John S.D. Eisenhower, son of the general, recounts the moment of Germany’s total surrender in his book, “The Bitter Woods: The Battle of the Bulge“:

General Eisenhower was sitting in his office awaiting the outcome of the surrender negotiations. Past the desk of his secretary and into the office came the Nazis, erect and cold. Eisenhower stood up. Rigid, and fixing a cold eye on his enemies, he demanded, “Do you understand all the provisions of the document you have just signed?”

“Ja!“

“You will, officially and personally, be held responsible if the terms of this surrender are violated, including its provision for German commanders to appear in Berlin at the moment set by the Russian High Command, to accomplish formal surrender to that government. That is all.”

The Nazis saluted and left, and Eisenhower relaxed. A few minutes later he sent a message to the Combined Chiefs of Staff: “The mission of this Allied Force was fulfilled at 0241, local time, May 7th, 1945.”

At first glance it may seem that the War in Ukraine is unrelated to Climate Change. I am not so sure. In fact, I would submit that we cannot begin to address CC without Russia’s defeat.

Prior to Feb-2022, Russia was in the top fossil producing league. When Putin, at his annual public forum, was asked what Russia had done to reduce its CC impact. Here is what he said. How can we make progress with a 900 pound russian bear breathing down our necks?

Russia has been knocked down from the top fossil league, but unless its Ukraine venture ends in utter failure, it will quickly regain that status and earth will lose out to the predatory russian bear.

”Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children . . . This is not a way of life at all in any sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.” Eisenhover – 1953

This is a pretty cool link to visual data analysis

Does “just because we can” imply that we should? Take a look at this? This is a pile of bison skulls. All gathered from carcasses brought down by holiday bison hunters, facilitated by the new railroad lines post US civil war. Yes, the bison was hunted to extinction, and the Indians brought to starvation.

One can draw many parallels. How about a kid in a candy store with a $100 bill? Buying a tin of (near extinct) Romanov caviar? A weekend trip to New York? What is outrageous and what is reasonable. Obviously, for the outrageous folks, nothing is outrageous. It is their right. Or, is it? Take a look at what President Carter had to say about this years ago:

Nov-9-2016, Mountain View, California

In memory of Professor Filson Glanz, UNH.

First; I apologize to the world for the election outcome. It stands in contrast to our California values and vision.

Contrary to popular campaign rhetoric, this election was not about health care, student loans, women’s rights, equal rights, trade, immigration or jobs. All those issues can comfortably be dealt with over time and as we mature as a society. No, the current situation is dark, and the future very sinister because Climate Change has been ridiculed and all our work stands to be steamrolled. The atmospheric greenhouse gas load has achieved a level where it is likely a self-feeding run-away phenomena. Certainly, the quickly accellerating melting of Greenlands icesheet, and beginning methane release of melting tundra organic matter, indicates so.

What can we do? With persistent low fossil fuel prices, there’s little incentive to switch. A carbon tax is now out of the question. The Obama EPA rules will undoubtedly be rewritten. Automotive electrification efforts will surely suffer a serious setback. The same goes with all other fuel efficiency efforts.

California, with our Air Resource Board, will continue to be a bright source in setting new standards. Yet, our local efforts amount to nothing but a trickle in the efforts needed to curtail global warming. George W. Bush cost us a trillion++ dollars and untold lives. I see no reason why D. Trump wont cost us additional trillions, and who knows – perhaps we just lost our last chance to curtail Climate Change.

Congratulations America, you picked a real winner!

Cheers – Mogens Lauritzen

Replies are very much welcome, but please try to stay on topic. If the topic is “global warming and ice melts”, let’s talk about just that and not “solar PV”! I will in the future try to moderate replies by deleting off-topic comments.

Another point; don’t waste yours and my time with offers for commercial services. This site is meant to be informative and we don’t need any third parties to promote it. Let the site promote itself!

Thank you for the feed-back so far. – Mogens Lauritzen