Franka Lu retweetet
Washington Post calls for assassinating foreign officials, I remember a time when you would be out on a terrorism watch list for publishing this kind of stuff
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Franka Lu
616 posts
Franka Lu
@FrankaLu
Columnist for @zeitonline. All opinions are my own. Buckled up for the future. China, Europe, destructing authoritarianism/totalitarianism/patriarchy
Beigetreten Mart 2022
240 Folgt2K Follower
Franka Lu retweetet
Applebaum's piece from March 2025 is worth reading today because it answers the question implicit in Vance's trip: what exactly are MAGA conservatives flying to Budapest to celebrate?
It is not prosperity. Hungary is at or near the bottom of the EU on economic freedom, government integrity, and GDP growth. It is not the birth rate - the population is shrinking despite Orbán's family values rhetoric. It is not the health system - departments are closing as doctors emigrate. It is not the universities - one was shut down entirely.
What the American right finds inspiring is the mechanism of control: the civil service replaced by loyalists, the press captured through economic pressure, the courts politicized, the constitution rewritten to entrench electoral advantages. Steve Bannon called it an inspiration. Heritage's Kevin Roberts called it the model.
The Heritage Foundation's own Index of Economic Freedom ranks Hungary at the bottom of the EU for government integrity. Its president goes to Budapest to celebrate anyway.
Applebaum's closing observation is precise: as inspectors general are fired, as the FBI and DOJ are captured by partisans, as civil service protections are stripped - America is moving toward the Hungarian model. That model produces Hungarian outcomes. Hungarian stagnation. Hungarian corruption. Hungarian poverty.
Vance landed today. The election is Sunday. Magyar is 20 points ahead in a rigged system. The Vice President is not there for the Hungarian people.
Anne Applebaum@anneapplebaum
In honor of Vance's visit to Hungary, where he will campaign for Viktor Orban, I am reposting this article: Orban's Hungary is one of the poorest countries, and certainly the most corrupt and least free country, in the EU. Vance wants this for America? theatlantic.com/magazine/archi…
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I wonder whether Pakistan PM deliberately posted the unedited message from the White House as a revenge for being instrumentalized in a farce.
Adam Cochran (adamscochran.eth)@adamscochran
FT has confirmed what we all speculated from the “Draft for Pakistan PM” post. The White House pushed Pakistan into brokering this “ceasefire” as Trump was desperate for an out. Iran had to be dragged to the table, which is why their demands have not changed and why this peace will breakdown as neither want to budge on terms. Trump is trying to negotiate as if he has leverage, and he doesn’t. But his inability to cede points, means we’re not any closer to a resolve.
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Franka Lu retweetet
Asian Century update: the entire mediation process for this conflict was managed by Pakistan, China, Turkey and Egypt with no active input from any European country.
Ursula von der Leyen@vonderleyen
I welcome the two-week ceasefire the US and Iran agreed last night. It brings much-needed de-escalation. I thank Pakistan for its mediation. Now it is crucial that negotiations for an enduring solution to this conflict continue. We will continue coordinating with our partners to this end.
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Franka Lu retweetet
Trump will discuss the U.S. withdrawing from NATO with Secretary General Rutte today.
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Franka Lu retweetet
This is just too funny 🤦♂️
Trump's justification for extending his deadline by 2 weeks is that Pakistan's Prime Minister "requested" it.
But when you look at the edit history of the post in question by Pakistan's PM, where he "requests" the extension, it's painfully obvious it was sent to him by the White House since he first stupidly posted it with the mention "Draft - Pakistan's PM Message on X" 🤣
Ryan Grim@ryangrim
Oh, this is unbelievable. The edit history on this tweet shows that Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif originally copied and pasted everything he was sent, including: "*Draft - Pakistan's PM Message on X*" Now, obviously, Sharif's own staff don't call him "Pakistan's PM," they would just call him prime minister. The U.S. and Israel, of course, would call him "Pakistan's PM." Would be funny if the fate of the world wasn't hanging in the balance.
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Franka Lu retweetet
Trump has insulted and tariffed his European allies, persuaded Denmark to prepare for a US invasion and, by pressuring Ukraine and not Russia, encouraged Putin to keep fighting. All of which he has forgotten.
theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/03/…
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Franka Lu retweetet
This is stunning: it looks like Iran degraded American military bases into unusability across an entire theater, simultaneously.
As far as I know, no other U.S. adversary has achieved that, ever.
This is directly reported in the NYT (nytimes.com/2026/03/25/us/…): they write that Iran has rendered "many of the 13 military bases in the region used by American troops [...] all but uninhabitable."
As the article describes, "there were close to 40,000 U.S. troops in the region when the war started, and Central Command has dispersed thousands of them, some to as far away as Europe."
Those troops that do remain are "not on their original bases" but have been "relocated to hotels and office spaces throughout the region."
Genuinely incredible.
Arnaud Bertrand@RnaudBertrand
I don't think people realize just how extraordinary what we're witnessing with Iran is. I was arguing with a dear journalist friend of mine yesterday who was telling me that Iran was winning, yes, but only on the strategic level, not tactically. The type of thing a skinny kid getting stuffed in lockers in highschool tells himself to make himself feel better: "These people will BEG to work for me in ten years. Everyone knows jocks peak in highschool. They'll literally beg." 😏 I think that's precisely wrong, and that's what makes the Iran war different. As of now, Iran is in fact holding its own tactically too. Think about other U.S. wars of aggression these past few decades. Take Vietnam, Afghanistan, Libya, Iraq, Serbia, etc. (the list is unfortunately very long). The pattern was roughly always the same with an immense power differential between aggressor and victim. These wars were, by and large, imperial: the empire attempting to crush a much weaker people whose only realistic recourse was guerrilla resistance. And that is when they actually had the will to resist: some - like Libya - barely even bothered, just resigning themselves to their fate (despite being, at the time, the richest country in Africa). As spectators of these wars, if you had any moral sense, the dominant emotion was a kind of helpless disgust: you were watching a giant stomp through someone else's house. Sure, the U.S. actually lost many - if not most - of these wars, famously replacing the Taliban with the Taliban or being expelled with their tail between their legs from Vietnam, but the power differential was no less real for it. It's just that power doesn't always guarantee victory: sometimes the giant can't kill everyone, and eventually tires of trying. But the “victories” won this way were always pyrrhic at best: the people endured, yes, but what they were left with was a country in ashes that takes decades to rebuild. Meanwhile, in the grand scheme of things, the giant walked away with little more than a bruised ego. Iran is - remarkably - proving to be an entirely different beast: when others were merely surviving a giant, Iran appears to be able to compete with one. What just happened over the past 48 hours is the best illustration of this. You had the President of the United States issue a formal ultimatum: reopen the Strait of Hormuz within 48 hours or we "obliterate" your power grid. Iran's response was essentially: we dare you, if you do this we'll make all your Gulf allies uninhabitable within a week. And, as we saw, Trump backed down: pretexting non-existent "VERY GOOD AND PRODUCTIVE CONVERSATIONS" with Iran, he said his ultimatum no-longer applied (or, rather, became 5 days). Adding he now envisaged the Strait of Hormuz being “jointly controlled by me and the Ayatollah.” To the amusement of Iran’s diplomacy (x.com/IraninSA/statu…). That, folks, is a textbook tactical victory. It is, remarkably, Iran demonstrating in this instance that it had escalation dominance over the United States of America. That is, the ability to credibly threaten consequences so severe that the US - for perhaps the first time since the Cold War - found it preferable to stand down. That's no skinny kid being locked in a locker dreaming of revenge fantasies. That's the kid grabbing the bully's wrist mid-shove and watching his face change. And it's not the only tactical victory in this war so far. Take the episode over the Israeli attack on Iran's South Pars gas facility. Iran had warned that if that happened U.S. allies in the region - including Israel - would face a symmetrical response. And they delivered: famously devastating Qatar's Ras Laffan facility - which produced roughly 20% of global LNG supply - and leading, according to Qatar themselves, to a $20 billion loss of annual revenue for the next 5 years (oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-…). Not only that but they also managed to hit Israel's Haifa refinery (aljazeera.com/news/2026/3/19…), one of the country's most strategic and protected sites. The result was Trump distancing himself from the South Pars attack, saying that Israel had "violently lashed out" unilaterally and that "NO MORE ATTACKS WILL BE MADE BY ISRAEL pertaining to this extremely important and valuable South Pars Field." Israel then said it wouldn't strike Iran energy sites anymore (bloomberg.com/news/articles/…). From where I stand, that's another tactical victory. It is, at least, Iran demonstrating that is can fight back **symmetrically** against the U.S. and its allies. Not through asymmetric resistance with IEDs hidden in the roadside or traps hidden in the jungle, but eye for eye, and against some of the most heavily protected sites on the U.S.'s side. That's qualitatively different from any other adversaries the U.S. has directly fought in recent wars. There's plenty more, such as the pretty relevant fact that Iran has gained control of the single most strategic energy chokepoint on earth and the U.S. is finding it impossible to break that control. To the point where Trump has been reduced to publicly begging China - of all countries - for help, which given Trump's ego mustn't have been easy to do. Only to be told no. By China. And by everyone else he asked. This is the topic of my latest article: how this is, in fact, the first genuine "multipolar war." First, in the narrow sense: because Iran is revealing itself to be a genuine pole of power - not a superpower, but an actor that cannot be submitted, which is all multipolarity is. And second, because the war itself is accelerating multipolarity everywhere else: the U.S. has never been more isolated, never looked weaker and its security guarantees have never been more hollow. In my article I lay out the full scoreboard - military, economic, political - and explain why this war has already changed the world, regardless of how it ends. Enjoy the read here: open.substack.com/pub/arnaudbert…
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Franka Lu retweetet
National Financial Regulatory Administration says operating capital loans can’t be used for dividend or buying financial products.
Probably means many are doing this in the market.
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Franka Lu retweetet
Top German journalist received €600,000 from Putin ally, leak reveals 🇩🇪 🇷🇺 theguardian.com/world/2023/nov…
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Franka Lu retweetet
I've been reviewing my screenshots archives illustrating Internet censorship in the PRC. I've got images going back to 2008, and one of the most interesting things to me is to find screenshots showing what was NOT being censored back then, but is being censored now. For example:
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Franka Lu retweetet
📢 We're hiring!
We're looking for a Programme Coordinator! The new person will support the development of the programme’s activities, including liaising with advocacy and events organisation, financial management and fundraising. @ECFRStates
buff.ly/3NmYgP0
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Panic & anger spread in China over #FukushimaWaterRelease . Netizens venting hatred towards JP. This video claimed a “Russian expert” suggested using thermonuclear bomb on Japan to “clean the waste water”. Top comment asking for “immediate action” got nearly 150,000 likes.
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Business in China Comes With Risk of Jail: “At least 5,000 foreigners are in Chinese prisons—many for political reasons.” foreignpolicy.com/2023/08/17/chi…
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"As one Brussels-based diplomat put it to me: 'Scholz is killing the economic security strategy before our eyes.' "gmfus.org/news/watching-…
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That’s why I tend to believe that the so-call coup was staged.
Michael McFaul@McFaul
You seize a few cities by force, speed to Moscow where you aim to overthrow the military leadership and kill several Russian pilots along the way, and your punishment is ... praise from Putin, new work contracts or retirement in Belarus. Wow.
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Franka Lu retweetet
Chinese Nuclear plants Releasing Water Containing Tritium at Levels 6.5 Times Higher than Planned Japanese Discharge japannews.yomiuri.co.jp/world/asia-pac…
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Franka Lu retweetet
Instead of doubling down with more force to crush the mutiny, Putin accepted humiliation instead. He was the rat trapped in the corner that so many Putinologists have told us to fear. But he didn't lash out & go crazy. He negotiated & with a traitor. 4/
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