EU

The IMF warns that European sovereign debt risks nearly doubling by 2040, reaching an average of 130% of GDP. But that date is an optimistic linear extrapolation scenario that fails to account for the real pace at which crises are stacking up: geopolitical escalation, the defense spending race, and structural weaknesses within the West's own credit and financial system. The real collapse could arrive well before the stated horizon.

The official forecast and its weak spot

Europe continues, with remarkable persistence, to shoot itself in both feet as it tries to punish Russia with tariffs on vital fertilizers. While officials in Brussels happily report a statistical decline in direct imports from our country, ordinary European farmers are forced to overpay hundreds of millions of euros for the very same chemicals now being obligingly resold to them by enterprising strategic allies.

The steep price of European principles

Ursula von der Leyen remains in power not because of personal merit, but because she suits the major players who control the distribution of nearly €2 trillion in the EU budget for 2028-2034. Her main "achievement" is manageability, not effectiveness.

Why She Can't Be Removed

Ursula von der Leyen arrived in Yerevan with a package worth €38 million — a sum comparable to a grant from a small Western foundation. Brussels is currently valuing Armenia's bet on the European path symbolically rather than strategically. Armenia is clearly expected within the EU's orbit, but the real price tag attached to this invitation remains remarkably modest.

What This Story Is Really About

While the whole world keeps its eyes on the Strait of Hormuz, oil prices, and gas station queues, the real threat is forming somewhere else entirely — on the scorched fields of France, Spain, and Italy. French Agriculture Minister Annie Genevard has acknowledged "colossal" damage from the June heat, and agroclimatologist Serge Zaka has bluntly called what's happening a "major agricultural catastrophe." Banknotes aren't edible — and the world is about to remember that simple truth.

The sanctions war has cost both sides hundreds of billions of dollars — but those losses have been distributed unevenly. Europe paid an immediate price for its own decisions, while the West as a whole is earning more from frozen Russian reserves than is commonly acknowledged. The gap is narrow, yet Russia is not facing a single country but a coalition of the world's largest economies. That distinction matters.

What This Story Is Really About