Риттеровский rant 092: Ошибка Карaганова — расширенный разбор

Ritter’s Rant 092: Karaganov's Fallacy Redux

Источник: https://scottritter.substack.com/p/ritters-rant-092-karaganovs-fallacy

Hello, welcome to this edition of Ritter's Rant. Today, I'm going to be talking about what I call the Karaganov fallacy. But let's set it up right. If you listen in the background, you can hear the chihuahuas barking. I think there's a couple of British poodles in there, maybe some French bulldogs, miniature ones. And they're barking loudly. They're barking about the atrocities carried out by Russia overnight in the Romanian city of Galati. You see a drone. flew off course we don't know if it's a russian drone but it probably is the russians aren't denying the possibility but it uh it flew over the danube river and struck an apartment building in the city of galati and tragically um injured two romanian citizens and oh my gosh are the chihuahuas bars because this is the this is the most dastardly attack that's ever taken place the russians are showing to the world you know just how You know, ruthless they are in how they operate in total disregard for international law.

This is the rallying cry around which NATO and Europe will come together to finally stand up against the Russian horde or not. You know, let's just be honest here. Romania is an active participant in the conflict against Russia. Ukraine is the proxy that Romania empowers through its actions to wage war against Russia. But Romania today provides safe haven for Ukrainian forces for the logistics that are involved in supporting the Ukrainian war effort. And they provide basing for Ukrainian aircraft. There's good reason to believe that a lot of the F-16s that Ukraine uses are based out of Romania and for safety. You know, it's a safe haven, so they aren't blown up on their airfields. Then they fly to Ukraine, are armed, and then they go carry out their missions, but they ultimately turn back to Romanian airfields. The city of Galati is right there on the Danube port, right across the river from the Ukrainian city of Ismail.

Ismail is one of the major port facilities that receives war material from Romania and NATO countries, and so it is a legitimate target of war. One of the resources that Russia used, one of the weapons they used to strike this legitimate target war are drones. And so these drones go in, they strike their targets, you know, and so sad, too bad. Wouldn't want to be, you know, involved in providing military support to Ukraine to be caught under a Russian drone attack. And the Ukrainians have every right to defend themselves, and they do. They shoot down some of these drones and they use electronic warfare against other drones, trying to jam the signals. And on occasion, they are successful. Now, if you jam a Russian drone, the signal, the drone goes dumb. It flies wherever the hell it wants to go based upon the direction it was going in. So the Ukrainians probably jammed a Russian drone, and the Russian drone flew in a straight line and ended up striking a Romanian building.

They call this a deliberate Russian attack. An attack on a NATO member is just gross misrepresentation of the facts involved. But that's okay. That's what Europe does. Europe has been grossly representing the facts from day one. Europe doesn't acknowledge that they are active participants in a conflict. They believe that what they're doing is legitimate, that they're supporting freedom, they're supporting liberty, they're supporting democracy, anything but being an active participant in a war against Russia that has taken on existential proportions. Now, Why is this important and how does this relate to Sergei Karaganov? Well, Sergei Karaganov is a noted Russian political scientist, a man who has achieved a certain notoriety in the last several years. He's been the proponents of what is called the Karaganov Doctrine. Basically, he's calling out the collective West for doing what I just talked about, beating the drums of war, providing material support to a combatant involved in a existential struggle with Russia.

active participants to this conflict. And Karaganov has taken particular umbrage against the European role being played. And he feels that because Europe is now engaged in direct conflict using the Ukrainian proxy with Russia that Europe must be held accountable. That Russia can't just sit there and let Europe use its proxy to beat down Russia and not be called upon to pay any price. And so Sergei Karaganov has talked about Russia openly attacking Europe, saying they are a legitimate target of war. Now, some people would say, well, wait a minute, Europe, when we say Europe, what we're really talking about is NATO. And doesn't NATO have Article 5, the collective security agreement, attack against one is an attack against all, and therefore isn't Sergei Karaganov talking about expanding the conflict in Ukraine to a conflict in Russia and NATO? And the answer is yes, that's exactly what he's talking.

Let's see he's under the belief that Europe is dysfunctional and if the Europeans lack the resources to respond and the best way to intimidate Europe from you know engaging in this irresponsible activities to sow the seeds of terror to show them the reality of war. I think it's common knowledge right now that most Europeans are unfamiliar with the reality of war. They're not familiar with the kind of conflict that's been fought today in Ukraine. War is this nebulous, romanticized adventure where the price is paid by others, but somehow the glory accrues to them, the people who are going on social media and making brave speeches, et cetera. Sige Karaganov believes that they should be held accountable. He believes that one of the ways to hold them accountable, especially when Europe, NATO, which is a nuclear armed entity, provides support to a non-nuclear entity, Ukraine, to attack Russia in a manner that threatens Russia's nuclear deterrence is that Russia should use its nuclear arsenal against Europe.

Karaganov famously wrote in June of 2023 that if Russia took out say the Polish city of Poznan with a nuclear weapon that we wouldn't Russia wouldn't have to worry about a response from the United States and no American president is suicidal enough to trade Boston for Poznan and that the United States would not get engaged with nuclear weapons and therefore this gives Russia a free hand to hold Europe accountable to terrorize Europe using nuclear weapons now I'm not here to question the Validity of the underlying argument that Sergei Karaganov makes about the threat that Europe poses to Russia. We know this. One only has to listen to the Germans. They just published a classified defense strategy that says Germany must be prepared to go to war with Russia in 2029. That's The British have said the same thing. They say 2030 is when they want to get ready But the bottom line is major European powers are talking about framing their military in a way that it's designed to go to war against Russia.

Europe is literally preparing to go to war against Russia. Mark Rutte, the Secretary General, has given this speech and says all of Europe must be prepared to make the sacrifices that their grandparents made in a major war against Russia. I'd like to remind Mark Rutte that most of Europe paid a heavy price because they were either occupied by Germany or fighting alongside Germany, and the people that made them pay the price was primarily Russia. So Mark Rutte wants the people today to pay the same price that their grandparents paid for going to war against Russia. Don't ask me to defend the logic of this thinking, but the bottom line is Sergei Karagov is 100% correct. Europe poses a threat to Russia of an existential nature. But I would point out a couple of things. This is where the fallacy comes in. Just because the chihuahuas are barking doesn't mean that they turn overnight into rottweilers capable of doing meaningful harm.

Germany doesn't have the military they want to build and they're not able to build the military they want to build. A, it's going to be impossible to recruit enough Germans who want to go to war against Russia today. The vast majority of Germans say that even if their country was invaded by Russia, and Russia had no plans to invade Germany, they would not join up to fight. They don't believe in Germany. They're not going to die for Germany. They're not going to defend Germany. They damn sure aren't going to volunteer to join this military whose sole purpose is to go to war with Russia, a war that Russia doesn't want, doesn't need to be fought. Moreover, the German defense industry is incapable of producing the material necessary to equip such a military. Even if they had the industrial base in place, the current economic realities of the world centered on energy deficiency means that Germany lacks the ability to turn this defense industry on.

But the problem is the German defense industry is virtually nonexistent. It has eroded over the years. It's not there. So Germany would literally have to reinvent itself from top to bottom to achieve the objectives they want. This is a mission impossible. So the Chihuahuas bark, but there will be no Rottweiler, no German Rottweiler. The same as with the British. In 2030 is when they say they want to fight a war with Russia, but they've acknowledged that they're not even going to be able to buy any new equipment for their pathetically small military until 2030. So it's just all fantasy. The British talk, there's nothing there. We can say the same about every single NATO company. There is no viable military today capable of standing up on the field of battle against the Russian military, which today is not only large, but it's combat proficient. It's probably the best ground army in the world today.

They would crush NATO in a stand-up fight, no questions asked, which means why are we talking nuclear weapons? If there is a conflict between NATO and Russia and Russia is pretty much guaranteed a victory, why Why are we speaking about nuclear weapons? Well, because the answer is the terror aspect to intimidate Europe, to use a weapon that will bring intimidation to ensure that Russia, you know, as Colin Powell once said, we don't want to fight a fair fight. If we're going to go to war, we're going to war to win. But here's the fallacy, too. Yes, Sergei Karyanov may be right. If you use a nuclear weapon against Poland, you probably won't respond and it will result in an American response. It's another question whether or not France or Britain will respond, but they would be committing national suicide to do so. Russia just tested a Sarmat ICBM that has the destructive power in one missile to take out France and Germany together.

Just one missile. They're going to deploy a division for you. So, you know, it's an unequal fight, but does Russia really want to sacrifice Russian cities in a nuclear exchange with Europe? That's a question only Russia can answer. Let's get back to the United States. Right now, Russia is a signatory to a statement that was made, I think, back in 2021, maybe even early 2022, a collective statement by the five major nuclear armed powers that says that nuclear wars cannot be won, therefore they should never be fought. Russia continues to adhere to that concept. Nuclear wars cannot be won, Therefore, they can never be fought. This statement frames the concept of nuclear deterrence. Nuclear deterrence, the possession of nuclear weapons, is supposed to provide deterrence against anybody using nuclear weapons because nuclear wars can't be won, so they can't be fought. What Karaganov is suggesting is that nuclear wars can be won and therefore should be fought, changing this paradigm totally.

While he may get away with it up front, what he needs to understand is once you break this understanding of nuclear wars can't be won, therefore should never be fought. It is a one-way street. Russia may accrue temporary advantage by taking out Poznan and not getting an American response, but the United States will now understand that Russia doesn't adhere to the nuclear wars can't be won, therefore should never be fought doctrine, paradigm, thinking. And therefore, the United States is now at a strategic disadvantage because if the United States continues to operate on the line that nuclear wars can't be won, therefore should never be fought. And Russia says nuclear wars can be won and will be fought. Who has this strategic advantage? The United States will seek to equalize the problem. That doesn't mean we're going to nuke Russia, but we'll nuke a Russian ally. Let's call it Iran. And so the United States will use a nuclear weapon against Iran.

Again, rightly opining that Russia is not going to sacrifice you know the city of Belgorod for Tehran but now what's happened we've changed the paradigm altogether it's now nuclear wars can be won therefore they must be fought and are being fought this lady and gentleman is to carry down the palace because this is an unsustainable logic because once you have that that means nuclear wars will be fought And once we get into the will-be-fought aspect, there's no control about it. And eventually what happens is nuclear weapons will be used against the nuclear power who will retaliate with nuclear weapons. It may start as a low-level conflict that people think will be inherently containable. But computer simulation and basic wargaming dynamics in human nature dictate that once you start exchanging nuclear weapons, it never stops until all nuclear weapons are exchanged and we die. That's the reality of it.

The Karaganov fallacy is that it's a suicide pill for Russia in the long term. Whatever short-term gains might be accrued by using a nuclear weapon preemptively against Europe will be eroded by the fact that eventually Russia will blanket with nuclear weapons. Now Russia may blanket others with nuclear weapons, but then everybody is dead. This sort of is what nuclear weapons are designed to prevent. But here we come to the ultimate part of the Karaganov fallacy. Rather than promoting and advocating on behalf of nuclear war, because of what I just said, political scientists like Sergei Karaganov would do well to start advocating against nuclear war. Nuclear wars can't be won, therefore they should never be caught, which means that rather engage in this era of nuclear anarchy, which currently resides, the last nuclear arms control treaty, who started expiring in February of this year, You know, we should be promoting new arms control realities, the necessity of arms control.

There has never been a time in world history where arms control is more necessary than today because of the Karagana fallacy. If nuclear wars can be fought, they can't be won and we all die. There's the fallacy. We need to avoid nuclear war. We need to promote nuclear disarmament. And that would be the direction of it. That doesn't mean we can't not hold Europe accountable. Russia should take a page from the Iranian plate. Iran is a nation that everybody said was pursuing nuclear weapons. They had to have nuclear weapons because it didn't have nuclear weapons. How could they survive in this world? A non-nuclear armed Iran defeated two nuclear powers, Israel and the United States. Had Iran had nuclear weapons, that would have changed the entire framework of this confrontation and nuclear weapons probably would have been used. But since Iran didn't have it, nuclear weapons were kept off the equation and Iran won the war.

Today, Russia holds a distinct advantage over Europe, the United States, and indeed most of the world when it comes to ballistic missiles. Not just nuclear-armed missiles, but non-nuclear-armed missiles. Tactical missiles like the Iskander, like the Caliber, like other, the KH-101. But they also now have introduced a new category of missile, intermediate-range missiles, the Oreshnik, with a non-nuclear payload. It gives Russia escalatory dominance. It means that Russia is able to achieved in a non-nuclear war results that no other party can achieve. Russia has the superiority. This is the war that Russia should be preparing to fight. Hopefully they won't have to fight it, but it's one that they can win without crossing the threshold of bringing nuclear weapons into play. The Kerrigan of Fallacy. With all due respect, Sergei, I think on this one you're wrong. Anyways, that's my rant. Next time a thought crosses my mind, I'm sure I'll let you know.

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═══ Транскрипция видео 1 ═══

Hello and welcome to this edition of Ritter's Rant. Today I'm going to be talking about what I call the Karaganov fallacy, but let's set it up right. If you listen in the background, you can hear the chihuahuas barking. I think there's a couple of British poodles in there, maybe some French bulldogs, miniature ones, and they're barking loudly. They're barking about the atrocities carried out by Russia overnight in the Romanian city of Galati. You see a drone flew off course. We don't know if it's a Russian drone, but it probably is. The Russians aren't denying the possibility, but it flew over the Danube River and struck an apartment building in the city of Galati and tragically entered two Romanian citizens. And oh my gosh, are the chihuahuas barking because this is the most dastardly attack that's ever taken place. The Russians are showing to the world, you know, just how ruthless they are and how they operate in total disregard for international law. This is the rallying cry around which NATO and Europe will come together to finally stand up against the Russian horde or not.

You know, let's just be honest here. Romania is an active participant in the conflict against Russia. Ukraine is the proxy that Romania empowers through its actions to wage war against Russia. But Romania today provides safe haven for Ukrainian forces for the logistics that are involved in supporting the Romanian war effort, I mean the Ukrainian war effort. And they provide basing for Ukrainian aircraft. There's good reason to believe that a lot of the F-16s that Ukraine uses are based out of Romania. And for safe, you know, it's a safe haven. So they don't clone up on their airfields. And then they fly to Ukraine, are armed, and then they go carry out their missions. But they ultimately turn back to Romanian airfields. The city of Galati is right there on the Danube port, right across the river from the Ukrainian city of Ismail. Ismail is one of the major port facilities that receives war material from Romania and NATO countries. And so it is a legitimate target of war. And one of the resources that Russia used, one of the weapons they used to strike this legitimate target of war are drones. And so these drones go in, they strike their targets, you know, and so sad, too bad. Wouldn't want to be, you know, involved in providing military support to Ukraine to be caught under a Russian drone attack. Now, the Ukrainians have every right to defend themselves. And they do. They shoot down some of these drones and they use electronic warfare against other drones, trying to jam the signals. And on occasion, they are successful. Now, if you jam a Russian drone, the signal, the drone goes dumb. It flies wherever the hell it wants to go, based upon the direction it was going in. So the Ukrainians probably jammed the Russian drone, and the Russian drone flew in a straight line and ended up striking a Romanian building. They call this a deliberate Russian attack. An attack on a NATO member is just gross misrepresentation of the facts involved. But that's okay. That's what Europe does. Europe has been grossly representing the facts from day one. Europe doesn't acknowledge that they are active participants in a conflict. They believe that what they're doing is legitimate, that they're supporting freedom, they're supporting liberty, they're supporting democracy, anything but being an active participant in a war against Russia that has taken on existential proportions. Now, why is this important?

And how does this relate to Sergei Karaganov? Well, Sergei Karaganov is a noted Russian political scientist, a man who has, you know, achieved a certain notoriety in the last several years. He's been the proponents of what is called the Karaganov Doctrine. Basically, he's calling out the collective West for doing what I just talked about, beating the drums of war, providing material support to a combatant involved in a existential struggle with Russia, And he feels that because Europe is now engaged in direct conflict using the Ukrainian proxy with Russia, that Europe must be held accountable, that Russia can't just sit there and let Europe use its proxy to beat down Russia and not be called upon to pay any price. And so Sergei Karaganov has talked about Russia openly attacking Europe, saying they are a legitimate target of war. Now, some people would say, well, wait a minute, Europe, when we say Europe, what we're really talking about is NATO. And doesn't NATO have Article 5 of the collective security agreement, attack against one is an attack against all, and therefore isn't Sergei Karaganov talking about expanding the conflict in Ukraine to a conflict in Russia and NATO? And the answer is yes, that's exactly what he's talking about. But see, he's under the belief that Europe is dysfunctional and that the Europeans lack the resources to respond. And the best way to intimidate Europe from, you know, engaging in this irresponsible activity is to sow the seeds of terror, to show them the reality of war. I think it's common knowledge right now that most Europeans are unfamiliar with the reality of war. They're not familiar with the kind of conflict that's been fought today in Ukraine. War is this nebulous, romanticized adventure, where the price is paid by others, but somehow the glory accrues to them, the people who are going on social media and making brave speeches, etc. Sergei Karaganov believes that they should be held accountable. He believes that one of the ways to hold them accountable, especially when Europe, NATO, which is a nuclear armed entity, provides support to a non-nuclear entity, Ukraine, to attack Russia in a manner that threatens Russia's nuclear deterrence is that Russia should use its nuclear arsenal against Europe. Karaganov famously wrote in June 2023 that if Russia took out, say, the Polish city of Poznan with a nuclear weapon, that Russia wouldn't have to worry about a response from the United States, that no American president is suicidal enough to trade Boston for Poznan, and that the United States would not get engaged with nuclear weapons. And therefore, this gives Russia a free hand to hold Europe accountable to terrorize Europe using nuclear weapons. Now, I'm not here to question the validity of the underlying argument that Sergei Karaganov makes about the threat that Europe poses to Russia. We know this. I mean, one only has to listen to the Germans. They just published a classified defense strategy that says Germany must be prepared to go to war with Russia in 2029. That's three years from now. They need to expand the military from the 183,000 that they have to over 400,000. They want the largest army in Europe, and they want to, you know, gear this army to go to war against Russia. They're openly speaking about it. The British have said the same thing. They say 2030 is when they want to get ready to go to war. But the bottom line is major European powers are talking about framing their military in a way that it's designed to go to war against Russia. Europe is literally preparing to go to war against Russia. Mark Rutte, the Secretary General, has given this speech that says all of Europe must be prepared to make the sacrifices that their grandparents made in a major war against Russia. I'd like to mark, remind Mark Rutte that most of Europe, you know, paid a heavy price because they were either occupied by Germany or fighting alongside Germany, and the people that made them pay the price was primarily Russia. So Mark Rutte wants the people today to pay the same price that their grandparents paid for going to war against Russia. Don't ask me to defend the logic of this thinking, but the bottom line is Sergey Karagov is 100% correct. Europe poses a threat to Russia of an existential nature. But I would point out a couple of things. This is where the fallacy comes in. Just because the Chihuahuas are barking doesn't mean that they turn overnight into rottweilers capable of doing meaningful harm. Germany doesn't have the military they want to build and they have, they're not able to build the military they want to build. A, it's going to be impossible to recruit enough Germans who want to go to war against Russia today. The vast majority of Germans say that even if their country was invaded by Russia, and Russia had no plans to invade Germany, they would not join up to fight. They don't believe in Germany. They're not going to die for Germany. They're not going to defend Germany. They damn sure aren't going to volunteer to join this military whose sole purpose is to go to war with Russia, a war that Russia doesn't want, doesn't need to be fought.

Moreover, the German defense industry is incapable of producing the material necessary to equip such a military. Even if they had the industrial base in place, you know, the current economic realities of the world centered on energy deficiency means that Germany, you know, lacks the ability to turn this defense industry on. But the problem is the German defense industry is virtually non-existent. It has eroded over the years and it's not there. So Germany would literally have to reinvent itself from top to bottom to achieve the objectives they want. This is a mission impossible. So the Chihuahuas bark, but there will be no Rottweil, no German Rottweil. The same as with the British. In 2030 is when they say they want to fight a war with Russia, but they've acknowledged that they're not even going to be able to buy any new equipment for their pathetically small military until 2030. So it's just all fantasy. The British talk, there's nothing there. We can say the same about every single NATO country. There is no viable military today capable of standing up on the field of battle against the Russian military, which today is not only large, but it's combat proficient. It's probably the best ground army in the world today. They would crush NATO in a stand-up fight, no questions asked. Which means why are we talking nuclear weapons? If there is a conflict between NATO and Russia, and Russia is pretty much guaranteed a victory, why are we speaking about nuclear weapons? Well, because the answer is the terror aspect to intimidate Europe, to use a weapon that will bring intimidation to ensure that Russia, you know, as Colin Powell once said, we don't want to fight a fair fight. If we're going to go to war, we're going to war to win. But here's the fallacy too. Yes, Sergei Karyanov may be right. To use a nuclear weapon against Poland, you probably won't respond and it will result in an American response. It's another question whether or not France or Britain would respond, but they would be committing national suicide to do so. Russia just tested a Sarmat ICBM that has the destructive power in one missile to take out France and Germany together. Just one missile. They're going to deploy, you know, divisions. So, you know, it's an unequal fight, but does Russia really want to sacrifice Russian cities in a nuclear exchange with Europe? That's a question only Russia can answer. Let's get back to the United States. Right now, Russia is a signatory to a statement that was made, I think, back in 2021, maybe even early 2022. A collective statement by the five major nuclear armed powers that says that nuclear wars cannot be won, therefore they should never be fought. Russia continues to adhere to that concept. Nuclear wars cannot be won, therefore they can never be fought.

This statement frames the concept of nuclear deterrence. Nuclear deterrence, the possession of nuclear weapons, is supposed to provide deterrence against anybody using nuclear weapons because nuclear wars can't be won, so they can't be fought. What Karaganov is suggesting is that nuclear wars can be won and therefore should be fought, changing this paradigm totally. While he may get away with it up front, what he needs to understand is once you break this understanding of nuclear wars can't be won, therefore should never be fought, it is a one-way street. Russia may accrue temporary advantage by taking out Poznan and not getting an American response, but the United States will now understand that Russia doesn't adhere to the nuclear wars, can't be won, therefore should never be fought, doctrine, paradigm, thinking, and therefore the United States is now at a strategic disadvantage because if the United States continues to operate on the line that nuclear wars can't be won, therefore should never be fought, and Russia say nuclear wars can be won and will be fought, who has this strategic advantage? The United States will seek to equalize the problem. That doesn't mean we're going to nuke Russia, but we'll nuke a Russian ally. Let's call it Iran. And so the United States will use a nuclear weapon against Iran.

Again, rightly opining that Russia is not going to sacrifice, you know, the city of Belgorod for Tehran. But now what's happened? We've changed the paradigm altogether. It's now nuclear wars can be won, therefore they must be fought and are being fought. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the character down the fallacy. Because this is an unsustainable logic. Because once you have that, that means nuclear wars will be fought. And once we get into the will be fought aspect, there's no controlling of it. And eventually what happens is nuclear weapons will be used against the nuclear power who will retaliate with nuclear weapons. And it may start as a low-level conflict that people think will be inherently containable. But computer simulation and basic wargaming dynamics in human nature dictate that once you start exchanging nuclear weapons, it never stops until all nuclear weapons are exchanged and we die. That's the reality of it.

The Karaganov fallacy is that it's a suicide pill for Russia in the long term. Whatever short-term gains might be accrued by using a nuclear weapon preemptively against Europe will be eroded by the fact that eventually Russia will blanket with nuclear weapons. Now, Russia may blanket others with nuclear weapons, but then everybody is dead. This sort of is what nuclear weapons are designed to prevent. But here we come to the ultimate part of the Karaganov fallacy. Rather than promoting and advocating on behalf of nuclear war, because of what I just said, political scientists like Sergei Karaganov would do well to start advocating against nuclear war. Nuclear wars can't be won. Therefore, they should never be caught. Which means that rather engage in this era of nuclear anarchy, which currently resides, the last nuclear arms control treaty, we start expiring February of this year, we should be promoting new arms control realities, the necessity of arms control. There has never been a time in world history where arms control is more necessary than today because of the Karaganov fallacy. If nuclear wars can be fought, they can't be won, and we all die.

There's the fallacy. We need to avoid nuclear war. We need to promote nuclear disarmament. And that would be the direction of Russia. That doesn't mean we can't not hold Europe accountable. Russia should take a page from the Iranian plague. Iran is a nation that everybody said was pursuing nuclear weapons. They had to have nuclear weapons. Because if it didn't have nuclear weapons, how could they survive in this world? A non-nuclear armed Iran defeated two nuclear arms powers, Israel and the United States. Had Iran had nuclear weapons, that would have changed the entire framework of this confrontation, and nuclear weapons probably would have been used. But since Iran didn't have it, nuclear weapons were kept off the equation, and Iran won the war. Today, Russia holds a distinct advantage over Europe, the United States, and indeed most of the world when it comes to ballistic missiles. Not just nuclear-armed missiles, but non-nuclear-armed missiles. Tactical missiles like the Iskander, like the Caliber, like other, the Cage-101. But they also now have introduced a new category of missile, intermediate-range missiles, the Oreshnik, with a non-nuclear payload. It gives Russia escalatory dominance. It means that Russia is able to achieve the non-nuclear war results that no other party can achieve.

Russia has the superiority. This is the war that Russia should be preparing to fight. Hopefully, they won't have to fight it, but it's one that they can win without crossing the threshold of bringing nuclear weapons into play. The Kerrigan of Fallacy. With all due respect, Sergei, I think on this one you're wrong. Anyways, that's my rant. Next time a thought crosses my mind, I'll be sure to let you know. Thank you.

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Hello and welcome to this edition of Ritter's Rant. Today I'm going to be talking about what I call the Karaganov fallacy, but let's set it up right. If you listen in the background, you can hear the chihuahuas barking. I think there's a couple British poodles in there, maybe some French bulldogs, miniature ones, and they're barking loudly. They're barking about the atrocities carried out by Russia overnight in the Romanian city of Galati. You see a drone flew off course. We don't know if it's a Russian drone, but it probably is. The Russians aren't denying the possibility. But it flew over the Danube River and struck an apartment building in the city of Galati and tragically injured two Romanian citizens. And oh my gosh, are the chihuahuas barking. Because this is the most dastardly attack that's ever taken place. The Russians are showing to the world, you know, just how ruthless they are and how they operate in total disregard for international law. This is the rallying cry around which NATO and Europe will come together to finally stand up against the Russian horde or not. You know, let's just be honest here. Romania is an active participant in the conflict against Russia. Ukraine is the proxy that Romania empowers through its actions to wage war against Russia. But Romania today provides safe haven for Ukrainian forces for the logistics that are involved in supporting the Romanian war effort, I mean the Ukrainian war effort. And they provide basing for Ukrainian aircraft. There's good reason to believe that a lot of the F-16s that Ukraine uses are based out of Romania and for safe, you know, it's a safe haven, so they aren't blown up on their airfields. And then they fly to Ukraine, are armed, and then they go carry out their missions, but they ultimately turn back to Romanian airfields. The city of Galati is right there on the Danube port, right across the river from the Ukrainian city of Ismail. Ismail is one of the major port facilities that receives war material from Romania and NATO countries. And so it is a legitimate target of war. And one of the resources that Russia used, one of the weapons they used to strike this legitimate target of war are drones. And so these drones go in, they strike their targets, you know, and so sad, too bad.

Wouldn't want to be, you know, involved in providing military support to Ukraine to be caught under a Russian drone attack. Now, the Ukrainians have every right to defend themselves, and they do. They shoot down some of these drones and they use electronic warfare against other drones, trying to jam the signals. And on occasion, they are successful. Now, if you jam a Russian drone, the signal that the drone goes dumb, it flies wherever the hell it wants to go, based upon the direction it's going. And so the Ukrainians probably jammed the Russian drone, and the Russian drone flew in a straight line and ended up striking the Romanian building. They call this a deliberate Russian attack. An attack on a NATO member is just gross misrepresentation of the facts involved. But that's okay. That's what Europe does. Europe has been grossly representing the facts from day one. Europe doesn't acknowledge that they are active participants in a conflict. They believe that what they're doing is legitimate, that they're supporting freedom, they're supporting liberty, they're supporting democracy. Anything but being an active participant in a war against Russia that has taken on existential proportions. Now, why is this important, and how does this relate to Sergei Karaganov? Well, Sergei Karaganov is a noted Russian political scientist, a man who has achieved a certain notoriety. In the last several years, he's been the proponents of what is called the Karaganov Doctrine. Basically, he's calling out the collective West for doing what I just talked about, beating the drums of war, providing material support to a combatant involved in a existential struggle with Russia, active participants to this conflict. And Karaganov has taken particular umbrage against the European role being played. And he feels that because Europe is now engaged in direct conflict, using the Ukrainian proxy with Russia, that Europe must be held accountable, that Russia can't just sit there and let Europe use this proxy to beat down Russia and not be called upon to pay any price. And so Sergei Karaganov has talked about Russia openly attacking Europe, saying they are a legitimate target of war. Now, some people would say, well, wait a minute, Europe, when we say Europe, what we're really talking about is NATO. And doesn't NATO have Article 5 of the collective security agreement, attack against one is an attack against all? And therefore, isn't Sergei Karaganov talking about expanding the conflict in Ukraine to a conflict in Russia and NATO? And the answer is yes, that's exactly what he's talking about. But see, he's under the belief that Europe is dysfunctional, and that the Europeans lack the resources to respond. And the best way to intimidate Europe from, you know, engaging in this irresponsible activity is to sow the seeds of terror, to show them the reality of war. I think it's common knowledge right now that most Europeans are unfamiliar with the reality of war. They're not familiar with the kind of conflict that's been fought today in Ukraine. The war is this nebulous, romanticized adventure, where the price is paid by others, but somehow the glory accrues to them, the people who are going on social media and making brave speeches, etc. Sergei Karaganov believes that they should be held accountable. He believes that one of the ways to hold them accountable, especially when Europe, NATO, which is a nuclear armed entity, provides support to a non-nuclear entity, Ukraine, to attack Russia in a manner that threatens Russia's nuclear deterrence, is that Russia should use its nuclear arsenal against Europe. Karaganov famously wrote in June 2023 that if Russia took out, say, the Polish city of Poznan, with a nuclear weapon, that Russia wouldn't have to worry about a response from the United States. No American president is suicidal enough to trade Boston for Poznan, and that the United States would not get engaged with nuclear weapons. And therefore, this gives Russia a free hand to hold Europe accountable to terrorizing using nuclear weapons. Now, I'm not here to question the validity of the underlying argument that Sergei Karaganov makes about the threat that Europe poses to Russia. We know this. I mean, one only has to listen to the Germans. They just published a classified defense strategy that says Germany must be prepared to go to war with Russia in 2029.

That's three years from now. They need to expand the military from the 183,000 that they have to over 400,000. They want the largest army in Europe, and they want to, you know, gear this army to go to war against Russia. They're openly speaking about it. The British have said the same thing. They say 2030 is when they want to get ready to go to war. But the bottom line is major European powers are talking about framing their military in a way that it's designed to go to war against Russia. Europe is literally preparing to go to war against Russia. Mark Rutte, the Secretary General, has given this speech and says all of Europe must be prepared to make the sacrifices that their grandparents made in a major war against Russia. I'd like to remind Mark Rutte that most of Europe, you know, paid a heavy price because they were either occupied by Germany or fighting alongside Germany, and the people that made them pay the price was primarily Russia. So Mark Rutte wants the people today to pay the same price that their grandparents paid for going to war against Russia. Don't ask me to defend the logic of this thinking. But the bottom line is Sergei Karagov is 100% correct. Europe poses a threat to Russia of an existential nature. But I would point out a couple of things. This is where the fallacy comes in. Just because the Chihuahuas are barking doesn't mean that they turn overnight into Rottweiler's capable of doing meaningful harm. Germany doesn't have the military they want to build, and they're not able to to build the military they want to build. A, it's going to be impossible to recruit enough Germans who want to go to war against Russia today. The vast majority of Germans say that even if their country was invaded by Russia, and Russia had no plans to invade Germany, they would not join up to fight. They don't believe in Germany. They're not going to die for Germany. They're not going to defend Germany. They damn sure aren't going to volunteer to join this military whose sole purpose is to go to war with Russia. A war that Russia doesn't want doesn't need to be fought. Moreover, the German defense industry is incapable of producing the material necessary to equip such a military. Even if they had the industrial base in place, the current economic realities of the world centered on energy deficiency means that Germany lacks the ability to turn this defense industry on. But the problem is the German defense industry is virtually nonexistent. It has eroded over the years, and it's not there. So Germany would literally have to reinvent itself from top to bottom to achieve the objectives they want. This is a mission impossible. So the Chihuahuas bark, but there will be no Rottweil, no German Rottweil. The same is with the British. In 2030 is when they say they want to fight a war with Russia, but they've acknowledged that they're not even going to be able to buy any new equipment for the pathetically small military until 2030.

So it's just all fantasy. The British talk, there's nothing there. We can say the same about every single NATO country. There is no viable military today capable of standing up on the field of battle against the Russian military, which today is not only large, but it's combat proficient. It's probably the best ground army in the world today. They would crush NATO in a stand-up fight, no questions asked. Which means why are we talking nuclear weapons? If there is a conflict between NATO and Russia, and Russia is pretty much guaranteed a victory, why are we speaking about nuclear weapons? Well, because the answer is the terror aspect to intimidate Europe, to use a weapon that will bring intimidation to ensure that Russia, you know, as Colin Powell once said, we don't want to fight a fair fight. If we're going to go to war, we're going to war to win. But here's the fallacy too. Yes, Sergei Kyrgyanov may be right. If you use a nuclear weapon against Poland, you probably won't respond, and it will result in an American response. It's another question whether or not France or Britain will respond, but they would be committing national suicide to do so.

Russia just tested a Sarmat ICBM that has the destructive power in one missile to take out France and Germany together. Just one missile. They're going to deploy a division for you. So, you know, it's an unequal fight, but does Russia really want to sacrifice Russian cities in a nuclear exchange with Europe? That's a question only Russia can answer. But let's get back to the United States. Right now, Russia is a signatory to a statement that was made, I think, back in 2021, maybe even early 2022, a collective statement by the five major nuclear armed powers that says that nuclear wars cannot be won, therefore they should never be fought. Russia continues to adhere to that concept. Nuclear wars cannot be won, therefore they can never be fought. This statement frames the concept of nuclear deterrence. Nuclear deterrence, the possession of nuclear weapons, is supposed to provide deterrence against anybody using nuclear weapons. Because nuclear wars can't be won, so they can't be fought. What Kyrgyanov is suggesting is that nuclear wars can be won, and therefore should be fought. Changing this paradigm totally. While he may get away with it up front, what he needs to understand is once you break this understanding of nuclear wars can't be won, therefore should never be fought, it is a one-way street. Russia may accrue temporary advantage by taking out Poznan and not getting an American response, but the United States will now understand that Russia doesn't adhere to the nuclear wars. It can't be won, therefore should never be fought.

Doctrine, paradigm, thinking. And therefore, the United States is now at a strategic disadvantage because if the United States continues to operate on the line that nuclear wars can't be won, therefore should never be fought, and Russia says nuclear wars can be won and will be fought, who has this strategic advantage? The United States will seek to have to, they will have to seek to equalize the problem. That doesn't mean we're going to nuke Russia, but we'll nuke a Russian ally. Let's call it Iran. And so the United States will use a nuclear weapon against Iran. Again, rightly opining that Russia is not going to sacrifice, you know, the city of Belgorod for Tehran. But now what's happened? We've changed the paradigm altogether. It's now nuclear wars can be won. Therefore, they must be fought and are being fought. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the carry down the fallacy. Because this is an unsustainable logic. Because once you have that, that means nuclear wars will be fought. And once we get into the will be fought aspect, there's no controlling of it. And eventually what happens is nuclear weapons will be used against the nuclear power who will retaliate with nuclear weapons. And it may start as a low level conflict that people think will be inherently containable. But computer simulation and basic war gaming dynamics in human nature dictate that once you start exchanging nuclear weapons, it never stops until all nuclear weapons are exchanged and we die. That's the reality of it. The carry down the fallacy is that it's a suicide pill for Russia in the long term. Whatever short term gains might be accrued by using a nuclear weapon preemptively against Europe, will be eroded by the fact that eventually Russia will blanket with nuclear weapons. Now Russia may blanket others with nuclear weapons, but then everybody is dead. This sort of is what nuclear weapons are designed to prevent. But here we come to the ultimate part of the carry down the fallacy. Rather than promoting and advocating on behalf of nuclear war, because of what I just said, political scientists like Sergei Karyanov would do well to start advocating against nuclear war. nuclear wars can't be one. Therefore, they should never be caught. Which means that rather engage in this era of nuclear anarchy, which currently resides, the last nuclear arms control treaty, we started expiring in February of this year. We should be promoting new arms control realities, the necessity of arms control. There has never been a time in world history where arms control is more necessary than today because of the Karyanov fallacy. If nuclear wars can be fought, they can't be won. And we all die. There's the fallacy. We need to avoid nuclear war. We need to promote nuclear disarmament. And that would be the direction of Russia.

That doesn't mean we can't not hold Europe accountable. Russia should take a page from the Iranian plate. Iran is a nation that everybody said was pursuing nuclear weapons. They had to have nuclear weapons. If they didn't have nuclear weapons, how could they survive in this world? A non-nuclear armed Iran defeated two nuclear arms powers, Israel and the United States. Had Iran had nuclear weapons, that would have changed the entire framework of this confrontation and nuclear weapons probably would have been used. But since Iran didn't have it, nuclear weapons were kept off the equation and Iran won the war. Today, Russia holds a distinct advantage over Europe, United States, and indeed most of the world when it comes to ballistic missiles. Not just nuclear armed missiles, but non-nuclear armed missiles. Tactical missiles like the Iskander, like the Caliber, like other, the KH-101. But they also now have introduced a new category of missile, intermediate range missiles, the Oreshnik, with a non-nuclear payload. It gives Russia escalatory dominance. It means that Russia is able to achieve the non-nuclear war results that no other party can achieve.

Russia has the superiority. This is the war that Russia should be preparing to fight. Hopefully, they won't have to fight it, but it's one that they can win without crossing the threshold of bringing nuclear weapons into play. The Kerrigan of Fallacy. With all due respect, Sergei, think on this one you're wrong. Anyways, that's my rant. Next time the thought crosses my mind, I'll be sure to let you know. Thank you.