The report is absolutely scathing. Some choice quotes:
But when the next crisis came, both the US and the governments of Europe fell back on old models of alliance leadership. Europe, as EU high representative for foreign affairs Josep Borrell loudly lamented prior to Russia’s invasion, is not really at the table when it comes to dealing with the Russia-Ukraine crisis. It has instead embarked on a process of vassalisation.
But “alone” had a very specific meaning for Scholz. He was unwilling to send Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine unless the US also sent its own main battle tank, the M1 Abrams. It was not enough that other partners would send tanks or that the US might send other weapons. Like a scared child in a room full of strangers, Germany felt alone if Uncle Sam was not holding its hand.
Europeans’ lack of agency in the Russia-Ukraine crisis stems from this growing power imbalance in the Western alliance. Under the Biden administration, the US has become ever more willing to exercise this growing influence.
...says the one with a lemmygrad account.
I'd actually be in favour of that but at the same time would worry about what the US will be doing without our moderating input.
When it comes to intervention abroad the US and EU have vastly different outlooks (even though France kicked off Libya).
Random recent example, take Mali: Their government said "Help we have ISIS here and can't deal with it", France said "No problem my old colonial subject we'll solve it", Mali said "We know the French, they are arrogant and are only going to stomp ISIS, then leave us as defenceless as we were before" upon which Germany said "We also know the French, yes they're arrogant we'll train you". Thus France went to fight, and Germany went to train. Then, and this is a bit speculation, Russia bribed some top Mali brass in any case the net effect was a military coup in Mali, the Junta then inviting Wagner over and their military started to massacre random people in joint operations with Mali. France and Germany promptly left and/or suspended operations, Wagner trying to blame the human rights abuses on France (playing into general anti-French propaganda Russia has been peddling in the region for quite a while). And no they didn't do anything to combat ISIS they only made things worse.
How many points in that -- coming when invited, doing a clean job, leaving when asked, would you expect the US to do? The European sentiment is that the fucked-up internal state of Mali politics cannot be solved by imposition from the outside, they will have to find their own way out of it, sure if they want we can lend a hand but ultimately it's their responsibility to not fuck up their own country. It's a kind of non-interventionist interventionism. We are precisely limited by not backing dictatorships, unlike Russia which prefers people who it can bribe, China which actually doesn't care one way or the other, regarding it as simply business, and the US well they're not even really in Africa but you know all to well how they treated, and are treating, South America. 60 fucking years and they're still pissed Cuba dared to rebel against them as colonial overlords.
Side note yes you should totally look into Wagner's operations in Africa. If that doesn't look like an attempt at colonialism then I don't know what does.
Who needs K-pop when you have the insanity that produces Eurovision.
I mean... it's respected. It's funky. But also rather specific, or alternatively used as ingredient in other styles. But speaking of Eurovision. No I don't know what that is, either, there's a reason there's a gazillion Eurovision drinking games.
Hmm. K.I.Z. is all the rage among the younger lefties but I could never really get into hip-hop. Other bands make other kinds, cult classic not in the least because of the lyrics, and then, well, over here everything ultimately turns out metal.
Not German, Germanic would fit better, genre is proto-germanic ritual folk. The band is as much German as Norwegian as Danish and the relation to Ukraine is in the theme and lyrics of the song. Ukrainians, btw, are an age-old mixture of Slavic and Germanic culture, Vikings settled there when travelling between the Baltic and Black Sea and mixed with the local Slavic population starting about 750CE.
As to Ukrainian music -- I'm a bit stumped but there's definitely Jinjer. They also punch way above their weight in Eurovision, counted by wins per time participated they lead the pack.
But as I didn't accost you with enough metal yet I'll add what should have been Germany's entry last year before the powers that be decided it to be "not suitable for radio play", which radio stations then promptly commented by playing it up and down.
You know I tried to come up with South American artists but failed twice -- first idea was Manu Chao, but the guy is French of Basque-Galician descent, and then Santana, well, closer, at least he's (originally) Mexican.
If you ask around in Spain or Portugal they'll know more of your stuff. And, just remembered, for some reason DTH are popular in Argentinia.