US funds press France to increase €10bn EDF buyout price
State moves for remaining 16 per cent of energy utility in reversal of 2005 privatisation
Several US funds are pushing the French state to lift its €10bn buyout offer to minority shareholders of energy utility EDF and asking France’s market regulator to recommend a price bump, adding to pressure from investors unhappy with the terms of the nationalisation.
The French government is moving to buy out the 16 per cent it does not already own in EDF, as the group grapples with production outages at its French nuclear reactors and soaring wholesale power prices in Europe, and gears up to build costly new plants.
The process reverses a 2005 privatisation and subsequent fall in the power company’s stock price since it was listed at €32 per share, leading to opposition to the €12 per share buyout price from some long-term investors, such as employee shareholders.
US funds holding several hundred million euros worth of EDF shares, which include hedge fund TIG Advisors, have now called on France’s Autorité des Marchés Financiers [AMF] to challenge the offer price and recommended it be raised to €15.80 per share, according to a November 3 letter sent by lawyer Sophie Vermeille and seen by the Financial Times.
The funds have argued that disclosures over the impact of government decisions in recent years on EDF’s finances were insufficient and not taken into account by an independent consultancy hired by the utility to review the offer. They have also called for some changes to the terms of the tender and how bids are collected.
“By not allowing minority shareholders a chance to benefit from a fair price or from the necessary information to come to an informed opinion about the financial conditions, [the AMF] would be sending an extremely negative signal about Paris as a financial centre,” Vermeille wrote.
The AMF is due to rubber-stamp or raise objections to the bid, in a decision that could be made public on Tuesday according to the tender offer filings. The AMF, EDF and France’s economy ministry declined to comment.
Once the offer is launched, the government needs to reach a 90 per cent acceptance threshold from its 84 per cent holding before it is able to squeeze out the rest of minority shareholders. EDF shares are hovering just under the €12 offer price level, after slumping close to all time lows at €5.8 in March.
The state’s €9.7bn buyout offer includes a bid for EDF’s convertible bonds. The bid represented a 53 per cent premium to the company’s closing price before the nationalisation was announced in July.
EDF, which last week cut its production forecast for the fourth time this year owing to reactor outages and maintenance programmes, was also hit in January when the French government made it absorb the cost for its bid to cap rises in consumers’ power bills at 4 per cent in 2022.
Vermeille told the FT the funds were not looking to derail the nationalisation, but pushing for more transparency around the process.
Some other shareholders are also calling for the price to be raised to at least €15 per share, such as employees who invested in the shares, and own collectively around 1.5 per cent of EDF’s capital.
“Minority shareholders are being forced to sell at the worst time in EDF’s history,” said Martine Faure, a representative of the leftwing CGT union and chair of two employee shareholder funds.
French activist shareholder CIAM, which holds under 1 per cent of EDF, has also criticised the process.
“It’s clear that the price is not adequate when you see how the state has intervened and caused the share price to fall,” CIAM co-founder Catherine Berjal said. The AMF should be the one appointing an independent expert to review the offer, not EDF, Berjal added.
The AMF has options including choosing to take more time to review the tender offer. The government has been looking to move ahead as swiftly as possible as EDF’s various production woes tear into its core profit.
The Secret Mission to Snatch Crimea Back From Putin’s Clutches
A top Ukrainian official shared with The Daily Beast an underground plan to take back key territory stolen by Vladimir Putin eight years ago.
Ukrainian forces are working to force Russia to retreat from Kherson, a key region Russia seized in the early days of the war this year. But behind the scenes, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s administration is plotting next steps for a takeover of Crimea, which Russia has been occupying since 2014 when Vladimir Putin illegally annexed the peninsula.
Tamila Tasheva, the official responsible for the plan to take back Crimea and kick Russia out, told The Daily Beast she is looking to the battlefield and an underground network of informants in Crimea to help.
Tasheva has long believed the “main mechanism” for kicking Russia out will depend on political factors and diplomacy with allies. But as the invasion has raged into its ninth month and Ukraine has begun to gain momentum in counteroffensives, the military component of the Crimea takeover is upon the Ukrainian government.
The “main mechanism of deoccupation” is the “political and diplomatic way,” Tasheva told The Daily Beast in an exclusive interview this week. “But of course we also in this strategy of deoccupation, we also [talk] about another mechanism of deoccupation including, of course, military components of deoccupation.”
Ukraine’s intelligence services have told her they believe Ukraine will be able to seize Crimea by the spring or summer of 2023, Tasheva said. But she thinks it might happen sooner.
“General Budanov also mentioned that we could deoccupy the territory of Crimea at the end of spring 2023 and maybe in summer,” Tasheva said, referring to Kyrylo Budanov, Ukraine’s top military intelligence official. “It’s really my belief that we return Crimea back to Ukraine in a shorter period of time.”
The Zelensky administration’s optimism about liberating Crimea underlines the dramatic shift in momentum in the war over recent months. Global leaders who fretted that Kyiv would fall to Russia in a matter of days after Russia’s invasion are now watching Ukrainians make stunning gains on the battlefield. The strategy has now shifted from talk of clawing back territory Russia has taken this year to taking back territory Russia took in 2014, including Crimea.
“We understand that the situation dramatically changed after the full scale invasion,” Tasheva said, noting that victory for Ukraine lies in pushing Russia out with its 2022 and 2014 gains in mind. “We have had a war in Ukraine for more than eight years, and it has not started on Feb. 24 this year, but eight years ago with the occupation of Crimea.”
The timeline for Ukraine to try to retake Crimea is unclear, Tasheva pointed out. But with the Ukrainian military forcing Russia to retreat from multiple pockets of Ukraine, the prospect is closer than ever before.
“I don’t know at this moment and maybe… nobody… [has] really concrete data when we deoccupy Crimea,” Tasheva said. “But it’s a shorter period than we expected one year ago.”
The retaking of Crimea by Ukraine would be a major blow to Moscow. For Putin, losing Crimea would be personal, and could threaten his political legitimacy in Russia, especially considering his popularity ratings surged when he seized Crimea in 2014, according to Angela Stent, a former national intelligence officer for Russia and Eurasia at the National Intelligence Council.
“This is one of his claims to legitimacy,” Stent told The Daily Beast. “One of the major claims is that he restored Crimea to its rightful place. If Crimea were now to be taken by the Ukrainians, then that would be a huge blow to his own legitimacy.”
“The concern would be what the next kind of escalation might be from Russia,” Stent said.
Already, following numerous attacks on Russian military entities in Crimea, Russia has intensified assaults on Ukrainian infrastructure, knocking out Kyiv’s water and power supplies. These attacks show Putin is likely raging about incursions into Crimea, according to Stent.
“Putin senses—and the people around him—the reality that their army really is doing very badly… therefore, you have this intensification of the strikes on infrastructure,” Stent said.
If Ukraine tries to kick Russia out of Crimea, it could run the risk of giving Putin a way to galvanize support domestically for the war, warned John Herbst, the former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine.
“A little bit of caution is in order,” Herbst told The Daily Beast. “A serious Ukrainian offensive in Crimea might enable Putin to rally support at home for his misbegotten war.”
Tasheva’s confidence about planning a Crimea takeover comes as signs emerge that Russia could be preparing to retreat from Kherson, which would be a necessary precursor to going after Crimea, she said.
Russian forces seized Kherson in the early days of the war. It sits just north of Crimea and represents a key component of Putin’s dreams to create a “land bridge” from Russia to Crimea, which has been crucial to supplying troops and pushing northwards into Ukraine.
And although Russian forces were able to take Kherson—in part by using Crimea as a launchpad—it’s now Moscow’s only major stronghold on the western side of the Dnieper River.
Tasheva acknowledged that booting Russia from Kherson should come before going after Crimea.
“We understand it’s really connected—deoccupation of Crimea—connected to the situation in the battlefield, in the southern part of Ukraine, especially deoccupation of Kherson,” Tasheva said.
Some of Russia’s foothold is starting to crumble, according to U.S. officials and reports from the ground. A Russian-installed administrator for the region said Thursday that Russia may abandon the region soon.
“Most likely, our troops will leave for the left-bank part of the Kherson region,” Kirill Stremousov, the Russian-installed deputy chief for the region, told Solovyov-Live.
Videos have emerged from Ukraine showing Russian flags had been taken down from the regional administration building in Kherson, according to Russian war correspondent Sasha Kots.
For Ben Hodges, the former commander of the U.S. Army in Europe, Russia’s fate is all but sealed, given Russia’s poor logistics and Ukraine’s methodical approach.
“As long as we continue to provide them with what they need, to me this is irreversible. The Russians cannot stop it,” Hodges said. “The only thing that they’re able to do right now is murder innocent people.”
But although there’s promise in Kherson, roadblocks remain. Rains in recent days have made the approach muddy and slow for Ukrainians, The Washington Post reported. Ukraine’s military said last week that Russia had moved up to 1,000 troops into the region.
Despite reports of a potential Russian retreat, Ukrainian progress on the battlefield has been slight, The White House said Friday.
“The lines… have been pretty well static over the last few days, not much movement,” White House National Security Council Coordinator John Kirby said on a call in response to a question from The Daily Beast. “We continue to see that the Ukrainians are making some incremental progress in the south.”
The White House declined to comment on Ukraine’s prospects of taking back Crimea.
And although the timing is up in the air on when Kyiv will make the move, one thing is clear: Kyiv’s plan includes cutting the peninsula off completely from Russia once Zelensky’s forces kick Russia out, according to Ukrainian military intelligence. Budanov indicated in an interview that a key bridge that connects Crimea to Russia, the Kerch bridge, will be taken out once Crimea is deoccupied.
“The Crimean bridge is the symbol that will be destroyed. When Crimea returns, this bridge will cease to exist,” Budanov said.
Concerns remain that Russia might interpret an attempt to retake Crimea as an invasion of Russian territory, particularly as Moscow has been hinting it might use nuclear weapons if its territory is threatened.
Tasheva doesn’t buy it.
Russia is “nuclear blackmailing,” Tasheva said, adding that she thinks kicking Russia out of territory it illegally annexed is not cause for escalation.
European leaders in particular have expressed concerns to Tasheva about Russia escalating over Crimea attacks. But for those who are worried, Tasheva stressed it’s not just about taking back territory from Russia. It’s about saving civilians, Crimean Tatars, and Ukrainians from Russia’s brutality.
“To deoccupy Crimea, it’s not an escalation. It’s our way for a liberation,” Tasheva told The Daily Beast. “When I speak with some of my friends or colleagues in European Union, for example, and when they asked me about escalation and about nuclear blackmailing and what we must do with it, and maybe Ukraine must do some compromises… we always say no. No compromise.”
“Because it’s not only about territory, because Russians during the years of occupation persecute people,” she added.
Tasheva and her team have their work cut out for them. In preparation for liberating Crimea and then reintegration, they have begun working with an “underground” network of human rights activists, non-governmental organizations, and dedicated civilians in Crimea who can help when the time comes, Tasheva said.
“We really work with people underground—with activists, with lawyers… with ordinary Crimeans—who now live in Crimea,” Tasheva said.
The work of sharing information outside of Crimea has been difficult since 2014. But it has grown incredibly sensitive and dangerous in recent months, according to those working with locals to share information with advocacy organizations about human rights abuses, political prisoners, Russian detention centers, and torture.
“The situation has obviously become extremely difficult since February in terms of access to the peninsula, as far as reaching out to and speaking with activists and others who are in Crimea,” Dave Elseroad, the Head of Advocacy for Human Rights House Foundation, which works to advance freedom of expression, assembly, and association in Crimea and across Eastern Europe, the Western Balkans, and the Caucasus, told The Daily Beast. “It’s certainly risky for them.”
It’s a gamble for those who choose to share information about the Russian occupation, so most of it must be done secretly so it’s obscured from Moscow, since Russia has systematically quashed freedom of expression and assembly in Crimea, and particularly discriminates against the Crimean Tatar community, according to Elseroad.
Four organizations that the Human Rights House Foundation works with “have informal networks” and “are still operating across the peninsula,” Elseroad said.
The list of tasks and horrors that Ukraine has to confront in Crimea is seemingly endless. There have been reports of enforced disappearances, torture, extrajudicial punishment, and forced conscription with Russia. There are also reports of Russian authorities placing Crimean dissidents in psychiatric institutions.
Crimean Tatars, a group Ukraine recognized last year as an indigenous people, have been one of the most vocal groups opposed to Russia’s occupation. Russia’s crackdown against them has been relentless, activists say.
And as Russia’s occupation continues, the list of human rights abuses is only growing.
“We’re seeing a significant increase in number of individuals who are being disappeared,” Elseroad told The Daily Beast. “The situation got progressively worse over the years… since 2022, it’s gone from bad to worse.”
As the fog of war grips Ukrainian forces, for Crimeans, kicking Russia out is existential.
“We fight for our people… it’s not only territory,” Tasheva said. “It’s also about values, values of freedom, values of human rights.”
EU accuses US of breaking WTO rules with green energy incentives
Washington’s Inflation Reduction Act could trigger retaliation from Brussels and other US allies
The US’s flagship green technology legislation breaches global trade agreements, risks a global “race to the bottom” on clean energy incentives, and could lead to retaliation, Brussels has claimed.
In its first formal response on the Inflation Reduction Act, EU documents seen by the Financial Times state that the $369bn package of subsidies and tax credits for American producers and consumers contravenes World Trade Organization treaties that say countries such as the US cannot discriminate against imported products.
Officials in Brussels also believe the package, passed in August, could trigger retaliation from the EU and other US allies.
The European Commission comments sent to the US Treasury state that five measures offering tax credits and subsidies “contain provisions with clearly discriminatory domestic content requirements, in breach of WTO rules”.
“If implemented in its current form, the Act risks causing not only economic damage to both the US and its closest trading partners, resulting in inefficiencies and market distortions, but could also trigger a harmful global subsidy race to the bottom on key technologies and inputs for the green transition,” the document, which is due to be published on the US Treasury’s website on Monday, said. “Moreover it risks creating tensions that could lead to reciprocal or retaliatory measures.”
The response highlights concern in European capitals that the act will hamper investment in green technologies throughout the EU and heightens the risk of a transatlantic trade war at a time of geopolitical uncertainty.
A subsidy race has already begun, with Canada saying last week that it would introduce tax credits for green investment to avoid companies being lured to the US. Japan and South Korea have also complained publicly about the IRA.
The EU wants changes to nine of the provisions in the legislation, which restrict subsidies and tax credits to products made in the US, or companies operating there. The incentives affect manufacturing and investing in products including solar panels, wind turbines and clean hydrogen.
Consumer tax breaks, which offer a $7,500 subsidy for purchases of electric vehicles, are treated slightly differently, with Canadian and Mexican products also qualifying.
The commission said the US must “give EU companies the same treatment as other US trading partners”.
While the EU welcomed the Biden administration’s commitment to fighting climate change it said “the green transition is not something to be achieved at the expense of others”. US companies would gain an advantage that would enable them to outcompete others, turning the fight against climate change “into a zero-sum game”.
It also warned that retaliation “threatens the multilateral trading system at a time when its value is more important than ever for both American and European businesses”.
While some EU member states, such as France, are already calling for retaliation, EU trade commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis has so far preferred negotiations.
A task force of senior US and commission officials met for the first time last week. The EU response said it “hopes to find constructive and amicable solutions”.
“The task force is a clear, senior level commitment by the US to address the serious concerns raised by the EU in relation to the Act,” it added.
The US Treasury is responsible for implementing the IRA, but it has not yet stated how much it is possible to change without asking Congress to rewrite sections. Analysts believe that Congress is unlikely to do so as the Act was a delicate compromise that only passed the Senate thanks to vice-president Kamala Harris’ casting vote.
US trade representative Katherine Tai defended the subsidies in an interview with the FT last week, but said she was hopeful differences with the EU could be resolved.
Philip Morris wins Elliott’s backing for $15.7bn Swedish Match takeover
Activist hedge fund stands to make about $150mn in profit from deal
Elliott Management, the biggest shareholder in Swedish Match, has decided to back Philip Morris’s $15.7bn offer for the smokeless tobacco specialist, putting completion of the deal within reach, according to several people familiar with the matter.
PMI’s offer had received more than 80 per cent of shareholder acceptances, as of the latest count on Friday, and more may be processed on Monday, according to two people familiar with the matter. Handelsbanken, the Swedish bank, is acting as the receiving agent.
The Marlboro maker first bid for Swedish Match in May, but the takeover bid was complicated when arbitrage funds and activist hedge funds bought up the stock, forcing PMI to up its offer from SKr106 ($9.63) to SKr116 per share last month to sweeten the deal.
Under strict Swedish takeover rules, PMI had made its offer conditional on achieving more than 90 cent of shareholder acceptances by a deadline of November 4, but PMI also reserves the right to complete the offer at a lower level of acceptances.
Two people close to the takeover process said Elliott, which as the biggest shareholder was the effective kingmaker of the deal, had decided to tender its 10.5 per cent stake, pushing shareholder acceptances above 80 per cent and clearing the path to the takeover.
Activist hedge fund Elliott stands to make about $150mn in profit from the deal, having started to buy up the stock below the offer price of SKr106, according to Financial Times calculations. The position was built from Elliott’s London office and led by Nabeel Bhanji, a senior portfolio manager at the company.
The two people close to the takeover process said they expected PMI to lower the threshold and extend the offer period by a few weeks so more investors could tender and they could get the deal over the line.
“If PMI wants to do this . . . they will likely waive down to the 80 per cent range, declare the offer unconditional and open up an extended offer period,” a person familiar with the deal said. “I would imagine then more shareholders tender and they will cross 90 per cent.”
The person predicted that then some index funds, retail investors and other holdouts would tender as they “won’t want to spend the money and time on the back-end of the trade”.
Longtime Swedish Match shareholders, such as Framtiden Partnerships and Australian fund manager John Hempton’s Bronte Capital, which own around 1 per cent of the stock respectively and have so far refused to tender, could be forced to “flop in reluctantly”, the person added.
“Without Elliott, I am forced to sell,” Hempton told the FT. “I don’t like being a minority in a company on the other side of the world without a big brother on my side.”
But Dan Juran, managing member of Framtiden, insisted he had no plans to tender, adding that the deal proved “the endangered status of the species ‘long-term investor’”.
If PMI succeeds in capturing Swedish Match, it will be a huge boon to its efforts to transition away from cigarettes towards so-called next-generation products as part of its pledge to “unsmoke the world”.
PMI will not only add Swedish Match’s hugely successful Zyn product, which has more than a 60 per cent share of the US nicotine pouch market, to its portfolio but it will also be able to use the product’s retail distribution channels to sell its IQOS heated tobacco sticks throughout the US.
PMI, Swedish Match and Elliott declined to comment.
U.S. privately asks Ukraine to show it’s open to negotiate with Russia
The encouragement is aimed not at pushing Ukraine to the negotiating table, but ensuring it maintains a moral high ground in the eyes of its international backers
The Biden administration is privately encouraging Ukraine’s leaders to signal an openness to negotiate with Russia and drop their public refusal to engage in peace talks unless President Vladimir Putin is removed from power, according to people familiar with the discussions.
The request by American officials is not aimed at pushing Ukraine to the negotiating table, these people said. Rather, they called it a calculated attempt to ensure the government in Kyiv maintains the support of other nations facing constituencies wary of fueling a war for many years to come.
The discussions illustrate how complex the Biden administration’s position on Ukraine has become, as U.S. officials publicly vow to support Kyiv with massive sums of aid “for as long as it takes” while hoping for a resolution to the conflict that over the past eight months has taken a punishing toll on the world economy and triggered fears of nuclear war.
While U.S. officials share their Ukrainian counterparts’ assessment that Putin, for now, isn’t serious about negotiations, they acknowledge that President Volodymyr Zelensky’s ban on talks with him has generated concern in parts of Europe, Africa and Latin America, where the war’s disruptive effects on the availability and cost of food and fuel are felt most sharply.
“Ukraine fatigue is a real thing for some of our partners,” said one U.S. official who, like others interviewed for this report, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive conversations between Washington and Kyiv.
Serhiy Nikiforov, a spokesman for Zelensky, did not respond to a request for comment.
In the United States, polls show eroding support among Republicans for continuing to finance Ukraine’s military at current levels, suggesting the White House may face resistance following Tuesday’s midterm elections as it seeks to continue a security assistance program that has delivered Ukraine the largest such annual sum since the end of the Cold War.
In a trip to Kyiv on Friday, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said the United States supported a just and lasting peace for Ukraine and said U.S. support would continue regardless of domestic politics. “We fully intend to ensure that the resources are there as necessary and that we’ll get votes from both sides of the aisle to make that happen,” he said during a briefing.
Eagerness for a potential resolution to the war has intensified as Ukrainian forces recapture occupied territory, pushing closer to areas prized by Putin. Those begin with Crimea, which Russia illegally annexed in 2014, and include cities along the Azov Sea that now provide him a “land bridge” to the Ukrainian peninsula. Zelensky has vowed to fight for every inch of Ukrainian territory.
Veteran diplomat Alexander Vershbow, who served as U.S. ambassador to Russia and deputy secretary general of NATO, said the United States could not afford to be completely “agnostic” about how and when the war is concluded, given the U.S. interest in ensuring European security and deterring further Kremlin aggression beyond Russia’s borders.
“If the conditions become more propitious for negotiations, I don’t think the administration is going to be passive,” Vershbow said. “But it is ultimately the Ukrainians doing the fighting, so we’ve got to be careful not to second-guess them.”
While Zelensky laid out proposals for a negotiated peace in the weeks following Putin’s Feb. 24 invasion, including Ukrainian neutrality and a return of areas occupied by Russia since that date, Ukrainian officials have hardened their stance in recent months.
In late September, following Putin’s annexation of four additional Ukrainian regions in the east and in the south, Zelensky issued a decree declaring it “impossible” to negotiate with the Russian leader. “We will negotiate with the new president,” he said in a video address.
That shift has been fueled by systematic atrocities in areas under Russian control, including rape and torture, along with regular airstrikes on Kyiv and other cities, and the Kremlin’s annexation decree.
Why Putin will fight for Kherson: Fresh water and land bridge to Crimea
Ukrainians have responded with outrage when foreigners have suggested they yield areas of their country as part of a peace deal, as they did last month when billionaire Elon Musk, who has helped supply Ukraine’s military with satellite communication devices, announced a proposal on Twitter that could allow Russia to cement its control of parts of Ukraine via referendum and give the Kremlin Crimea.
In recent weeks Ukrainian criticism of proposed concessions has grown more pointed, as officials decry “useful idiots” in the West whom they’ve accused of serving Kremlin interests.
“If Russia wins, we will get a period of chaos: flowering of tyranny, wars, genocides, nuclear races,” presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said Friday. “Any ‘concessions’ to Putin today — a deal with the Devil. You won’t like its price.”
Ukrainian officials point out that a 2015 peace deal in the country’s eastern Donbas region — where Moscow backed a separatist campaign — only provided Russia time before Putin launched his full-scale invasion this year. They question why any new peace deal would be different, arguing that the only way Russia will be prevented from returning for further attacks is vanquishing its military on the battlefield.
Russia, facing a poor position on the battlefield, has proposed negotiations but in the past has proved unwilling to accept much other than Ukrainian capitulation.
“Cynically, Russia and its Western supporters are holding out an olive branch. Please do not be fooled: An aggressor cannot be a peacemaker,” Andriy Yermak, head of the Ukrainian presidential administration, wrote in a recent op-ed published by The Washington Post.
Ukrainian officials also question how they can conduct negotiations with Russian leaders who fundamentally believe in Moscow’s right to hegemony over Kyiv.
Putin has continued to undermine the notion of a sovereign and independent Ukraine, including in remarks last month when he once again asserted that Russians and Ukrainians were one people, and argued that Russia could be “the only real and serious guarantor of Ukraine’s statehood, sovereignty and territorial integrity.”
While Western officials also hold profound skepticism of Russia’s aims, they have chafed at Ukraine’s harsh public rebukes as Kyiv remains entirely dependent on Western assistance. Swiping at donors and ruling out talks could hurt Kyiv in the long run, officials say.
The maximalist remarks on both sides have increased global fears of a years-long conflict spanning the life of Russia’s 70-year-old leader, whose grip on power has only tightened in recent years. Already the war has deepened global economic woes, helping to send energy prices soaring for European consumers and causing a surge in commodity prices that worsened hunger in nations including Somalia, Yemen and Afghanistan.
In the United States, rising inflation partially linked to the war has stiffened head winds for President Biden and his party ahead of the Nov. 8 midterms and raised new questions about the future of U.S. security assistance, which has amounted to $18.2 billion since the war began. According to a poll published Nov. 3 by the Wall Street Journal, 48 percent of Republicans said the United States was doing “too much” to support Ukraine, up from 6 percent in March.
Progressives within the Democratic Party are calling for diplomacy to avoid a protracted war, releasing but later retracting a letter calling on Biden to redouble efforts to seek “a realistic framework” for a halt to the fighting.
Speaking in Kyiv, Sullivan said the war could end easily. “Russia chose to start it,” he said. “Russia could choose to end it by ceasing its attack on Ukraine, ceasing its occupation of Ukraine, and that’s precisely what it should do from our perspective.”
The concerns about a longer conflict are particularly salient in nations that were already hesitant to throw their weight behind the U.S.-led coalition in support of Ukraine, either because of ties with Moscow or reluctance to fall in line behind Washington.
South Africa abstained from a recent U.N. vote that condemned Russia’s annexation decrees, saying the world must instead focus on facilitating a cease-fire and political resolution. Brazil’s new president-elect, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has said Zelensky is as responsible for the war as Putin.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has tried to maintain good relations with Moscow and Kyiv, offered assistance on peace talks in a call with Zelensky last month. He was spurned by the Ukrainian leader.
Zelensky told him Ukraine would not conduct any negotiations with Putin but said Ukraine was “committed to peaceful settlement through dialogue,” according to a statement released by Zelensky’s office. The statement noted that Russia had deliberately undermined efforts at dialogue.
Despite Ukrainian leaders’ refusal to talk to Putin and their vow to fight to retake all of Ukraine, U.S. officials say they believe that Zelensky would probably endorse negotiations and eventually accept concessions, as he suggested he would early in the war. They believe that Kyiv is attempting to lock in as many military gains as it can before winter sets in, when there might be a window for diplomacy.
Zelensky faces the challenge of appealing both to a domestic constituency that has suffered immensely at the hands of Russian invaders and a foreign audience providing his forces with the weapons they need to fight. To motivate Ukrainians domestically, Zelensky has promoted victory rather than settlement and become a symbol of defiance that has motivated Ukrainian forces on the battlefield.
While members of the Group of Seven industrialized bloc of nations seemingly threw their weight behind a Ukrainian vision of victory last month, endorsing a plan for a “just peace” including potential Russian reparation payments and security guarantees for Ukraine, some of those same countries see a potential turning point if Ukrainian forces approach Crimea.
Reports of a Russian withdrawal from the southern city of Kherson have raised the question of whether Ukrainian forces could eventually march on the strategic peninsula, which U.S. and NATO officials believe Putin views differently than other areas of Ukraine under Russian control, and what a likely all-out fight for Crimea would mean for Kyiv’s backers in the West.
Not only has Crimea been under direct Russian control for longer than areas seized since February, but it has long been the site of a Russian naval base and is home to many retired Russian military personnel.
Illustrating Russia’s elevation of Crimea, the Kremlin responded to an explosion last month on a bridge linking the region to mainland Russia — a symbol of Moscow’s grip of the peninsula — by launching a barrage of missiles on Ukrainian cities, including Kyiv, ending a long period of peace in the capital.
In the meantime, Ukrainian leaders continue to telegraph their intention to pursue total victory, not only to their beleaguered citizens but also to Moscow.
Zelensky told an interviewer on Wednesday that the first thing he would do after Ukraine prevails in the war would be to visit a recaptured Crimea. “I really want to see the sea,” he said.
Russia Says Major Dam Hit By US-Supplied HIMARS Rockets
Russia has announced Sunday that a major dam in the Russian-controlled region of Kherson was damaged in a Ukrainian strike using an advanced US-supplied system.
"Today at 10:00 there was a hit of six HIMARS rockets. Air defense units shot down five missiles, one hit a lock of the Kakhovka dam, which was damaged," Russian news agencies quoted local emergency authorities as saying.
Kakhovka hydroelectric dam, file image
The Kakhovka hydroelectric dam in southern Ukraine has been in Russian hands since near the start of the invasion of Ukraine, considered a critical asset to the Russians given it supplies water to Crimea. This also makes it a potential target for the Ukrainian army, given President Zelensky's prior pledges to "liberate" Crimea.
An official with the Moscow-installed administration, however, said "Everything is under control. The main air defense strikes were repelled, one missile hit [the dam], but did not cause critical damage."
The Kakhovka dam has for months been at the center of competing accusations and claims, with President Zelensky saying weeks ago that Russian troops are plotting a 'false flag' detonation of the large structure in order to trigger cataclysmic flooding.
Zelensky appealed to world powers to ensure the dam's safe operation by sending an international mission to protect and operate it, pointing out that if the dam burst it would case a "catastrophe on a grand scale".
"The dam of this hydroelectric power plant holds about 18 million cubic meters of water," he said in statements last month. "If Russian terrorists blow up this dam, more than 80 settlements, including Kherson, will be in the zone of rapid flooding. Hundreds, hundreds of thousands of people may be affected."
Source: Google Maps
He described that Russian forces previously kicked the dam workers out of the facility and now have complete control over it. "They have complete control over the station," Zelensky added. “It is necessary to act immediately so that Russia does not have the opportunity to realize this catastrophe."
The ongoing standoff mirrors that of Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, which has also from the war's start been under Russian control but has also suffered shelling, which if damaged severely enough could have catastrophic effects on the whole area, given the potential for radioactive fallout.
The Weird-Looking, Fuel-Efficient Planes You Could Be Flying in One Day
Engineers are exploring radical new designs for commercial planes that would use less energy and lower emissions. But will passengers be willing to board them?
Modern airliner designs date from the 1950s: a metal tube and swept-back wings with jet engines slung underneath. They get you where you’re going and back. But after decades of research, something very different could be flying you on vacation by the late 2030s.
Unconventional designs such as “blended-wing” shapes now used for some military jets, which combine the cabin and wings in one piece, have been floated for years as possibilities for passenger aircraft. Now the rise of climate-change concerns and emergence of new manufacturing materials have brought a rethink a step closer to reality, scientists at the National Aeronautics and Space Admin
Just about every fuel-saving aerodynamic efficiency has been wrung out of existing aircraft. The next generation will need bolder designs to meet new environmental standards and airline economics, and that’s forcing plane makers back to the drawing board.
The designs now exist mainly as artists’ renderings, models and small-scale prototypes. That could be set to finally change. NASA in June launched a competition for U.S. companies to design and build a full-scale demonstrator. The rules require entrants to target planes around the size of a Boeing Co. 737 that can carry 150 passengers. The agency wants a prototype that could fly as early as 2027 and be ready for mass production in the next decade.
The agency won’t comment on the proposals submitted by the September deadline, but points to the recent history of alternative designs by researchers and aircraft makers. These include plane bodies that look like flying wings with passengers seated 10 or more across, compared with rows of six on a Boeing 737. Others have long, thin wings that would have to fold to fit into airport gates. In some designs, jets under the wing are replaced by rear-facing propellers mounted on the back of the plane.
So-called double-bubble concepts that combine two almost round fuselages use the main body of the plane to provide lift, rather than relying mainly on the wings.
PHOTO: NASA (RENDERING)
NASA held a similar competition 10 years ago that focused more on the efficiency of the designs than the ability to make them commercially feasible. Now, it is focused on aircraft that are more efficient and can enter the fleet to make a difference to aviation industry emissions. “We’ve been working on advanced configurations for 20 years, but last time I went to the airport I didn’t see any of them flying around,” says Brent Cobleigh, NASA’s Flight Demonstrations and Capabilities Project Manager.
Aircraft designers have coalesced around three main designs, which people involved in the latest contest said are expected to feature prominently in the entries. They carry exotic names—such as transonic truss-braced wings, blended-wing bodies and double bubbles—that reflect how far removed they are from most of the conventional planes that now carry commercial passengers worldwide.
NASA earmarked only around $1 billion of its $26 billion fiscal 2023 budget request for aircraft-related activities, in line with past years, but officials say its work has influenced every part of planes now flying. The agency plans to additionally dip into its space budget to fund part of the construction and testing of the winning design, which it plans to announce in January. New airplanes developed this century by Airbus SE and Boeing have required investments of $10 billion or more, so any future aircraft will require significant external funding.
Such designs promise improved fuel efficiency and lower emissions, mainly from reducing aerodynamic drag, says Prof. R. John Hansman, head of the International Center for Air Transportation at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The blended-wing models and double bubbles—which combine two almost round fuselages—use the main body of the plane to provide lift, rather than relying mainly on the wings, Prof. Hansman says. They also don’t need drag-inducing tailplanes.
A joint effort by NASA and Boeing led to transonic truss-braced wing models with long, thin wings that reduce drag in flight but need support struts.
PHOTO: NASA (RENDERING)
Transonic truss-braced wing models use a conventional passenger tube, which is aerodynamically efficient and an easy shape to pressurize so passengers can breathe oxygen at altitude. They incorporate long, thin wings that have less drag in flight than conventional ones, but are more delicate and need support struts to reduce the stress where they join the body.
While Boeing and rival Airbus have worked on radical designs for years, airlines have preferred the cheaper option of incremental improvements to conventional planes. Aircraft makers have been reluctant to move first, given the huge investment required for all-new designs.
Big aircraft buyers, like the broader industry, support the aims of reducing its climate footprint. But they question the economics of new designs. “Will the world beat a path to its door?” says John Plueger, chief executive of Air Lease Corp. , one of the world’s largest jetliner-rental companies.
“If we don’t do this there will never be change,” says Rich Wahls, NASA’s mission integration manager for its Sustainable Flight National Partnership program, which includes the plane-design contest. “We have to get this into the fleet quickly to make a climate impact.”
Entrants to the NASA competition had to demonstrate their designs can be mass-produced at 60 planes a month, Mr. Wahls says. The contest is being run in parallel with the industry’s efforts to develop new power systems, including alternatives to jet fuel such as hydrogen and electricity, as well as composite materials and new manufacturing systems.
A blended-wing design developed at the German Aerospace Center would seat 500 passengers.
PHOTO: GERMAN AEROSPACE CENTER (RENDERING)
“I believe in 20 years we’ll see something that looks different,” he says.
NASA says one of its aims is to create a “national champion” to give the aircraft-manufacturing export sector—the U.S.’s largest—a first-mover advantage. European countries, notably France, Germany and the U.K., as well as China, Japan and South Korea are also eyeing the big leap into an all-new plane design.
The agency says it will be a true contest, despite Boeing’s dominance of the U.S. market in producing large commercial aircraft. The company is already working with NASA on a truss-braced wing design.
Boeing says it has been researching the concept for more than a decade, and sees significant potential benefits in fuel consumption and emissions. “Because we are in an active competition, we cannot comment further at this time,” the company said.
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In the competition to build a new kind of jetliner, Mr. Wahls says he doesn’t expect to see anything like the 300-plus companies vying to create air taxis, but finds no shortage of nontraditional players. “There’s a lot of rich people out there. You get the right one…,” he says.
But a new jetliner design will likely face one of the same challenges seen in the nascent air-taxi business: convincing people to fly on something unfamiliar. NASA says passenger acceptability is one of the criteria built into its contest.
Earlier studies of flying-wing designs found that being on the outside seats was no bumpier than flying in the back seat of a Boeing 747, Mr. Wahls says. Some studies also have shown that such designs could be evacuated as quickly as a conventional design, he says.
As leaders of the contest, Mr. Wahls and Mr. Cobleigh won’t discuss what kind of aircraft they expect to see at airports in the late 2030s. In a video interview for this story neither had any visible photographs, renderings or models in the background—not so much as a child’s drawing. “I’m afraid to show any configuration as it looks like I’m favoring one,” says Mr. Cobleigh, whose presentations right now feature nature photos rather than planes.