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Here Is Why Europe Just Launched The "Nuclear Option" Against Russia
Europe's leaders, we assume under pressure from Washington, appear to be making a big weather-related bet with their taxpayers' lives this winter. As they unleash funding sanctions on Russia's big energy producers, Europe has pumped a record volume of natural gas into underground inventories in an effort to 'outlast' Russia and mitigate any Napoleonic "Winter War" scenario. The plan appears to be to starve Russian energy firms of cashflow - as flows to Europe are already plunging - and remove their funding ability, potentially forcing severe hardship on Russia's key economic drivers. There appears to be 3 potential problems with this plan...
As Bloomberg reports,
Europe’s reliance on Russian natural gas shipments via Ukraine is declining after the region pumped a record volume of the fuel into underground inventories, minimizing the risk of shortages during the coming winter.
The blue line above shows average daily flows at Velke Kapusany on the Slovakian-Ukrainian border, the biggest single entry point for Russian gas into the European Union, last month fell to a record, according to data from Slovak grid operator Eustream AS going back to 2011. The red histogram shows the 28-nation bloc has pumped a record volume of gas into storage, according to Gas Infrastructure Europe, a lobby group in Brussels.
Natural gas flows from Russia to the EU haven’t been affected in the current crisis. Storage sites in Slovakia, which had to seek emergency imports after its supplies were cut in 2009, were 92 percent full on Sept. 4, according to Gas Infrastructure Europe.
* * *
So Europe is stocking-up - which makes perfect sense - just in case Russia pulls the plug... but has now taken the situation to "11" on the Spinal Tap amplifier of escalating tensions by planning sanctions on Russia's energy providers.
The plan appears clear:
stock-up now (to survive the winter)...
starve Russian firms of cashflow (thanks to stockpiles)...
cut off their funding source (sanctions)...
force Putin's economy into a tailspin...
Putin folds and it all ends happily ever after
* * *
There appears to be 3 problems with this plan...
1) What if the weather is considerably colder than normal this winter? (i.e. they need more supply)
Central based El Nino's seem to be associated with much colder European winters than eastern based El Nino's. Temperature anomalies come out on average 2-3c colder than a "normal" European winter.
With a central based El Nino forecast for winter 2014/2015 this would suggest a chance of some brutal cold moving much of central and northern Europe at times this winter.
For the United Kingdom and Ireland a central based El Nino does suggest a colder than average winter as well - Because of our proximity to the Atlantic Ocean the negative anomaly is much less extreme for Great Britain than it is for central Europe and Russia. Nevertheless, with the temperature anomaly coming out at 1c colder than average, the UK would still have a greater chance of a colder than average winter than an eastern based El Nino.
2) Russia has already committed to supporting the sanctioned firms (and we would hardly be shocked if China chipped in)
The Russian government, according to Bloomberg, is ready to provide 1.5 Trillion rubles financing to Rosneft to support production at current level, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev says in Vedomosti interview.
Details, ways of support are under review
Support wouldn’t be in one yr; needed to sustain output because Rosneft is budget’s main taxpayer
and furthermore, Gazprom appears to be quickly funding before the sanctions are actually put in place...
As Bloomberg reports, European banks may organize new borrowing for Gazprom, Interfax reports, citing people familiar it doesn’t identify.
The company's board to consider some loans Sept. 23, no details yet, news service reports
Gazprom spokesman Sergei Kupriyanov declined to comment when reached by Bloomberg
3) What happens in Spring? German industrials need energy?
It appears that Putin is a patient man... why not wait till the stockpiles have dwindled, winter is over, and then press...?
* * *
It appears Europe's short-term plan to mitigate the "Winter War" may have bigger boomerag consequences than they seem to believe (and bear in mind the consequences of cold, pissed off Europeans in the past).
* * *
We point out that planned sanctions are on Gazprom Neft will be sanctioned (not the gazprom nat gas entity) as Europe appears to be focused on the crude oil side of things for now.
New European Union sanctions on Russia will expand the number of Russian companies unable to raise money in the bloc's capital markets to include three state-owned oil companies, according to documents seen by The Wall Street Journal.
The documents show the EU seeking to hit Russian oil companies, but leaving unscathed those involved in gas production and export, which are critical to many European countries' energy supplies.
...
Under a modest expansion of sanctions introduced in late July, the three oil companies - Gazpromneft, the oil-production and refining subsidiary of OAO Gazprom, oil transportation company Transneft, and oil giant Rosneft - will be forbidden from raising funds of longer than 30 days' maturity.
* * *
So jab at oil companies, and mitigate natural gas restriction blowback?
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Russian invasion proof
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ljZhKEIhcC8
thats some scary stuff
That is not Why Europe Launched the Nuclear Option.
The why is petrogold, loss of US reserve currency status and the BRICS gold exchange standard currency starting on Sept 26 with the Shanghai Gold Exchange opening to foreigners in the Shanghai Free Trade Zone.
Financial warfare. It's how the fat, lazy panzies in power in the West fight nowadays. lol
Wonder what will happen to energy prices once the stockpiles are gone? lmfao.
Gumby Bears
4. Putin could be in Slovakia in 3 weeks.
Just joking. Let's not have any war here.
Weather wars ahoy, maties. Chemtrails and HAARP to become very high profile stuff.
Hah ha ha ha haah ah ah ha ahhhhhh
This reminds me of a medieval siege. In this case, we are talking energy. Putin just needs to wait outside the castle walls before the EU freezes. It is a matter of time.
I lost the plot, what is it that the Rothchild shadow Government is asking of Russia, other than to place a Zionist in control of the Country? Seriously, what do they want from Putin?
Not to upset the dollar applecart.
How cold is nuclear winter?? Can they stockpile enough gas to make it thru one of those??
D. Orlov nailed it:
Because if Russia invaded on Thursday morning, this is what the situation on the ground would look like by Saturday afternoon.
1. Ukrainian artillery fell silent almost immediately. They are no longer shelling residential districts of Donetsk and Lugansk. This is because their locations had been pinpointed prior to the operation, and by Thursday afternoon they were completely wiped out using air attacks, artillery and ground-based rocket fire, as the first order of business. Local residents are overjoyed that their horrible ordeal is finally at an end.
2. The look of military activity on the ground in Donetsk and Lugansk has changed dramatically. Whereas before it involved small groups of resistance fighters, the Russians operate in battalions of 400 men and dozens of armored vehicles, followed by convoys of support vehicles (tanker trucks, communications, field kitchens, field hospitals and so on). The flow of vehicles in and out is non-stop, plainly visible on air reconnaissance and satellite photos. Add to that the relentless radio chatter, all in Russian, which anyone who wants to can intercept, and the operation becomes impossible to hide.
3. The Ukrainian military has promptly vanished. Soldiers and officers alike have taken off their uniforms, abandoned their weapons, and are doing their best to blend in with the locals. Nobody thought the odds of the Ukrainian army against the Russians were any good. Ukraine's only military victory against Russia was at the battle of Konotop in 1659, but at the time Ukraine was allied with the mighty Khanate of Crimea, and, you may have noticed, Crimea is not on Ukraine's side this time around.
4. There are Russian checkpoints everywhere. Local civilians are allowed through, but anyone associated with a government, foreign or domestic, is detained for questioning. A filtration system has been set up to return demobilized Ukrainian army draftees to their native regions, while the volunteers and the officers are shunted to pretrial detention centers, to determine whether they had ordered war crimes to be committed.
5. Most of Ukraine's border crossings are by now under Russian control. Some have been reinforced with air defense and artillery systems and tank battalions, to dissuade NATO forces from attempting to stage an invasion. Civilians and humanitarian goods are allowed through. Businessmen are allowed through once they fill out the required forms (which are in Russian).
6. Russia has imposed a no-fly zone over all of Ukraine. All civilian flights have been cancelled. There is quite a crowd of US State Department staffers, CIA and Mossad agents, and Western NGO people stuck at Borispol airport in Kiev. Some are nervously calling everyone they know on their satellite phones. Western politicians are demanding that they be evacuated immediately, but Russian authorities want to hold onto them until their possible complicity in war crimes has been determined.
7. The usual Ukrainian talking heads, such as president Poroshenko, PM Yatsenyuk and others, are no longer available to be interviewed by Western media. Nobody quite knows where they are. There are rumors that they have already fled the country. Crowds have stormed their abandoned residences, and were amazed to discover that they were all outfitted with solid gold toilets. Nor are the Ukrainian oligarchs anywhere to be found, except for the warlord Igor Kolomoisky, who was found in his residence, abandoned by his henchmen, dead from a heart attack. (Contributed by the Saker.)
8. Some of the over 800,000 Ukrainian refugees are starting to stream back in from Russia. They were living in tent cities, many of them in the nearby Rostov region, but with the winter coming they are eager to get back home, now that the shelling is over. Along with them, construction crews, cement trucks and flatbeds stacked with pipe, cable and rebar are streaming in, to repair the damage from the shelling.
9. There is all sorts of intense diplomatic and military activity around the world, especially in Europe and the US. Military forces are on highest alert, diplomats are jetting around and holding conferences. President Obama just held a press conference to announce that “We don't have a strategy on Ukraine yet.” His military advisers tell him that his usual strategy of “bomb a little and see what happens” is not likely to be helpful in this instance.
10. Kiev has surrendered. There are Russian tanks on the Maidan Square. Russian infantry is mopping up the remains of Ukraine's National Guard. A curfew has been announced. The operation to take Kiev resembled “Shock and Awe” in Baghdad: a few loud bangs and then a whimper.
Armed with this list, you too should be able to determine whether or not Russia has invaded Ukraine last Thursday.
http://cluborlov.blogspot.com/2014/08/how-can-you-tell-whether-russia-ha...
Excellent.
Now, what about Friday's list?
Some Kenyan in Washington trying to play a master in chess moves. Putin will get the last laugh and the Kenyan will go back to his birthplace back in Africa.
Someone told me Obama is a Niger native? Nigeria that is.....
The "through Slovakia" transit isn't the right way to look at it. Russia isn't going to send anything through the Nord Stream line either if sanctions are in place.
EU-28 have about 100 days of stored supply when averaged over the entire year and all countries. That supply is less than two months' worth total in the middle of winter if averaged across all EU-28 nations (gas consumption 2x summer consumption per day). Some individual countries reserve and cross-connect transfer capability is limited - they may only have weeks worth of reserve where other countries may have three or four months of reserve.
If Russia is anticipating these sanctions, then they're going to shut down all sales now - not wait until the middle of winter.
"Friday's list..."
Early Friday morning, ICBM launched.
Few hours later, Sun don't shine...
Dead silent on the Western Front !
Coz, it was never about Ukraine. "Fxck EU", remember ?
The other (invincible) hand, stirring...
So, can we conclude that Europe's "Leaders" are totally fucking stupid??
yes but they have company. at least the u.s. and by extension, israel.
with gathering momentum since 9-11, the corrupt and brutal attempts at short-term advantage have bankrupted the u.s. of its capital, both financial and moral, and revealed, to particularly the newer generations, the degree to which the zionists have copied from their former nazi associates: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Other_Side:_The_Secret_Relationship_Bet...
I'm no fan of the European powers-that-be. With that said, Putin did commit an act of war. He's just a Stalin wannabe. Putin's a dinosaur who needs to fade away.
What you smoking Elvis?
How did Putin do that?
The operation to take Kiev resembled “Shock and Awe” in Baghdad: a few loud bangs and then a whimper.
It would not resmble Baghdad in a very key way. The Rusian Army actually WOULD be greeted as liberators LOL!
Thank you for the best international news I can remember reading, ever.
I would pay to watch a Russian trial of any American diplomat for war crimes. Conviction even better. If it's legal, I'll send money to Putin to pay for the bullets for the execution.
Again, if it's legal.
"If it's legal, I'll send money to Putin..."
"Again, if it's legal."
I see you live in the "Land of the Free"..., ;-)
Of course I mean that in the most legal way being in the "Land of the Free" also.
Cheers,
Exomike
wow, thanks for the play by play straight from the Kremlin!
I see this site is still utterly infested w Putin's blogger brigade of cubicle-jockey disinfo serfs.
But seriously, its sad that Putin's oligarch's (including his judo instructor and other peeps he picked up along the way) have crippled Russia's economy through totalitarianism, and now have to invade a weak, harmless neighbor because they can't think of anything better to do to feel good about themselves.
You know, actually freeing your people to live their lives without being treated like criminals in an open air prison can actually do wonders for a country. Just look at all the countries your oligarchs flee to to raise their families after raping your mother-land and looting its wealth.
Russia could be a great place if they would actually throw off the chains of their oligarch, klepto-mafia oppressors. Russians, wake up, read news in other languages! Be a patriot of the Russian people, not of the criminal gang that is running your country now like a giant feudal estate with you as the serfs who get the left-over crumbs.
I met a Rusian woman in Moscow who is as free spirited as can be. She refused to join the KGB after she graduated from the university ( they give you a Rubble to get in and you pays them two to get out ). She laughed at the KGB building as being the tallest in the old days because from that building you could see Siberia. Yet of all these sarcism. She said most people, especially the young ones supports Putin adn think he has done a great job for Russia.The only ones who dislike Putin are hte older folks who long for the secure communist era pension etc. Are you one of them ? It is funny that statistic of Russian's economy seem to contradict your "facts" of "Putin Crippled Russia's economy".
Personally, I do not care if Putin or his successor are good guy or bad. I care what is wrong and what is right. Anyone with more than two brain cells would do the same.
Rofl, so you think people who don't like Putin are commies?!
Wake-up, people who don't like Putin want Western European FREEDOM.
The 1st thing any Russian who gets enough $ or education does is LEAVE.
Putin's own family is enjoying life in HOLLAND.
Its the most educated (and generally younger) who want a FREE Russia, not a continuation of totalitarianism.
I'm writing you from the free world good sir.
Like I said, I dont know Putin and frankly dont care. However , Americans have a tradition of rooting for the underdog. In this case, the US(Zionist) and EU are ganging up against Russia for no apparent reason other than being aggreesive , bringing trouble to Russia's door step. I also think that the Ukraine Nazis planned and carried out the downing of MH17 and your beloved Holland just dispicably covered up the truth. I admire what Putin has done in fighting back and outsmart them so far. I dont like bullies.
komrad, you are hilarious. The underdog is Ukraine.
Not fascist, expanionist, kgb propaganda blaring, Russia.
Gorbachev let everyone vote and they decided to BREAK-UP THE USSR, because IT SUCKED!
No need to try and recreate it! Lets move on, Russia needs to clean its own house, and stay out of others...
luftmensch
Search American citizen the late "Anwar Al Awlaki." Search his deceased 16 year old son, also an American citizen by the same name. Search how America says it "accidentially" assasinated the 16 year old son with a drone missle, a weak after killing the father the same way, sans trial, sans description of any criminal offense other than Prez. Obombya's words, "Trust me, he deserved to die."
A shining example of American "freedom" to have one's name written on a kill list.
Search "kill list" in the top desk drawer of Prez. Obombya. Search "kill list criteria" and learn how our dear Prez. can keep secret the criteria to have one's name added to the "kill list."
Some staunch ultra-liberals condemned 24/7 Bush's abuses of power while he was president. Now they defend Obombya "kill list" with ardent fervor. When asked if they would similarly defend Prez. Sarah Palin's "kill list," the silence is deafening. Maybe their name will top the list and they can get a taste of their medicine.
Anyone suggesting that ultimately there is less "freedom" for Russian citizen than American citizen is naive, stupid, or more likely a government troll, AKA blood sucking scum bag parasite killing its host.
Plato try googling "Stalin" (20 million killed, not including anything from WWII).
Try googling "Ukraine famine genocide" - estimated 10 million Ukrainians killed by USSR policies to steal all of the food from Ukraine. Ukranian farmers were killed for trying to eat their own food, or trying to travel to get food.
You can libel anyone, indeed disinformation and libel is one of Putin's top skills. I mean, it was his actual profession as a KGB disinformation officer in East Germany working hand in hand with the Stasi East German spy agency, known for spying on virtually every citizen of East Germany. You can find something wrong with any person or government.
But when taken in total, the crimes, totalitarianism, and lack of freedom in Russia far far outweighs the rest of the free Western world. Which all of your rich, educated, elite are fully aware of, which is why they leave Russia in droves to go live in Europe and the U.S.
Looks like you've been injesting a little too much of Putin / Kremlin disinfo machine...try to taper off of it a little bit at a time. Open up your eyes, and come out of the cave Plato.
... still utterly infested w Putin's blogger brigade of cubicle-jockey disinfo serfs.
Well, yes, you are here, are you not?
Creep
is your iq in the 2 digits or are you just out of words?
Seriously, what do they want from Putin?
"It All"
Correct... it's the sociopath way. Eventually it always comes down to various sociopaths, all trying to destroy each other in order for one "to win". Unfortunately, the rest of the world is collateral damage.
If you kick someone in the nuts and then they hit you over the head with an anvil doncha think it's gonna take a lot more than a kick in the nuts next time?
This whole thing is getting nuttier by the minute.
Seriously, what do they want from Putin?
My wild guess is they think Russia will be put into serious economic trouble if they do not sell Europe gas. It is like one large restaurant chain stops buying food from their largest farm. Yeah, the farm may hurt in the short run. The restaurant now lost its' largest food supply and will have to shut down. Idiots.
It's worrisome... the West thinks that: "if we can make the Russians suffer, then they will knuckle-under and subjugate themselves to our [foreign and distantly-remote] will!"
Seriously, these guys in the West think that this strategy will actually work... like their "advisors" know that this will work or something...
It makes me weep in hilarity...
A person in the West's "I had a hard year, but I'll manage" = They lose 15% in their portfolio, someone steals their iphone, their dog got hit by a car
A Russian's "I had a hard year, but I'll manage" = War destroys their home, their brother and mother die of starvation, they had to walk across 500Km of war-torn land to escape to another country, many many more
We are talking different planes of existence of fortitude... 6M jews get annihilated by Hitler and it's "never forget," 25M Russians get annihilated by Stalin and it's "we moved on."
Get this straight... there's "hardship," and then there's "Russian hardship," and they cannot be measured on the same scale.
There's "Western" hardship and then there is "Russian" hardship ... yes.
A story from my Russian in-laws: woman goes to her husband's mistress - the prettiest woman in the village - and says "stay away from husband". Mistress laughs and says "no, what are going to to about it?"
Wife says nothing. Wife grabs mistress by face, bites her nose, and tears it off between her teeth. Mistress runs screaming from village, never seen again.
The Russian way, in action. Think NATO as the mistress, Putin as the wife.
yikes!!! Note to self: stay off those Russian bride websites.
excellent ....
I don't know what Jewish nationalists want from Putin but the criminals running things over here want... EVERYTHING.
And they are getting it through complete control of the eyes and ears of the US public including their internet access. Who controls the media controls the country and its politicians.
It is called " you support our enemy neighbor Syria, we create an enemy in your backyard " - even if that means WW3. Folks, take these Zionist mother fucker seriously for they are no better than the ISIS they support.
Putin was allowed into power because $the global elite$ longed for a enemy, a cold war style enemy - and what is more convenient than a strong Russia - the age old propaganda allready soked in the sheaple's aspartame-eaten brains, weapons and fear stockpiled... and so on! So after looting and but-fucking the bear for some time they allowed Putin to thake control. But he did way beter than they hoped... he rides the bear so good that now it can eat the very same elite.
Any way if they can someway manage to make the bear eat Europe's business and peoples instead they can probably continue to fuck the rotten leftovers of those same peoples afterwards...
So the endgame is - they want war to justify there existence and control. Putin wants them dead...
It's annoying. I see at least 5 chemtrails a day.
If they pass this crap it's going to get really, really interesting. I imagine the EU won't exist in it's current form by next spring. It also has the potential to throw a big, heavy wrench into our basket case of a financial system.
I think ZH is right, they are going to make Russia into the bogeyman and blame them for both freezing children and the collapse of the system.
They'll be back
Yes Knuckles,
Expect incredibly abnormal weather to be the talk of the globe. All of the rain supressing done in the West is to control the precipitation and crops in the Midwest..
Thus, behold the bumper crops in beans and corn, (wheat to some extent).
Food wars... who needs to eat? China?
The NATO countries all have active weather mod ocurring. The general W to E flow creates a strategic opportunity where moisture can be removed from the air prior to arriving at countries just East of its application. Look at the geography of NATO encirclement, in conjunction with weather/jetstream flow and you'll know what possibilities exist.
China backs off with its Shanghai coop with Russia to feed its people, Russia loses its new petrol/gas buyer. Petrodollar stays in control longer.
Hook Line and Sphincter
Natural cyclical changes don't need to be 'explained' by fantastic Weather Wars. Even the AGW terror meme seems to be shelved as other things take priority.
As a hobbiest of the electric universe theory, I concur, but neither should you discount the massive amounts of actual physically documented geoengineering studies and funding.
Granted. Control freaks want to control EVERYTHING.
Your theory suffers from a fatal flaw. As with nuclear technology, any nation with the scientific and technical means can execute a weather control program, in which case, just like the nuclear option, it becomes a zero sum game.
Not sure where the 'flaw' you're referring to exists. If you're speaking about my speculation regarding geopolitical reactions to weather mod, then maybe. However, most weather mod is not done with HAARP or its facsimiles. Rather, it's done from NEXRAD stations acting as atmospheric heaters in concert with metal particulates to move low pressure cells, as well as nudging the jetstream in particular directions. Most countries do not have the tech savvy, ship born NEXRADS, nor are they surrounded by the Pacific and Atlantic oceans of which to re-route moisture (remember US on the incoming Pacific fronts, and NATO (The North Atlantic Treaty Organization) flowing in from the Atlantic. Whatever countries that have NEXRADS just West of any other can mod the weather to the East.
Note the amount of tornados and severe weather that hit NEXRAD locations next to airports throughout the US. (I believe Denver Aiports been hit 6 or 7 times by tornados lately, just to name one of the many).
Hook Line and Rain Dances!
Aaaand I thought it was just about manipulating markets to exploit futures, and an occasional 'Deprive Your Enemy Of Battlefield Comfort' flood, drought or earthquake. The plot definitely thickens if weather mods can become long-play strategic pieces on the Grand Chessboard. Will be very very intersting to test the theory this winter in Euroland. Warmer than usual vs colder than usual.
GeoEngineering tipping point:
http://www.geoengineeringwatch.org/climate-engineering-weather-warfare-a...
Weather as a 'Force Muliplier - Owning the Weather by 2025:
http://sincedutch.wordpress.com/2012/04/24/want-to-know-about-weather-mo...
Chemtrail doco: http://www.whyintheworldaretheyspraying.com/ Angels Dont Play This HAARP www.youtube.com/watch?v=YT9rD-8dEIM PeaceWow the EU just must really want UKIP to win by a land slide next election cycle.
What "next election cycle"?
There is only one saviour and he will not be saving you via politics.. Neither will any party save you, co-opted shortly, UKIP that is..
You mean General Election, but yes, fair point.
.
So Europe goes without Nat Gas and the Russian public goes without European FOOD.
Maybe China can provide the FOOD.../sarc.
(I know that they do not run any surplus stocks of crops in China. The Russians will find that out also.)
I wonder whom can outlast whom...
Pass the popcorn. I am hungry. Fortunately I have some.
Perhaps petroleum is digestable...NOT
It will be interesting to watch.
This is a poor article because it did not even consider that "minor" fact in the analysis.
Tall:
Your analysis falls flat on its face when you premise that Russia can only get food from either the NATO West, or from China.
The Russians are already linking up with South American countries to get foodstuffs, as well as others around the globe.
I don't think you get it: this is all about tectonic structural realignments.
-30-
Russians apparently grow an enormous percentage of their own food in gardens. Someone posted a link to this whenever people first starting saying Russia could "starve" without Europe:
http://www.naturalhomes.org/naturalliving/russian-dacha.htm
Bottom line: no chance in hell. They didn't starve after the collapse of the Soviet Union; they won't starve if Europe doesn't sell them fancy cheese.
The Russian people are nothing if not hardy. Don't hold your breath for food riots, that sounds like our leaders reading their worries about what we'd do into their situation. Not going to happen.
But here's the real question. If the EU almost doubled their in ground gas storage and during the same time frame the gas transit through Slovakia more than halved, what gives? I would have thought that the gas transit would have followed the same graph during the time that they imported more gas to build up the reserve, yet the two are going in opposite directions. Hmmmm...... How bad is the economy if the gas transit through Slovakia is even less than it was last year?
Okay, I can get that those Russians with houses aren't stuck with useless pocket handkerchief patches of grass for a garden as is the way with modern housing here in UK (er, for the time being), and so can grow their own produce, but what about those living in all those apartment blocks? Is Russia big on allotments?
At least in Soviet times, absolutely yes, the people who lived in giant apartment complexes had large plots in what we would call community gardens. They were extremely well tended and guarded and productive. Whether they still typically have them, I don't know.
That's good planning, especially if they still have and tend them.
"I don't think you get it: this is all about tectonic structural realignments."
I'd have to agree with that. As I pointed out elsewhere, Russia has the potential to be entirely self-sufficient, and the effect of sanctions and war-baiting only serves to push them further along that path.
In the short run, cutting Russia off from western capital may slow them down, but that can be replaced with Chinese capital in exchange for oil. China gets energy security, Russia gets the capital and technology it needs to grow their economy, thus providing an expanding market for Chinese exports - a win for both sides.
If I were a young guy today (how I wish) I'd be learning Russian with the aim of studying and working over there. I'm sure it would cost far less to get a degree, and the work opportunities would be much greater than in the stagnant west.
As it stands, I'm currently looking at ways to invest in Russia as I feel this is a ground floor opportunity which has at least a decade or two to run.
Your comment is stupid because you must think that China is the only other food exporter.
It would be far easier for Russia to replace EU food than EU to replace Russian gas.
Just another neocon assmunch post.
This is just laughable. The EU is trying to convince Latin/South American countries to NOT sell food to Russia, pointing out it would be taking unfair advantage of the EU/Russia situation and South America would be "profiting unfairly".
http://rt.com/business/179684-eu-latinamerica-sanctions-russia/
Ho-ho-ho!
It's immoral and you'll make too much money if you sell food to these hungry people. Can't you see we're trying to starve them out?
Good luck with that argument.
Ho-ho-ho! (very funny if not so clearly sociopathic)
He said "Tall", not smart. Cut him some slack. :) (even though he's an obvious NWO shill)
Russia was actually exporting food to the European block. They'll have enough. Besides, Russians can live without food for three years, Americans declare starvation after 18 hours.
The European food exports to Russia are more the luxury variety than the subsistence variety. They're expensive, high margin processed foods that generate lots of taxes and money for Europeans to spend on better lives for themselves.
Russians can do without Dutch gouda, French Bordeaux wine and German BMWs. Can the Dutch, French and Germans do without those Russian energy sourced euros as easily? It may require postponing that Greek island vacation.
It may require moving to that Greek island.
Bullish for 2nd German invasion of Greece probably end the same way too..
Russia will gladly trade oil (that the EU is sanctioning) for food. Hell, all the major oil producers have been doing that for decades with the USSA.
I can´t say much about the rest of Europe, but living here in Germany, and especially in Bavaria, I have learned a few things about the German volk. Like Russia in the past, Germany has gone through the wringer. They understand pain. They also know how to survive. They are not going to just let their industrial base wither on the vine if they don´t get russian gas. There are world class machinists living here, and they will find alternatives. More than likely they will end up specializing in industrial conversions, and the German government is going to offer very cheap business loans to support the effort (for example through their KfW Development Bank).
You can also expect coal to make a giant comeback, and clean coal technology will have a secure future. That does not mean there will not be pain. There will be. Economical and societal pain...and probably lots of it.
Germany pumped a shit load of cash into Russia, and it looks like much of it will be lost. That is going to hurt. The conversion process also takes time. Jobs will be lost short term. They may even have to hold on to their nuclear power plants for awhile longer. But, believe me, and again, I have no clue what the French or the Austrians or whoever else in the EU are going to do (besides complain), the Germans will not be held hostage. They will act.
Germany pumped a shit load of cash into Russia, and it looks like much of it will be lost. That is going to hurt.
Why are you so eager tp pay this kind of price, simply to protect Hunter Biden's job and to keep Merkel's NSA sourced iCloud lesbian romp nude photos under wrap.
because they're not tin foil hat wearing Putin apologists. They're a major world power that doesn't stand idly by while their neighbor (who was guaranteed proptection from russia if they gave up their nukes) gets invaded. Russia is a third world country. They only made it into the BRICS because energy prices went up for a while in the early 2000's. Per capita income is 18K, they're economy is 1/7th of the US. Their economy is getting wrecked and this is the nail in the coffin.
"Per capita income is 18K, they're economy is 1/7th of the US."
Right.
And their:
Per-capita arable land?
Per-capita acres of timber?
Per-capita industrial minerals?
Per capital barrels of oil?
Per capita fresh water?
As a contrarian, I see enormous potential for growth.
well why don't we just throw hookers and blow in there, then they'd really be on top. Half of state revenues come from exporting energy. The Europeans might be lazy but they're not stupid.
The effects are already being felt. Russian corporations can’t roll over their loans and have had to cancel IPO’s. The Russian government has had to call off all but two bond auctions since the beginning of the crisis. This adds to capital flight, puts pressure on the Ruble and creates inflation. At the same time, it limits investment in the country and lowers income.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/gregsatell/2014/04/28/heres-how-obamas-sanct...
You take the short view
and I'll take the long view
and I'll be in Moscow before you
Perhaps there was one vital piece of risk-management information missing from the 2012 Tartarstan Campaign (which was harped by CNBS...of course). Vladimir Putin. I suppose if your business is based in B, or I, or C, or S, your still hanging on, although if you were exporting your goods to Europe, things may be a bit dicey right now. For the rest of them (some of whom you can see in the video), they are all but shit out of luck now aren´t they.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24pce6MMUbw
Too bad for Germany about all that coal in the Donbass that won't be available. Just when they were switching over too! What a coincidence.
The bigger question is what happens to all the resources flowing west from Kazakhstan. That is going to be something to look at.
Probably won't be lost.
With all due respect, I don't think Frau Bundeskanzlerin will stay in Office much longer if the Gas stops flowing over the Nordstream. I presume their Bunds are funded by Gas Flow revenues.
The Silkroad involves TEAM_RUS. To join in, TEAM_DEU will have to make some dfficult decisions sooner than expected.
Questions to ask may include: Who's Financing Nordstream? Who owns the Bonds?
FW 190 - absolutely correct. Few Americans alive today know their WWII history but those that do also know that Germany did just fine without oil or gas (with the exception of a few sources such as the Polesti fields in Romania - for a while) and that the Germans military and civilian sectors managed to create machines that ran on a wide range of fuels that had nothing to do with oil and gas. The US won not because of the superiority of our technology but because we could throw so many resources into mass manufacturing of war machinery. German machines has the US and Britain outclassed in every category from tanks to aircraft. It was only our massive resources that enabled us to throw so many inferior machines at Germany that overwhelmed the German war machine - it was absolutely NOT technological superiority.
The US could not and can not begin to match German engineering ingenuity, which is why we had to "persuade" so many German scientists to come to the US after WWII and help us build our military infrastructure. And of course the US couldn't have begun to build its nuclear arsenal without the help of Germans ingenuity. The name Albert Einstein is well known, but there are literally thousands of germans less well known, or completely unknown, who were the core of all that "America" accomplished. So any American who thinks that Germany will fold because of a bunch of kiddie idiots in the US government and their "strategic planning" is simply a fool - but that's redundant, isn't it.
I do agree entirely with what you have posted however, I feel you have overlooked one very important piece in the collapsing German puzzle.
Germany would probably STILL be fighting the war and the Allies would STILL be planning their invasion at Normandy if it had not been for the Russians soaking up and destroying the greater percentage of the 1st class German forces of man and machines on the eastern front between 41-44.
That was where Germany was defeated, on the eastern front. The Russians defeated 3 army groups totalling something like 5 million men as well as 24,000 tanks and Artillery pieces. The US and English forces took a huge advantage of the fact that Russia had defeated the meat of the German forces.
Overlooked fact is that it was energy rather than technology that defeated Germany. Russian and U.S. technology was at least(by conservative estimate) two years behind Germany and Japan but U.S. and Russia were able to 1) cut off energy to Germany and Japan and 2) produce inferior technology enmasse and have the supply lines of energy to fuel said inferior technology. More men, more trucks, more tanks, more diesel fuel, etc.
There is a big difference between surviving vs thriving.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QEJ9HrZq7Ro
Shermans were nick-named "Tommy-kettles" and would you fancy your chances in a Churchill or Matilda against a Panzer IV or a Tiger?
Tall Tom, your analysis is wrong. Russia grows 80% plus of their calorific needs. The imports provide out of season produce, variety to the diet and consumer choice. Take away all the imported food and they will grudgingly survive on what they grow. That is assuming that they won't be importing from many other countries that will happily ignore the stupid sanctions.
Meanwhile the Russians will stop buying German cars and other consumer goods from the EU, both to save currency during the sanctions and as nationalistic paybackto the EU.
So Germany and other EU nations will lose tens of billions in exports, add another 100,000+ to the unemployed and suffer through a cold winter.
All for a puppet regime in Kiev.
They stockpile at relatively low prices, they precipitate a gas shutoff, they sell the stockpiles to consumers at crisis prices, what's not to like about that plan?
Careful with that thinking Fred, you will be recruited.
pods
<< they sell the stockpiles to consumers at crisis prices >>
So ... it' a "win-win" for the consumer, right?
/sarc
Ha ha...talk about 'non-renewable resources'
My guess is (and I am probably giving to much credit to DC) that we WANT Putin to agitate and turn off the oil either through rebels blowing up the pipeline or due to sanctions. We are in the middle of a fracking boom in this country and are now looking for export markets for LNG. We are building LNG ports, GLNG, GLOG and others are ramping up huge Panamax sized tankers to dump US nat gas and oil on the EU in their moment of need. Russia turning off the spigots ensures INFLATION as we get a nice rising price for energy heading to Europe. Solves the deflation problem, solves the EU not dependent on the US and thinking they actually can ignore what the US wants problem, and solves an export market for a new commodity problem.
<-- Come November/Santcions, Gas-for-Rubles, Yen or Gold
<-- Come November/Sanctions, Gas-for-Dollars or Euros
Gas-math exercise:
[1] Pay up, or it's "No Gas for You!"
[2] No gas = "No Soup for You!"
Solve quadratic equations [1] and [2] for the "Gas Root" of Geo-Politics. Tick, tock.
p.s. If the EU goes for a nuclear gas-winter, let's see what they do when Russia takes over Kiev and boots out the Zio-Nazis. Will they send in ISIS, shouting "Elohim gadol! Elohim gadol!"?
A few more of potential interest:
- Ein be’aya
- Ein ma la’asot
- Ein lo Elohim (He has no Restraint)
- kacha lo bonim homa
- ga’avat yehida (pride in the unit)
- miluim (reserve duty)
- Magia lanu! (We deserve it!)
Listen, I will not tolerate members using ISIL as the butt-end of their jokes!
Don't you have to "CELEBRATE" for your Prince William and Kate? Yippy! The breeders are once again exchanging their "ROYAL" fluids!
Lies.
Reptiles hatch
Maybe so, but there ARE fluids involved.
He squirts on the mattress, and she rolls around in it.
With a little imagination... I can see Zbigniew Brzezinski enjoying a win-win in Iraq & Creation of ISIS/ISIL.
What does US/UK/EU care if the middle east is in Chaos. What does TPTB care if ISIS kills 1/10 of the population.
It means less to share in profits from resources and more room to maneuver our big weapons and drop our big bombs.
Really. Royals are part of TPTB. They are the problem.
Gold and oil are trading as if they were directly linked. One reason is that investors may be putting them in the same hedge basket. The other reason is that petro-gold may've already been implemented and it's producing a correlation. I personally miss the days when the DOW and GLV were making 10% swings in the opposite directions.
Yep, also Putin is going to wait them out he has a plan for this whole mess.
.....Way, way, way better for European Leaders to Nuke Russia than be Pitchforked by their own Citizens.
y3:
You realize of course, that is totally insane - nobody survives the MAD.
-30-
Yeah but what if Russia says fuck it and starts pointing at their nuclear option. It certainly has more bite to it than anything Europe has.
Listen, "POINTING" is not polite. And in that game you can never bluff! Including "DIRTY BOMBS"!
.
RisingSun and viedorkolis_lv will claim it is real.
AND the Germans can use those October Fest Tents for Militia and Citizen Armies all along the Russian Flanks.
http://www.oktoberfest.de/en/ressort/The+big+tents/
http://www.oktoberfest.de/en/article/About+the+Oktoberfest/About+the+Okt...
http://www.muenchen.de/int/en/events/oktoberfest.html
http://www.muenchen.de/int/en/events/oktoberfest/beertents.html
Anyone ever heard of Hydro-fuel cells???
Yes, they don't provide a source of energy.
Epic reply. And your correct, they don't provide any power.
It is about preventing WWIII... (Big picture!)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_cell
El Oregonian It is about preventing WWIII... (Big picture!)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_cell
---
Even your link suggests that another fuel source is necessary: "Hydrogen produced from the steam methane reforming of natural gas is the most common fuel, but for greater efficiency hydrocarbons can be used directly such as natural gas and alcohols like methanol. Fuel cells are different from batteries in that they require a continuous source of fuel and oxygen/air"
I suggest you start with little pictures before you try to jump to the big picture
Hydrogen does not generally exist in its H2 form on earth, and thus you need to expend energy to get H2. Once you have that H2, it is a form of stored energy. If you do all of the engineering to build storage tanks that are energy dense enough to be practical, the fuel cells are merely a tool for accessing that energy.
A basic misunderstanding of physics underlies all these alternate energy proposals.
Base load energy production is one thing, but unless you're prepared to electrify the entire transportation grid, there is still no alternative to liquid fuel in terms of energy density.
Assuming you were being sarcastic... :-)
If you were serious... Think of it as a high tech BATTERY. You use energy to separate the H and the O in H2O, and store the H in the car's tank. You use the H for engine combustion.
Great for tech careers, VCs and Banks. And for car makers, so they can show how 'progressive' and Green they are. Probably an ETF for it also, or coming soon.
I watch platinum as an indication of fuel cell progress. Much like in catalytic converters of gasoline cars, platinum plays an important role in manufacturing of fuel cells. If the technology proved itself worthy, it would lead to substitution of platinum use in exhaust systems to platinum in fuel cells. It hasn't happened. In reality, the platinum price crashed along with demand for gas guzzlers in 2008 and it is currently on a very slow recovery course, supported by decade old trends. No H-cell demand. Lithium is where all the interest currently lies for conventional battery use, and barely any of it is due to the niche electric cars market.
There's still lots of coal in the world, and lots of thorium.
Thorium reactors to produce electricity.
Electricity to liquify coal into transportation fuel.
I don't have time to make the case in detail, but there's plenty of good material on the web if anyone cares to look. Check it out.
If I remember correctly it would take 7-8 tankers moving hydrogen to deliver the same energy that 1 tanker of gasoline does. Again making that energy even more inefficient. Also hydogen is a bit more explosive than regular gasoline.... more risky to move and unload......in sum total not a viable response...pipe dream
There are many articles on the subject. I remember reading one about low energy density of hydrogen compared to gasoline. That study concluded that in order for Germany (the country used as an example), to subsitute its gasoline use for H2, they would have to convert their entire water supply into the energy carrier, which doesn't take a genius to realize, is not physically possible.
Just to run the Frankfurt airport they'd have to electolize all of Main River.
Atomic hydrogen (H) is very energy dense, an Apollo mission could been flown on a fuel tank the size of the bed of a pickup truck. Alas, H is even tougher to produce and store than H2 (molecular hydrogen).
coal to liquid fuel:
Fischer–Tropsch Process
IXQ it.
No conversion runs at 100% efficiency. Losses are always present. That's why we're not doing it, preferring to utilize fuels in their primary form - oil as a liquid, natural gas as gas, and coal as solid burning lumps of material. They're all hydrocarbons, they can all be turned into eachother with effort, but it would only produce unnecessary waste.
when the oil runs out there will still be coal and thorium.
Liquefy the hydrogen.
It's about 1000 times as dense as gas.
Promoted by the same planks who think electric trains are "clean" and a "Good Idea"".
It's cheaper to crack natural gas over an iron oxide catalyst.
Sure they will make wishes become horses.
So can I put a whole buncha cows on a semi, rig up their bungholes to a carburetor that's been converted to natural gas and eat my beef and drive it, too?
mmmmmmmmm bacon
I used to drive my car around with aluminum-wrapped pieces of chicken tied to the engine block. Lunch on the go. Ahh, the memories!
And this is what the cool kids are into these days:
http://www.everydaynodaysoff.com/2010/03/26/cooking-some-bacon-the-machi...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_cell
From Robert Newman's speech on alternative forms of energy:
Humans are in denial, looking as ever for a quick techno fix but there is no way out. Not this time. But….we are suckers and we need to believe, like the victims of every con trick ever played, we need to believe, but there is no way out.
Well we run out of oil, we go to the hydrogen economy. But there are no hydrogen reservoirs. Beneath the Thames valley, you make hydrogen fuel cells from fossil fuel cells. You can use hydrogen fuel cells to store wave and wind. It’s not useless but it’s not an energy source. It’s an energy carrier.
“No way out”
Well we run out of oil, we go to the nuclear option. Well apart from everything else is the small matter that from mining to decommissioning the nuclear cycle as a whole produces 75% as much carbon emissions as coal-fired gas stations…
“Non-starter”.
If you must have cars in the future, they can be powered by zinc air fuel cells which produce a non-toxic byproduct zinc oxide, which is a kind of viscous thick creamy white substance which can be recycled into fresh zinc fuel pellets, using electrolysis and walnut oil. And the catalyst that they are developing at Stanford University, is therma broca cacao, or cocoa solids. So, the car of the future will drive along, powered by zinc air fuel cells and out the back on a little tray will reproduce the run of this thick creamy white substance surrounded by chocolate whirl with a walnut on the top.
“There is no way out”.
There were ways out, but I don't see them working for 7 billion people and we should have been putting our effort towards implementing them at least a decade ago. As in we should already be well underway with installing the infrastructure. Thorium + reverse combustion + a serious lifestyle revamp towards relocalization of basic necessities. The basis for the technology exists, though the technology itself isn't quite there. Sandia National Labs has been working on a way to break down CO2 that is very efficient, we built a working thorium reactor in the 1960s and some egghead at MIT supposedly has a way to break H2O down to get the hydrogen that is close to the theoritical limit of efficiency.
Thorium - I've been reading about it for decades. It if was an economically viable option, we would've used it already. There are no conspiracies. Something either works or it doesn't.
I'm also following fusion reactor research. It is always a tiny step away from being successful. The problem is that it's been in such suspended state for as long as thorium. The magnetic containment field for a fusion reaction to be successful has to be perfectly round and it is mathematically impossible. It is possible to run fusion bursts, without producing a chain reaction until the containment breaks, but that's about it.
That, however, does not prevent scientists from misrepresenting past discoveries to fish for funding. I've attended lectures. They're designed to dazzle and mislead. I think the people who work on fusion know it all too well. They are coming up with more and more intricate containment shells, yet all of them accomplish exact same thing. They fail to reproduce the natural effect of gravity that makes fusion reactors such as the Sun possible. Suspending mass in total vaccuum, physically detached from the environment and deflecting particles back into the active core - only gravity will do that. Magnetism is a lost hope. However that does not prevent people from trying, or at least acting like they do, while getting paid.
Really, point to the research saying thorium derived from coal is not economical and cannot work, how are the guys at Exxon anyway??
Thorium is a pipe dream, at least until there is a quantum leap in materials science. 'Til then, we have what we have, and no more.
One thing conspiracy theorists aren't willing to admit is that companies like Exxon are fuel vendors. If Hydrogen was the fuel of the future, they'd be converting hydrocarbons into H2 and there'd be a station selling that instead of gas on every corner. They don't actually care what the fuel is, as long as they get to be the retailer. If there was a cheaper way to make profit, they would not be stabbing themselves in the back. They'd be putting that technology to use. No company is going to say: "There's an easier way of making money, but we're going to bury it in order to keep doing things the hard way". Nobody does that.
Cheap energy (input/output) means greater profit and nobody would shy away from the oportunity - not Exxon not any other company. Oil replaced coal for the majority of human transportation. There was an entire industrial infrastructure that revolved around coal use. Did those "cartels" squash the oil barons, so they could do everything the old way? No. They either adapted or vanished.
If there was something better than oil - more economically viable, there'd be 2 options. Either Exxon would be doing it, or they'd go out of business. But that's simple logic. Much more comforting to believe in "Who Killed the Electric Car" type of bullshit. Well, here's your Chevy Volt, your Nissan Leaf and your Tesla Model S. Who's killing those? Nobody! They're killing themselves. Even with the superior Lithium battery (compared to best available NiMH option during EV1 days) they still make little to no economic sense. They take a lot and give back very little. That's the whole problem.
Hydrogen makes sense to power equipment in enclosed areas, like forklifts in mega warehouses.
APD and PX are big in that industry.
They are probably owned by Saudi Arabia.
I'm a nuclear engineer with 40 years in the commercial nuclear power business. I've just started looking into molten salt reactors again - the US project was being shutdown when I was in engineering school so I knew of it then. It was just in the prototype stage when light water reactors were making a big commercial hit. It made sense to walk away at that time.
The boosters like Hargrave are overselling, as usual. The money quote is: "There is considerable engineering needed to perfect the process.” What an understatement!
That said, there is potential in the concept. The urgency to move from uranium to thorium is misplaced - there is plenty of uranium ore bodies awaiting exploitation when the markets need them. The design is strong on the safety aspects but pushes the issue of containment of radioactive wastes to a continuous process of cleaning up the molten salt. the wastes will be stored on-site in some sort of tank TBD. That needs word as does the metallurge of the Hasteloy metal and of the graphite moderators.
It will take a decade or more to get where we can say we have a salable product in the thorium molten salt reactor.
I think there's a TED lecture by some teenager on the molten salt reactors.
When reactor design is something a teenager claims he understands better than people who've been doing it for decades, you know there's oportunity for misrepresentation, because the general public knows even less than that guy.
Which is part of why I say that we should have started at least a decade ago and should be installing the infrastructure already. I never said that the Th232 fuel cycle was perfected, just that we had built a working reactor in the 1960s. Proof of concept. One of the reasons that I am for thorium is the lack of a need for the enrichment process. You just need fissile material to get it kick-started. I would look to the spent fuel rods that we don't know what to do with for that.
"It if was an economically viable option, we would've used it already. There are no conspiracies. Something either works or it doesn't."
1- Historically, uranium was the preferred fuel because it can be used to make plutonium for atomic bombs. You can't do that with thorium.
2- Once you build the infrastructure (sunk costs) for uranium based energy production you have a powerful lobby that stands in the way of alternative approaches.
No conspiracy, just the natural path of government sponsored industry and research. Now that the hidden costs have been revealed, the less costly, less harmful approach will come into play, if not here then elsewhere where the MIC doesn't have as much say.
One thing that gets overlooked in terms of future energy production is that we already have a vast source of energy in the form of spent fuel rods. The uranium fuel cycle uses only 5% of the energy content, the rest goes to waste. Figure out a way to get at the remaining 95% and you've got centuries of energy production without having to mine a single ton of ore.
You're making a good point actually. During the cold war as soon as the Americans figured how to bounce radio signals off the surface of the moon and decode them into useful telemetry, the US government began handing out grants to universities for construction of radio telescopes, supposedly for research purposes. In reality they were more interested in spying on Russia and mapping their missile silo locations.
Nuclear power has dual use also, but very few countries that use Fission reactors utilize enrichment facilities for production of military grade reagents.
If Thorium process was viable economically, such reactors would exist side by side with the conventional ones. They don't.
You think Japan would go for anything other than Thorium or Salt reactors considering the persistent risk of tsunami's and earthquakes? Hell no! Chernobil and Fukushima later, we still have uranium fission as a defacto standard. Why? Because there's nothing else out there. At least not yet.
If you've been on ZH long enough, you should know question the efficient markets theory, and certainly not use it to justify a position that something would work or not work just because people do it or don't do it. It's kind of an appeal to authority. I can bring up the idea that enrichment is not necessary as part of the fuel cycle, and that we only need to worry about waste storage for a few hundred years rather than tens of thousands of years, and the fact that a working reactor was built. What were the technical problems with the reactor? What were the costs of running it and what would be the costs of refining the design? Once the up-front costs of getting a solid design are paid, how much would they cost compared to running a uranium reactor? Because the costs of designing working uranium reactors has already been sunk.
I made myself quite clear. Do you think that after Chernobyl, Three Mile Island and Fukushima people would still rely on uranium fission if there was an alternative?
You think we're having deep ocean rig disasters because there is plenty of cheaper oil elsewhere? No!
The dangerous lengths we are willing to go to get things done is the best proof of resources at our disposal.
Proof of concept thorium reactors did exis. So did fusion pulse reactors. Same thing. You can get 99% of the way, yet the last one will give you all the trouble. It's like an inertia capacitors masquerading as potential zero point energy devices. Looks like it's almost there. Almost possible. But in reality it is just empty hype and wishful thinking. Believing in conspiracies is more comforting than admitting we're out of options.