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A Continued Russian Invasion of Ukraine – Six Scenarios in Three Maps

From Seth Jones/CSIS (mid-January):

1. Redeploy some of its ground forces away from the Ukrainian border—at least temporarily—if negotiations are successful but continue to aid pro-Russian rebels in Eastern Ukraine.

2. Send conventional Russian troops into the breakaway regions of Donetsk and Luhansk as unilateral “peacekeepers” and refuse to withdraw them until peace talks end successfully and Kiev agrees to implement the Minsk Accords.

3. Seize Ukrainian territory as far west as the Dnepr River to use as a bargaining chip or incorporate this new territory fully into the Russian Federation. This option is represented in Figure 2a.

4. Seize Ukrainian territory up to the Dnepr River and seize an additional belt of land (to include Odessa) that connects Russian territory with the breakaway Transdniestria Republic and separates Ukraine from any access to the Black Sea. The Kremlin would incorporate these new lands into Russia and ensure that the rump Ukrainian statelet remains economically unviable.

5. Seize only a belt of land between Russia and Transdniestria (including Mariupol, Kherson, and Odessa) to secure freshwater supplies for Crimea and block Ukraine’s access to the sea, while avoiding major combat over Kiev and Kharkiv. This option is represented in Figure 2b.

6. Seize all of Ukraine and, with Belarus, announce the formation of a new tripartite Slavic union of Great, Little, and White Russians (Russians, Ukrainians, and Belarusians). This option would involve operations represented in Figure 2a as “phase one,” with Figure 2c representing “phase two” of this option.

Here are the relevant maps.

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Nowcasting, Big Data, MIDAS, Lasso, etc.

I get the impression that people mix up things that are logically distinct, even if they might overlap. For instance, one reader says criticizes the failure to use big data at the Fed [1] [2] (see this post for a rejoinder) and in a closely adjoining comment, contrasts the GDPNow series run by the Atlanta Fed and the absence of a global counterpart at the Board. Let’s define some terms, so people who are inclined toward confusion become less confused.

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“Big Data” at the Fed

A reader bewails the failure of the Fed to use “new” tools like “big data”. And yet, 10 seconds to type into the Fed’s search engine yields dozens of pages of results. Why is it that some people fail to understand the limitations of their own knowledge, and simultaneously refuse to use “search engines”. Anyway, here’s excerpts from the first two pages of results:

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