Monday, March 17, 2014

From Sochi to Sevastopol

from Google Maps


"What Did Sochi Get for $51 Billion? Highways, Railroads and a Lot of White Elephants," scoffed Alec Luhn in The Nation last month.
Don't forget the new airport, Alec. And the new port.


Further up the coast is the "Hero City" and major port of Novorossiisk. Also being developed.
 
An hour away on the M25, northeastwards, is Anapa:

 
(Source, if you need to look more closely)
(Source)

(Source)





Poor, dumb President Putin! He simply can't see how he has wasted all that money developing Russian assets on the Black Sea.

Nor, to be frank, can I.

Watch for (a) destabilising tendencies in Greece and (b) a gradual rise in the commercial fortunes of Thessaloniki. And - who knows? - a revival of nostalgic sentiment among the descendants of Pontic Greeks (many of whom now speak Russian) in northern Turkey, Georgia and the Ukraine.

Currently, the Bosphorus Strait is 35 metres deep at its shallowest northern part.

READER: PLEASE CLICK THE REACTION BELOW - THANKS!

All original material is copyright of its author. Fair use permitted. Contact via comment. Unless indicated otherwise, all internet links accessed at time of writing. Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog; or for unintentional error and inaccuracy. The blog author may have, or intend to change, a personal position in any stock or other kind of investment mentioned.

2 comments:

James Higham said...

Really rather interesting, that pipeline. It will make things easier.

James Higham said...

Yes, South Stream and the newly gained Crimean ports, plus the new ones are pretty clear. Seems to me it's all the more reason not to take the army in to the Ukraine. There's sufficient blackmail as it is.

For rational people, that is. The Right Sector is not rational. It is nationalistic. Whichever scenario plays out, the ordinary people of the Ukraine will suffer yet again.