Cai Berger

In Russia there is such a place as the "Yamal Cross". This is the intersection of 17 main gas pipelines, which together transport ~80% of all gas in the Russian Federation. If at least 8 of the 17 pipes fail, which is 47% of the capacity. Russia will be forced to spend $200 mln

🚨🇩🇪 The bedrock of European security is fracturing as the U.S. moves to withdraw 5,000 troops from Germany in a move fueled by political friction. Major General Randy Manner warns that this structural pullback, targeting long-range fire battalions, signals a dangerous shift in the NATO deterrent posture. The lives of thousands of service members are being upended by knee-jerk policy decisions, dictated by social media feuds.

🚜 Farms in the south are struggling: 78% of Southern farmers say they can’t afford all required fertilizer this year, the highest of any region.  The South is exposed for two reasons: crop mix and pre-booking behavior. Just 19% of Southern producers pre-booked fertilizer ahead of the season, vs. 30% in the Northeast, 31% in the West, and 67% in the Midwest.  Cotton, rice, and peanut growers, largely concentrated in the South, barely locked anything in before fertilizer prices skyrocketed. Only 13% of cotton growers and 9% of peanut growers pre-booked.  Those are also the most fertilizer-intensive crops on the board. Rice runs $1,308/acre to produce, peanuts $1,166, and cotton $943 vs. $658 for soybeans and $396 for wheat. U.S. farm sector losses have exceeded $50 billion across the past three crop years. Nearly all (94%) farmers say their financial situation has worsened or stayed the same vs. last year. Farms are getting squeezed.

David Reich on how much ancient DNA evidence has overturned so much consensus thinking how ancient cultures spread. "It wasn't peaceful, it wasn't friendly, it wasn't nice. Some of our archaeologist co-authors were just really distressed."

The big stock market crash following the 1973 oil crisis did not come during the embargo, but in the 6 months after the embargo was lifted. Chart: Bloomberg

🇺🇸🇮🇷 CENTCOM just requested deployment of the Dark Eagle hypersonic missile to the Middle East. This would be the first time the U.S. has ever deployed a hypersonic weapon in combat. Here's why it's being requested now specifically. Iran has spent the ceasefire relocating its ballistic missile launchers deeper into the country, beyond the reach of the Precision Strike Missile, whose range caps out around 500 kilometers. The U.S. burned through its entire PrSM inventory in the opening weeks of this war. The weapon designed to replace it hasn't been declared fully operational yet. Dark Eagle travels at Mach 5 plus, maneuvers unpredictably in the terminal phase, and has a range of over 1,700 miles. No existing Iranian air defense system can intercept it. From launch positions in the Gulf it reaches Tehran in minutes. Now here's the catch nobody is leading with. The Pentagon's own testing office says it won't have enough data to evaluate Dark Eagle's combat effectiveness until early 2027. It has repeatedly failed to launch during tests due to launcher and production quality issues. A defense official told Fox News it has reached "initial operational capability." That is the military's careful way of saying it works, sometimes, under controlled conditions. One senior fellow at the Stimson Center said plainly: "How do you know it is defense budget season in Washington? An unnecessary push to deploy a not-yet-fully-operational hypersonic missile against Iran. Nothing says fund me like first use." There are roughly 8 missiles available. Each costs $15 million. Russia and China have been fielding their own hypersonic weapons for years while the US repeatedly delayed. Deploying Dark Eagle now sends a message to Tehran, Beijing, and Moscow simultaneously. The problem is that message cuts both ways. It signals America's hypersonic era has finally arrived. It also signals that America is considering using an unproven weapon, in combat, for the first time, against a target that has spent the ceasefire hardening and dispersing precisely because it saw this coming. Source: Al Jazeera, CNN, Crisis Group