russian ambassador to Sweden told the Dagens Nyheter, a leading local paper, in an interview Thursday. "Sweden is not a target for our armed troops."

Tatarintsev went on to underline that if Sweden — not to be confused with Switzerland, the chocolate-loving Alpine fortress to the south — abandons its historical position of neutrality, it might find itself in Russia's crosshairs.

"If it happens there will be counter measures. [Russian President Vladimir] Putin pointed out that there will be consequences, that Russia will have to resort to a response of the military kind and re-orientate our troops and missiles," Tatarintsev told the local paper. "The country that joins NATO needs to be aware of the risks it is exposing itself to."

The Swedish embassy said that the "topic is too sensitive to comment."

The Russian threats come after the release of a nationwide poll in May that found that 1 in 3 Swedes support the country joining the NATO defense alliance, a sharp increase from previous years. Another poll a few months earlier found the exact same approval rating. Both polls showed a significant drop in the number of Swedes who were against joining NATO.

Sweden has stayed neutral and non-aligned since the early 19th century, following the Napoleonic Wars. Even during World War II, when the country found itself in the geographic center of the conflict, Sweden was able to maintain political neutrality. But Russia's recent behavior has pushed Sweden to consider abandoning its 200-year track record.

Russia has become increasingly provocative in its military actions as tensions with the West continue to grow over Ukraine and Crimea. And this is only the most recent uptick in Russia's military aggressiveness, which has been increasing for several years under Putin. A video recently released by the US Navy shows Russian fighter jets buzzing a Navy destroyer on both May 30 and June 1 of this year.

Only two weeks earlier, the British Royal Air Force was forced to scramble fighter jets to intercept two Russian long-range bombers that were spotted off the northern coast of Scotland, en route to the UK.

Sweden itself has not been without Russian confrontations. In September 2014, two Russian fighter jets allegedly entered Swedish air space. They were the same type —Sukhoi Su-24 attack aircraft — as those that buzzed the US destroyer at the end of May.

Related: NATO Conducts Anti-Submarine Exercises in North Sea as Russian Activity Increases

The following month, the Swedish military released conclusive evidence that a foreign submarine had been spotted in Swedish waters. The military was unable to conclusively determine where it came from.

In March, Sweden decided to remilitarize the island of Gotland off the southwest coast of the country in the Baltic Sea. The decision to deploy around 150 troops to the island came as the Baltic nation of Estonia expressed major concerns about the island's vulnerability.

"Gotland is a big worry for us," a senior Estonian politician told Russia Insider. "It could be overrun by Russia in minutes and then all of us would be highly vulnerable to an attack."

While Sweden has not yet joined NATO, that doesn't mean they aren't working together. Though Sweden remains militarily non-aligned, it participates in joint military exercises with NATO and has a long history of international military operations, most recently in Afghanistan, where Swedish troops were deployed under NATO command.

"There has already been some movement between Sweden and NATO," said Steven Pifer, the director of the Brookings Institute's Arms Control and Non-Proliferation Initiative. "There is actually a fair amount of military-to-military cooperation going on."

NATO has good reason to be interested in Sweden joining its alliance. In fact, NATO would like to see both Sweden and its easterly neighbor, Finland, join on. It will likely be a two-for-one deal, according to Pifer: if Sweden joins, then Finland will, too, and vice versa.

If the duo joined NATO, it would mean that the Baltic Sea, a precious warm-water port for Russia, would be entirely surrounded by NATO member nations, with the exception of two small slivers of Russian land. Needless to say, Russia would rather this not be the case.






Sweden and Finland took the first steps to official and sustained cooperation with NATO on September 4, 2014, when the countries signed a Host Nation Support Agreement, which allows NATO forces to enter the countries during a variety of exercises and operations.

This past weekend, that agreement was put into use as the Swedish military joined a host of other allied forces — including three US nuclear-capable B-52 bombers — to participate in the annual BALTOPS naval and maritime exercise.

BALTOPS is designed to enhance flexibility and improve interoperability among the multinational participants, according to the US Navy. Additionally, the exercise is a way for the partnered forces to demonstrate their resolve to defend the Baltic region.

The allied forces — comprised of American, British, Polish, Swedish, and Finnish troops — used the Swedish beaches to practice an amphibious assault similar to what would be used if Gotland were invaded by Russia. Several B-52s were included in the exercise as well, Pifer told VICE News, practicing mine laying off the Swedish coast, while Swedish fighters provided air cover. After several practice runs in Sweden, the forces were ready for the main event, an amphibious landing in Poland, which happened June 17.

Though NATO has insisted that the operation was not in response to any specific action, the Dutch foreign affairs officer, Bert Koenders, said the BALTOPS exercise was a warning to Russia, reported UNIAN.

"There are NATO member states in Eastern Europe that feel threatened by what is happening in eastern Ukraine. These drills are also a warning to President Putin," Koenders said. "This is not an aggressive approach. This is a combination of pressure and dialogue, rather than a lack of judgment when dealing with Putin."

Koender's comments come as Putin announced on June 16 that Russia would be adding an additional 40 intercontinental ballistic missiles to its nuclear arsenal this year. He said that the missiles would be "able to overcome even the most technically advanced anti-missile defense systems."

Related: Russia Is Getting New Nuclear Missiles — But It's Probably Not the End of the World

"Saber-rattling like this does nothing to deescalate conflict," said White House press secretary Josh Earnest at a Washington briefing June 17. "The United States has repeatedly stressed our commitment to the collective defense of our NATO allies. That is a commitment that we are willing to back up with action, if necessary. That stands in pretty stark contrast to the saber-rattling that we've seen from Mr. Putin. And you could also make a case — and I think with some credibility — that invoking the nuclear arsenal is even an escalation of that saber-rattling. That's unnecessary and not constructive."

Nobody is expecting Sweden or Finland to join NATO tomorrow, but support for such a move seems to be increasing steadily. Considering Russian claims that their military activities in Ukraine are simply a response to NATO's eastward expansion, it is somewhat ironic that Moscow's continued muscle-flexing may be expanding NATO's reach in the Baltic.

https://news.vice.com/article/flexi...-sweden-into-natos-arms?utm_source=vicenewsfb

 

[88m3]

Russia Assails Extension of E.U. Sanctions in Ukraine Crisis
By DAVID M. HERSZENHORNJUNE 22, 2015

Photo

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia paid tribute to the soldiers lost in World War II, during a ceremony on Monday, the Day of Memory and Sorrow. CreditAlexander Zemlianichenko/Associated Press

• Russia has tried not to flinch in the face of the sanctions, which have severely restricted the access of major Russian corporations to Western capital markets, among other punitive measures, but the country’s economy has suffered and continues to contract. Lower prices for oil, an important Russian export, delivered a concurrent blow, deepening the recession.
  
  
  In perhaps the most emotional in a barrage of responses by the Russian government on Monday, Sergei Ivanov, the chief of staff to President Vladimir V. Putin, accused the European Union of deliberately announcing the extension on June 22, to coincide with the Day of Memory and Sorrow, when Russia honors soldiers lost in World War II.
  
  Mr. Ivanov, speaking to the Interfax news agency, also accused Belgium of announcing a plan to seize Russian assets last week in an attempt to mar the annual St. Petersburg International Economic Forum.
  
  “Unfortunately it doesn’t surprise me anymore,” he said. “Do you believe in coincidences? Is it a coincidence that the St. Petersburg forum took place on the same days when the property seizure was declared? It’s not a coincidence, either.”
  
  In response to the sanctions last year, Russia imposed a ban on most agricultural imports from Europe, dealing a severe blow to many farmers across the Continent and stripping Russian grocery store shelves of some favorite imports, including cheeses.
  
  Mr. Putin’s spokesman, Dmitri S. Peskov, in a less emotional statement to reporters on Monday, said that those countersanctions would be extended.
  
  Continue reading the main story
  GRAPHIC
  Russia’s Endgame in Ukraine
  How Russia aims to achieve its goal of keeping Ukraine isolated from the West.
  
  
  OPEN GRAPHIC
  “The principle of mutuality is the foundation of our approach,” Mr. Peskov said. Russia had not initiated any sanctions, he said, but had only responded in kind. “We will follow the principle of mutuality.”
  
  The Foreign Ministry, in its own statement, accused the European Union of trying to minimize the harm that sanctions against Russia were causing to its own member countries, including reduced jobs.
  
  The ministry also accused the Europeans of bending to an anti-Russian lobby, apparently a jab at the United States, which had urged a continuation of sanctions to maintain pressure on the Kremlin over its intervention in eastern Ukraine.
  
  “We are deeply disappointed that once again the opinion of the Russophobic lobby, which pushed through the decision to extend illegal restrictions, dominated in the E.U.,” the Foreign Ministry’s spokesman, Aleksandr K. Lukashevich, said in the statement. “At the same time, in Brussels they are deliberately tight-lipped about the fact that this is guaranteed to be followed by hundreds of thousands of Europeans, or millions, according to some estimates, losing their jobs.”
  
  Mr. Lukashevich also complained that the West was placing unfair responsibility on Russia for carrying out the Ukraine cease-fire agreement, which was signed in February in Minsk, Belarus. Russia has long insisted that the Ukrainian government bears the largest responsibility for the failure so far to put the accord in effect.
  
  
  
  UKRAINE CRISIS By Grant Slater 4:33
  Near Donetsk, a Rift Frozen in Time
  Continue reading the main storyVideo
  Near Donetsk, a Rift Frozen in Time
  For months, a billionaire-funded Ukrainian militia and whip-wielding Cossacks have been locked in a war of waiting near the long-contested Donetsk airport.
  
  By Grant Slater on Publish DateMay 29, 2015.
  “The E.U. keeps laying all the responsibility over the implementation of the Minsk agreements on the Russian side,” Mr. Lukashevich said. “The absurdity of this approach has been long clear to everyone. The key to the internal Ukrainian crisis was and still remains in the hands of Kiev, which is not hurrying to implement its responsibilities.”
  
  As for the timing of the announcement, Mr. Lukashevich added: “It looks especially cynical that the decision to extend the anti-Russian sanctions was taken by the E.U. states on June 22, the day when fascist Germany attacked the U.S.S.R. We would like to believe that this is a coincidence, and not an intentionally planned step.”
  
  While the sanctions were originally imposed by the United States and the European Union, as well as Canada and other nations, to punish Russia for the invasion and annexation of Crimea, they have been viewed largely as an effort to dissuade the Kremlin from further intervention in eastern Ukraine, where it has backed an armed separatist insurrection.
  
  Western officials have generally spoken about the possibility of relaxing the sanctions once the Minsk peace agreement has been fully put in effect, but there has been virtually no discussion about the possibility of a Russian withdrawal from Crimea.
  
  Last week, Russian officials similarly criticized a decision by the European Union to extend economic sanctions restricting most business dealings with Crimea. Those measures have been extended until June 23, 2016. The Foreign Ministry said the restrictions would do little other than “punish” residents of the Crimean Peninsula for what it called their free, democratic choice to leave Ukraine and join the Russian Federation.
  
  The dispute over Russia’s actions in Ukraine has created some of the worst tension between the Kremlin and the West since the end of the Cold War, and anti-American remarks are quite common in Russian government circles.
  
  In the latest inflammatory comments, the head of Russia’s Security Council, Nikolai Patrushev, said in an interview with Kommersant, a leading newspaper here, that the United States hoped to eliminate Russia.
  
  “They very much want Russia to be gone as a country,” Mr. Patrushev said in the interview. “This is because we possess huge resources. And the Americans think that we possess them illegally and do not deserve them because, in their opinion, we are using them in the wrong way.”
  
  
• http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/23/w...ension-of-eu-sanctions-in-ukraine-crisis.html

 

[☑︎#VoteDemocrat]

Guess who fukked up?









US to Put Military Equipment in Several European Countries
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESSJUNE 23, 2015, 9:10 A.M. E.D.T.


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TALLINN, Estonia — The U.S. will spread about 250 tanks, armored vehicles and other military equipment across six former Soviet bloc nations to help reassure NATO allies facing threats from Russia and terrorist groups, Defense Secretary Ash Carter announced Tuesday.

Carter's announcement, made as he stood with defense chiefs from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, comes a day after he announced that the U.S. would have other weapons, aircraft and forces, including commandos, ready as needed for NATO's new rapid reaction force, to help Europe defend against potential Russian aggression from the east and the Islamic State and other violent extremists from the south.

The defense chiefs standing with Carter all spoke bluntly about the threat they perceive from Russia, and the latest military plans provide a show of solidarity across the region and in NATO.

Estonia Defense Minister Sven Mikser said the Baltic leaders aren't trying to restart the Cold War arms race or match Russian President Vladimir Putin "tank for tank," but the additional military presences will be a deterrent to Russia and could change the calculous.

"In global terms Russia is no match conventionally to U.S. or to NATO, but here in our corner of the world, Putin believes that he enjoys regional superiority," Mikser said, adding that Estonia is eager and ready to accept the equipment immediately.

Each set of equipment would be enough to outfit a military company or battalion, and would go on at least a temporary basis to Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and Romania. Carter said the equipment could be moved around the region for training and military exercises, and would include Bradley fighting vehicles and self-propelled howitzer artillery guns.

Germany will be participating in the expanded military effort, but already has U.S. equipment.

"We intend to move those equipment sets around as exercises move around," Carter told a news conference. "They're not static. Their purpose is to enable richer training and more mobility to forces in Europe." He said the U.S. presence will be "persistent" but "agile," and he said the troops will be able to stay at a higher state of readiness.

But while the stated goal of the move is that American forces moving in and out of Europe will be better able to do training, it also would allow NATO nations to more quickly respond to any military crisis in the region.

Later in the day, Russia was also on the minds of U.S. sailors and Marines aboard the USS San Antonio, which just finished up a major annual international military exercise on the Baltic Sea called BALTOPS.

The exercise, which involved some 60 ships from 17 NATO nations, is part of the stepped-up campaign to increase military training and activities in the region as a deterrent to Russia.

Troops quizzed Carter on U.S. relations with Russia and questioned whether the U.S. might put a greater maritime presence in the region.

The U.S. military "is highly, highly visible here in Europe, it's reassuring for them to see you," he said, "because of what you stand for."

The U.S., said Carter, is also going to work with NATO's cyber center, located in Estonia, to help allies develop cyber defense strategies and other protections against computer-based attacks. Russian hackers have become particularly adept, including breaking into U.S. State Department computers.

The countries for the equipment storage were chosen based on their proximity to training ranges, to reduce the time and cost of transporting it for exercises.

The two-pronged U.S. plan — with the placement of equipment in Europe and the commitment of resources for NATO's very high readiness task force — underscore America's commitment to helping allies counter growing threats on Europe's eastern and southern fronts.

U.S. and NATO allies have criticized Russia for its increasingly aggressive actions, including the annexation of Crimea and its backing of separatist troops on Ukraine's eastern border.

Under the plan to commit troops and resources if needed during a crisis, the U.S. could see a temporary increase in American troops in Europe, although many could be reassigned from bases already in the region. No U.S. troops or equipment will move immediately.

Carter said the U.S., if requested and approved, would be willing to provide intelligence and surveillance capabilities, special operations forces, logistics, transport aircraft, and a range of weapons support that could include bombers, fighters and ship-based missiles. It would not provide a large ground force.

 

[88m3]

Just one of those decades for Putin

 

[☑︎#VoteDemocrat]