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Área Livre-Outras Temáticas de Defesa / Re: Espaço
« Última mensagem por Lusitano89 em Hoje às 11:00:02 am »STARSHIP pode voar em março, Artemis 2 é adiada e Falcon 9 passa por falha
Mensagens recentes
2
Força Aérea Portuguesa / Re: Programa de substituição do C-130
« Última mensagem por Lampuka em Hoje às 10:36:22 am »3
Mundo / Re: União Europeia
« Última mensagem por Viajante em Hoje às 10:15:50 am »Europe is not as weak as it acts
Many were mesmerised by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s Davos speech three weeks ago. He told “middle powers” to drop the pretence that the US-founded rules-based order delivered what it promised, and to pair up with like-minded countries when and where they could.
But in a speech in Leuven last week, Europe’s supreme elder statesman, Mario Draghi, saw Carney’s hand and raised it. The old order is indeed “defunct”, he said — but not “because it was built on illusion. It delivered real and widely shared gains.” What it could not survive was the willed weaponisation of economic interdependence. The EU’s response — strengthening domestic capabilities while seeking deeper relationships where possible — is very Carneyesque. But, Draghi warned, this can only ever be a “holding strategy”.
The reason? “Individually, most EU countries are not even middle powers capable of navigating this new order by forming coalitions,” Draghi said. “[But of] all those now caught between the US and China, Europeans alone have the option to become a genuine power themselves.” In short, Europe is not Canada: it must either accept the greatness being thrust upon it, or be divided and ruled.
But how? Draghi’s answer is a “pragmatic federalism” — where EU members willing to share more sovereignty opt in to unite in as many areas as they can find ways to progress in. On the ground, this approach is already being put to the test.
Take the Spanish-led “competitiveness lab” initiative, open to EU members keen to accelerate common rules for financial markets. Perhaps in reaction, the finance ministers of the six largest EU economies recently vowed to forge agreements between themselves. To rebut the inevitable charge that this is a wreckers’ initiative, however, the group had better produce serious progress fast.
In security and defence, the new Safe common borrowing facility covers only about half of EU countries (and includes a few non-EU ones). Strong proposals now exist for coalitions of willing European capitals to jointly fund and build strategic military capacities previously provided by the US. In macro policy, leaders have agreed to issue new EU bonds (for Ukraine) but with side payments to let unwilling countries in effect opt out.
The increasingly geopolitical approach to EU enlargement supports a similar “pragmatically federal” logic. As the FT reports, the high stakes surrounding Ukraine’s future have provoked discussion of turning the current accession process on its head. Instead of crowning a long process of EU alignment, membership would instead come first, but with only core rights and obligations. More would be added gradually as and when the new member gets through the required reforms at home.
Such a template could invigorate talks with other EU candidates, including Turkey, whose long-frozen relationship with the bloc has been showing faint hints of a thaw. A less binary membership path could also be attractive to Iceland, due a referendum soon, Norway and even the UK. If the eventual result is a larger EU but one of many speeds, it would be not by design but through the organic growing together of those wanting to do more in common.
Still, many will think Draghi’s pragmatic federalism doomed by Europe’s internal divisions. US Treasury secretary Scott Bessent hit a nerve with his lethal quip about the EU wheeling out its “dreaded working group”. Draghi offers two insights in response.
First, lack of unity is not an argument for waiting to act: “Unity does not precede action; it is forged by taking consequential decisions together, by the shared experience and solidarity they create, and by discovering that we can bear the result.” When Europeans dared to jointly push back against Donald Trump’s claim on Greenland, they were forced to “carry out a genuine strategic assessment”, and the “willingness to act” clarified “the capacity to act”.
Second, Europe’s necessity to bring people on board — the demands of a union of national democracies — is itself a precious value. Where the US system lets the executive ram its will through and China happily pushes the cost of its economic advance on to other economies, Draghi points out that “European integration is built differently: not on force, but common will; not on subjugation, but shared benefit”.
Europeans are, slowly but surely, waking up to what they are able to do. Something a senior EU minister said to me recently is typical of this shift: “Europe is not as weak as it behaves.”
https://www.ft.com/content/52d2b108-7a9e-4558-abb3-920adc60bf24
Uma visão muito pragmática do Mario Draghi que aponta para uma maior integração da UE e fala mesmo num Federalismo Pragmático, se os países concordarem ceder mais soberania para a UE. Se quiserem ser novamente uma potência mundial (economicamente já o são) e se os egos permitirem!
Many were mesmerised by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s Davos speech three weeks ago. He told “middle powers” to drop the pretence that the US-founded rules-based order delivered what it promised, and to pair up with like-minded countries when and where they could.
But in a speech in Leuven last week, Europe’s supreme elder statesman, Mario Draghi, saw Carney’s hand and raised it. The old order is indeed “defunct”, he said — but not “because it was built on illusion. It delivered real and widely shared gains.” What it could not survive was the willed weaponisation of economic interdependence. The EU’s response — strengthening domestic capabilities while seeking deeper relationships where possible — is very Carneyesque. But, Draghi warned, this can only ever be a “holding strategy”.
The reason? “Individually, most EU countries are not even middle powers capable of navigating this new order by forming coalitions,” Draghi said. “[But of] all those now caught between the US and China, Europeans alone have the option to become a genuine power themselves.” In short, Europe is not Canada: it must either accept the greatness being thrust upon it, or be divided and ruled.
But how? Draghi’s answer is a “pragmatic federalism” — where EU members willing to share more sovereignty opt in to unite in as many areas as they can find ways to progress in. On the ground, this approach is already being put to the test.
Take the Spanish-led “competitiveness lab” initiative, open to EU members keen to accelerate common rules for financial markets. Perhaps in reaction, the finance ministers of the six largest EU economies recently vowed to forge agreements between themselves. To rebut the inevitable charge that this is a wreckers’ initiative, however, the group had better produce serious progress fast.
In security and defence, the new Safe common borrowing facility covers only about half of EU countries (and includes a few non-EU ones). Strong proposals now exist for coalitions of willing European capitals to jointly fund and build strategic military capacities previously provided by the US. In macro policy, leaders have agreed to issue new EU bonds (for Ukraine) but with side payments to let unwilling countries in effect opt out.
The increasingly geopolitical approach to EU enlargement supports a similar “pragmatically federal” logic. As the FT reports, the high stakes surrounding Ukraine’s future have provoked discussion of turning the current accession process on its head. Instead of crowning a long process of EU alignment, membership would instead come first, but with only core rights and obligations. More would be added gradually as and when the new member gets through the required reforms at home.
Such a template could invigorate talks with other EU candidates, including Turkey, whose long-frozen relationship with the bloc has been showing faint hints of a thaw. A less binary membership path could also be attractive to Iceland, due a referendum soon, Norway and even the UK. If the eventual result is a larger EU but one of many speeds, it would be not by design but through the organic growing together of those wanting to do more in common.
Still, many will think Draghi’s pragmatic federalism doomed by Europe’s internal divisions. US Treasury secretary Scott Bessent hit a nerve with his lethal quip about the EU wheeling out its “dreaded working group”. Draghi offers two insights in response.
First, lack of unity is not an argument for waiting to act: “Unity does not precede action; it is forged by taking consequential decisions together, by the shared experience and solidarity they create, and by discovering that we can bear the result.” When Europeans dared to jointly push back against Donald Trump’s claim on Greenland, they were forced to “carry out a genuine strategic assessment”, and the “willingness to act” clarified “the capacity to act”.
Second, Europe’s necessity to bring people on board — the demands of a union of national democracies — is itself a precious value. Where the US system lets the executive ram its will through and China happily pushes the cost of its economic advance on to other economies, Draghi points out that “European integration is built differently: not on force, but common will; not on subjugation, but shared benefit”.
Europeans are, slowly but surely, waking up to what they are able to do. Something a senior EU minister said to me recently is typical of this shift: “Europe is not as weak as it behaves.”
https://www.ft.com/content/52d2b108-7a9e-4558-abb3-920adc60bf24
Uma visão muito pragmática do Mario Draghi que aponta para uma maior integração da UE e fala mesmo num Federalismo Pragmático, se os países concordarem ceder mais soberania para a UE. Se quiserem ser novamente uma potência mundial (economicamente já o são) e se os egos permitirem!
4
Mundo / Re: União Europeia
« Última mensagem por Viajante em Hoje às 10:06:15 am »European alternatives to Visa and Mastercard ‘urgently’ needed, says banking chief
US payment processing companies account for about two-thirds of card transactions in Eurozone
Europe “urgently” needs to reduce its reliance on US groups such as Visa and Mastercard, the head of a banking alliance has said, as officials warn that their market dominance could be weaponised if transatlantic relations were to deteriorate.
“We are highly dependent on international [payment] solutions,” said Martina Weimert, chief executive of the European Payments Initiative (EPI), a consortium of 16 European banks and financial services companies.
“Yes, we have nice national assets like domestic [payment] card schemes . . . but we don’t have anything cross-border.’’
“If we say independence is so crucial and we all know it’s a timing issue . . . we need action urgently,’’ she said.
Visa and Mastercard accounted for almost two-thirds of card transactions in the Eurozone in 2022, according to the European Central Bank, with 13 member countries lacking a national alternative to the US providers. Even where domestic schemes exist, they are declining in use.
With cash use falling, European officials have become increasingly concerned that US payment companies’ power could be weaponised in the event of a serious breakdown in relations.
It is one of several critical areas where officials fear the bloc has become too dependent on US companies, with Belgium’s cyber security chief recently warning that Europe had “lost the internet” owing to the dominance of American tech giants.
“Deep integration created dependencies that could be abused when not all partners were allies,” warned Mario Draghi, former ECB president, in a recent speech. “Interdependence, once seen as a source of mutual restraint, became a source of leverage and control.”
The EPI, whose members include BNP Paribas and Deutsche Bank, launched a European alternative to Apple Pay called Wero in 2024. The digital payments scheme now claims to have 48.5mn users in Belgium, France and Germany, with plans to expand to online and in-store payments by 2027.
Weimert said banks and merchants largely had ‘’awareness’‘ of the need to build a cross-border European payments network, but the “geopolitical context” meant it was now “becoming a mainstream topic”.
The ECB said that private sector initiatives in the past, including an earlier plan by the EPI to launch a rival card scheme, “have shown the difficulty of scaling”, with a spokesperson citing how “actors involved struggle to align on common standards”.
The central bank is promoting the digital euro, a public initiative to make payments digitally across the Eurozone, to strengthen the bloc’s monetary sovereignty.
Piero Cipollone, the ECB executive board member in charge of the project, emphasised its importance last week. “As European citizens, we want to avoid a situation where Europe is overly dependent on payment systems that are not in our hands,” he said.
The project is proving divisive among European politicians, and some lenders have lobbied against it, claiming it would undermine private-sector efforts. A vote in the European parliament later this year is likely to go down to the wire.
Merchants in the Eurozone would need to accept digital euros in store and online by 2029, when the ECB plans to start issuing the token. The underlying infrastructure would also be open to private-sector initiatives to build on.
The digital euro could ‘‘provide this foundation upon which, after consolidation, the equivalent of a European Visa or Mastercard can potentially be built”, said Aurore Lalucq, chair of the European parliament’s economic committee and a supporter of the project.
But Weimert warned that if geopolitical tensions were to deteriorate, the digital euro could arrive too late.
“The problem with the digital euro is it will come in a couple of years, maybe after the mandate of [US President] Donald Trump. So I think we are a little bit out of time,” she added.
https://www.ft.com/content/fcc215bb-b7b8-4a62-87ed-03f603eb3d14
US payment processing companies account for about two-thirds of card transactions in Eurozone
Europe “urgently” needs to reduce its reliance on US groups such as Visa and Mastercard, the head of a banking alliance has said, as officials warn that their market dominance could be weaponised if transatlantic relations were to deteriorate.
“We are highly dependent on international [payment] solutions,” said Martina Weimert, chief executive of the European Payments Initiative (EPI), a consortium of 16 European banks and financial services companies.
“Yes, we have nice national assets like domestic [payment] card schemes . . . but we don’t have anything cross-border.’’
“If we say independence is so crucial and we all know it’s a timing issue . . . we need action urgently,’’ she said.
Visa and Mastercard accounted for almost two-thirds of card transactions in the Eurozone in 2022, according to the European Central Bank, with 13 member countries lacking a national alternative to the US providers. Even where domestic schemes exist, they are declining in use.
With cash use falling, European officials have become increasingly concerned that US payment companies’ power could be weaponised in the event of a serious breakdown in relations.
It is one of several critical areas where officials fear the bloc has become too dependent on US companies, with Belgium’s cyber security chief recently warning that Europe had “lost the internet” owing to the dominance of American tech giants.
“Deep integration created dependencies that could be abused when not all partners were allies,” warned Mario Draghi, former ECB president, in a recent speech. “Interdependence, once seen as a source of mutual restraint, became a source of leverage and control.”
The EPI, whose members include BNP Paribas and Deutsche Bank, launched a European alternative to Apple Pay called Wero in 2024. The digital payments scheme now claims to have 48.5mn users in Belgium, France and Germany, with plans to expand to online and in-store payments by 2027.
Weimert said banks and merchants largely had ‘’awareness’‘ of the need to build a cross-border European payments network, but the “geopolitical context” meant it was now “becoming a mainstream topic”.
The ECB said that private sector initiatives in the past, including an earlier plan by the EPI to launch a rival card scheme, “have shown the difficulty of scaling”, with a spokesperson citing how “actors involved struggle to align on common standards”.
The central bank is promoting the digital euro, a public initiative to make payments digitally across the Eurozone, to strengthen the bloc’s monetary sovereignty.
Piero Cipollone, the ECB executive board member in charge of the project, emphasised its importance last week. “As European citizens, we want to avoid a situation where Europe is overly dependent on payment systems that are not in our hands,” he said.
The project is proving divisive among European politicians, and some lenders have lobbied against it, claiming it would undermine private-sector efforts. A vote in the European parliament later this year is likely to go down to the wire.
Merchants in the Eurozone would need to accept digital euros in store and online by 2029, when the ECB plans to start issuing the token. The underlying infrastructure would also be open to private-sector initiatives to build on.
The digital euro could ‘‘provide this foundation upon which, after consolidation, the equivalent of a European Visa or Mastercard can potentially be built”, said Aurore Lalucq, chair of the European parliament’s economic committee and a supporter of the project.
But Weimert warned that if geopolitical tensions were to deteriorate, the digital euro could arrive too late.
“The problem with the digital euro is it will come in a couple of years, maybe after the mandate of [US President] Donald Trump. So I think we are a little bit out of time,” she added.
https://www.ft.com/content/fcc215bb-b7b8-4a62-87ed-03f603eb3d14
5
Forças de Segurança / Consumo, tráfico e prova: notas críticas sobre o regime jurídico da droga
« Última mensagem por O Portal do Direito em Hoje às 10:05:41 am »👉 Consumo, tráfico e prova: notas críticas sobre a reforma do regime jurídico da droga
Há mais droga a circular nas ruas, mas há menos certezas no direito penal.
A nova Lei da Droga descriminalizou o consumo, mas criou um indício de tráfico que levanta dúvidas sérias de prova, constitucionalidade e proporcionalidade da intervenção policial.
-- Onde acaba o consumo e começa o tráfico?
-- Dez gramas bastam para deter alguém?
Uma leitura crítica do art.º 40.º da Lei da Droga e das suas contradições.
https://oportaldodireito.blogspot.com/2026/02/consumo-trafico-e-prova-notas-criticas.html
Há mais droga a circular nas ruas, mas há menos certezas no direito penal.
A nova Lei da Droga descriminalizou o consumo, mas criou um indício de tráfico que levanta dúvidas sérias de prova, constitucionalidade e proporcionalidade da intervenção policial.
-- Onde acaba o consumo e começa o tráfico?
-- Dez gramas bastam para deter alguém?
Uma leitura crítica do art.º 40.º da Lei da Droga e das suas contradições.
https://oportaldodireito.blogspot.com/2026/02/consumo-trafico-e-prova-notas-criticas.html
6
Armadas/Sistemas de Armas / Re: Marinha de Guerra Dinamarquesa
« Última mensagem por P44 em Hoje às 09:52:07 am »The parties to the Danish Defence Agreement have decided on a distributed construction strategy for five new Arctic patrol vessels for the Danish Navy. This was announced in a press release by the Danish Ministry of Defence on 02 February 2026.
https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2026/02/denmark-decides-on-construction-strategy-for-arctic-vessels/
https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2026/02/denmark-decides-on-construction-strategy-for-arctic-vessels/
7
Força Aérea Portuguesa / Re: Força Aérea Portuguesa: Album de Fotografias
« Última mensagem por mafets em Hoje às 09:44:35 am »F16
Saudações
Saudações
8
Forças Aéreas/Sistemas de Armas / Re: Fotos Internacionais (Forças Aéreas/Sistemas de Armas)
« Última mensagem por mafets em Hoje às 09:40:58 am »J10
Saudações
Saudações
9
Forças Aéreas/Sistemas de Armas / Re: F-35 JSF
« Última mensagem por P44 em Hoje às 09:31:28 am »Polônia avança na entrega dos F-35A Husarz e se aproxima de receber os primeiros caças em seu território.
https://www-cavok-com-br.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.cavok.com.br/polonia-avanca-na-entrega-dos-f-35a-husarz-e-se-aproxima-de-receber-os-primeiros-cacas-em-seu-territorio/
https://www-cavok-com-br.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.cavok.com.br/polonia-avanca-na-entrega-dos-f-35a-husarz-e-se-aproxima-de-receber-os-primeiros-cacas-em-seu-territorio/
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Forças Aéreas/Sistemas de Armas / Re: F-35 JSF
« Última mensagem por P44 em Hoje às 09:31:06 am »Polônia avança na entrega dos F-35A Husarz e se aproxima de receber os primeiros caças em seu território.
https://www-cavok-com-br.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.cavok.com.br/polonia-avanca-na-entrega-dos-f-35a-husarz-e-se-aproxima-de-receber-os-primeiros-cacas-em-seu-territorio
https://www-cavok-com-br.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.cavok.com.br/polonia-avanca-na-entrega-dos-f-35a-husarz-e-se-aproxima-de-receber-os-primeiros-cacas-em-seu-territorio