Hello action, meet my friend, consequences.

It is extremely obvious all these cable cutting “accidents” are done on purpose by Russia, Russian actors, or someone contracted by Russia. The ship should be seized and used for financing new cables, even if it the rusty bathtub is only worth a couple of bucks. Most importantly the crew (regardless of nationality) needs to be sentenced to something like 20-30 years in jail for acts of war or the like. Then future crews and shipping companies will realise the cost of accepting these contracts from Russia.

Preferably we’d be self-sufficient since Europe has a lot of, if not most of the rare earth minerals in various deposits. But, no wants to deal with the ugly process of extraction and processing, not to mention the upfront costs. Until someone steps up I guess we sadly have to deal with China.

Shit, I hate mines as much as the next guy, but against a Russia who doesn’t care about any kind of laws or rules of war you have to use all the tools at your disposal to keep them away.

Europe should probably invest in some kind of European FASCAM alternative. So in the event the Russians actually do launch an attack we can absolutely cover the roads, fields, and forests their side of the border several kilometres deep with mines. While we bunker down and just keep draining their resources on clearing mines in their own land.

There’s some serious NIMBY’ing going on with new manufacturing. People understandably don’t want to live next door to a explosives factory. So the next option is to build the factories far away in some forest, but then environmentalists get up in arms over forests being cut down. Also, the longer commute makes it harder to get workers.

All in all it’s a lose-lose situation. Hopefully someone can cut through, find an agreeable solution somewhere in the middle, and start building new factories.