"Russian President Putin: 'Russia Ready To Expand Its..." Topic

… Military Involvement In Syria'

"Vladimir Putin's warning that Moscow will use ‘more military means' in Syria conflict comes just hours after UN roadmap to peace was agreed

Vladimir Putin has warned that Russia is ready to to scale up its military intervention in Syria, less than a day after Moscow signed off on an ambitious UN plan to end the war.

The peace roadmap lays out a two-year path to elections for a new government, starting with a January ceasefire, and marks the first time America and Russia have reached broad consensus on Syria's future after years of conflict that has cost more than 250,000 lives and made millions more into refugees…"
Full article here
link

Amicalement
Armand

"Vladimir Putin's warning that Moscow will use ‘more military means' in Syria conflict

Because a KGB ego learned nothing from Afghanistan.

Can he afford it? He's already acknowledged recently that the budget austerity measures were based on oil at $50 USD/barrel, and it's currently more like $38 USD, so they are going to have to look at it again, then he wants to step up expenditure?

He also stopped the Turkish pipeline so he can only ship gas via Ukraine; so he can't get that to market very easily either.

The more the merrier there, I say.

Under $35 USD a barrel for oil, last I saw, and rumors of $20 USD no longer appear to be crazy talk.

Why is my car fuel still nearly £1.20 GBP a litre then? 😄
(£1.20/litre = $4.50 USD/US Gallon)

Geoff: because, if your situation is comparable with The Netherlands, at least 2/3rd of the price at the pump is taxes which do not lower :-(((

And who is going to stop Putin if he does ? And a much better question is why would you want to stop him ?

GeoffQRF – not sure where you are in the UK but I paid £1.03 GBP/Litre (95 RON) at my local BP today.

Unleaded or diesel?

Petrol – 95 RON.

Ah ok. 95 is regular unleaded (regular in the UK, premium in Australia. Their regular is 91, while our premium is 98).

Current prices here in Hampshire are £1.00 GBP/l for 95 and £1.10 GBP/l for diesel

Curiously the price (which seems to be msinly pushed down by the sudden introduction of US shale oil) doesn't look to be going anywhere soon OPEC has said not only that it "would not cut production from its 30 million barrels a day (mb/d) quota, but had no intention of doing so even if oil fell to $20 USD a barrel."

So with oil well below the price Russia needs to balance the budget, by over half, and no sign of any recovery in the near future, the question would be how much Russia can afford to step up military operations, which are never cheap

Between and Federal and state, here if FL, we have about 75 cents a gallon in taxes.

Some amplifying information about the state of Russia's oil economy from ZeroHedge: ( link )

"Russia's unexpected oil bounty this year is the result not of a new Kremlin campaign but of dozens of modest productivity improvements across the sprawling sector. Even pressured by plunging prices, as well as U.S. and European Union sanctions that cut access to much foreign financing and technology, Russian companies have managed to squeeze more crude out of some of the country's oldest fields," Bloomberg writes, before noting that "Bashneft and other Russian companies working fields in the Volga River basin -- some of the first to be discovered in Russia early in the last century -- are benefiting from Soviet inefficiency as [the old motto was]: 'whatever we don't produce will be left for our children.'"

For analysts, Russia's resiliency has come as a surprise. "I know of no one who had predicted that Russian production would rise in 2015, let alone to new record levels," Edward Morse, Citigroup's global head of commodities research said.

They can produce more oil (at an increased cost) but can they sell it? Having more product is still no use for paying the economy if you cant sell it, and putting more on the market will simply further reduce the unit cost, and that's not going to pay for increased military activity in Syria either…

Russian oil production has been on a steady increase for the last 10 years:

I'm not sure that recent increases are significantly different?

The significant part of that report is not that they are producing more oil, but that "….for the second time this year, Russia overtook Saudi Arabia as the biggest exporter of crude to China…"

So Russia becomes yet more dependent on China. That's a lot of eggs going into one basket.

Of course that doesn't match up to the chart they also show (?)

Meanwhile Ukraine has placed increased sanctions on Russian banks and businesses in compliance with its continuing move towards EU free trade. This has resulted in Russia banning Ukrainian food imports from January.

Russia could always follow a certain example set whereby they freeze another states international assets,move in and absorb the wealth.

Between and Federal and state, here if FL, we have about 75 cents a gallon in taxes.

And in most of Europe, it's more like $2.50 USD a gallon in fuel taxes…