It is sounding like Putin is going to make an announcement about the referendums on Friday. He will either knuckle down and go for it or introduce an excuse about how it is going to take more time.

there is no reason for him not to annex them, from his point of view, at this time.

Ultimately, it is a test of resolve. I think he will announce the annexation with a big caveat.

He may try to use the specter of him accepting the regions into Russia as a bargaining chip. You'd think at this point anyone would realize that you cannot bargain with America, but I wouldn't put it past Putin.


European industries are already shuttering or relocating to America, this is a fact. That doesn't get better over winter, it gets worse.

The Norwegian pipeline carries a maximum 10 billion m3 of gas per year. NS carries 11 times that much. This is a fact.

Replacing all Russian gas with LNG, even if it was possible, still results in European exports being completely uncompetitive in world markets. This is a fact.

I keep posting the exact same three things at you, but you just keep on ignoring it and posting these three things all over the place. Repeating it doesn't make it true, no matter how much it may seem that way when you look at Western media.

This post was edited by kusotarre1 on Sep 28 2022 04:53pm

Well at least Europe has exports, looking at country you are from (Russia) you only export raw materials as Russians are too drunk to make anything of use to the modern world.
Don't worry about Europe so much, worry about yourself, they might soon take you to your grave in Ukraine, go spend more time with your family unless you are an orphan.
Sitting here whole day telling Euros how essential these pipes are to them 50 times in a row LOL

People have to accept that if Putin announces the annexation of the states in Ukraine without resolve, and that Ukraine will; rightfully, continue to liberate, and Russia have self-justified use of defensive weapons, then things are going to get a little bit upsetting for everyone. Hence, it is impossible for Putin to announce annexation without caveat.

Hey bro, would like to let you know something very important

NS 1 + 2 have a theoretical capacity of 120 billion m³, but NS 2 was never operational, so the maximum we ever got out of the NS pipelines was slightly less than 60b m³. You are of course right that Europe's industry would be fucked if prices for natural gas and electricity stayed as insanely high as they currently are. But there's plenty of reason to assume that they won't.

The current prices are driven to absurd heights by panic, speculation and the pains of a reorganization of the global energy market. Since their height in August, gas prices have already come down to around half their peak price, and had been on a pretty steady downward trend until the recent stunt with the blown up pipelines. There is also a proper shortage of natural gas on the global markets right now since a lot of Russia's production was taken off the global markets and there is no short-term recourse. (All major producers are at max capacity or lack the LNG infrastructure; Russia lacks the pipelines to China or India.) In a couple of years, places like the US, the Gulf region, Canada or even Argentina will export a lot more LNG because prices are high enough, they no longer have to compete with giga-cheap Russian gas and the necessary infrastructure for the LNG transport will be scaled up. The economic pains will also cause a lot of countries to rethink their priorities when it comes to stuff like nuclear energy, fracking and drilling bans and all that. Yes, LNG gas will never be as cheap as Russian pipeline gas was, but that's not necessary for Europe to stay competitive. If the new gas price in a post-war Europe settles at twice the pre-war level or something like that, it's not a huge deal.

Electricity prices surged mostly because of a system called "merit order principle" which dictates that all producers of electricity get compensated at the price of the most expensive source, which is usually gas power. Through this mechanism, the excesses of the gas market spilled over to the electricity market. This is essentially a bug in the system which was overlooked because it didn't cause damage during normal times, but has been identified and will be fixed in the near future.


You are also completely ignoring the damage that Western sanctions inflict on the Russian economy. Your side cannot keep this up forever either. Eventually, both sides will come to an agreement and resume some level of trading, even if it won't ever get back to the pre-war volumes when Europe was dangerously hooked on Russian energy.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Sep 28 2022 09:13pm

but, can they?

At the end of the day, Russia produces more than it consumes. Its energy independent, its food independent. It was Putin who made the decision over the past couple decades to prioritize production whereas the west went for an import model based on a service sector economy. And that's the thing, no matter how many sanctions are thrown at Russia by the west, they can be weathered. The same is not true for Europe, who are very much dependent on imports. What Russia is going through right now isn't even a drop of water in the ocean that was their losses in WW2. And what's more, EU infrastructure is far more vulnerable than any Russian insular energy production and distribution. LNG terminals and Norwegian pipelines can be sabotaged as easily as Russian pipelines.

Talking about prioritizing domestic production, switching to nuclear, opening up fracking and drilling- its a day late and a dollar short. This is a geopolitical conflict that we sparked, that Russia was preparing for decades before we are even willing to start making a sacrifice.