So is Putin going to invade Ukraine anytime soon or..?

[Christoph Stiepermann 1,135]

I had some faint, probably delusional hope that the Russian people would stand up to this lunatic but there isn't a whiff of dissent and their military is obviously all in on the kill the Ukrainian scum mentality judging by the video. That is the one and only way to can defeat tyrannical lunatics with access to a nuclear arsenal is by having his own people turn on him. Any action from other countries would lead to the end of all human life on the planet, but he can't bomb his own country.

 

Maybe I'm being overly optimistic here, but i can't help but think that if we invaded another country unprovoked and footage emerged of an RAF jet taking pot shots at civilian houses for sh!1s and giggles we'd have stormed all government buildings by now and publicly lynched those responsible. I suppose it's a mix of fear and their state controlled media warping the narrative, but it's disappointing

[Capt. Pants 4,234]

36 minutes ago, It's Character Forming said:

So I see UEFA is pulling the Champions League final out of Russia.  Hitting them where it hurts !

Also calls for Russia to be kicked out of the World Cup, and Vettel wants the Russian F1 Grand Prix cancelled.

So this is the sort of world Putin wants for his people, eat, sh1t, then die.

[TheGunnShow 5,940]

11 minutes ago, Christoph Stiepermann said:

I had some faint, probably delusional hope that the Russian people would stand up to this lunatic but there isn't a whiff of dissent and their military is obviously all in on the kill the Ukrainian scum mentality judging by the video. That is the one and only way to can defeat tyrannical lunatics with access to a nuclear arsenal is by having his own people turn on him. Any action from other countries would lead to the end of all human life on the planet, but he can't bomb his own country.

 

Maybe I'm being overly optimistic here, but i can't help but think that if we invaded another country unprovoked and footage emerged of an RAF jet taking pot shots at civilian houses for sh!1s and giggles we'd have stormed all government buildings by now and publicly lynched those responsible. I suppose it's a mix of fear and their state controlled media warping the narrative, but it's disappointing

There are some, but suspect they might be going off a balcony here and there. Dmitry Muratov - a recent Nobel Prize winner, is certainly a dissenter too.

Top hardline Russian general warns Putin NOT to invade Ukraine and accuses him of 'criminal policy' | Daily Mail Online

 

[Herman 9,764]

1 hour ago, ricardo said:

 I refer you to your post of 8 hrs ago.

What, the accurate statement that you will have to accept one day? 

[Yellow Fever 3,783]

I trust we'll be open to taking hundreds of thousands refugees?

[Badger 2,405]

 

 

[TheGunnShow 5,940]

1 minute ago, Yellow Fever said:

I trust we'll be open to taking hundreds of thousands refugees?

They're already coming into Romania from the north as the friend of mine in Iasi has relatives in the far northern city of Suceava, and there are already loads of Ukrainian refugees there. No doubt Moldova (well, not the Transnistrian bit, I suspect) and Slovakia will have plenty to handle right away..

[The Real Buh 3,432]

2 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

I trust we'll be open to taking hundreds of thousands refugees?

It’ll be millions

and the guy you voted for would have allowed Russia to bomb Ukraine from the UK.

[Yellow Fever 3,783]

Just now, TheGunnShow said:

They're already coming into Romania from the north as the friend of mine in Iasi has relatives in the far northern city of Suceava, and there are already loads of Ukrainian refugees there. No doubt Moldova (well, not the Transnistrian bit, I suspect) and Slovakia will have plenty to handle right away..

I'd like to put Trump. Farage, Corbyn, Nevermind, the Fox lot and a lot of those Oligarchs on a plane the other way. Drop them off short of the border and then they can walk back to their 'handlers'. Job well done. Pure 'genius'.

[Christoph Stiepermann 1,135]

3 minutes ago, TheGunnShow said:

There are some, but suspect they might be going off a balcony here and there. Dmitry Muratov - a recent Nobel Prize winner, is certainly a dissenter too.

Top hardline Russian general warns Putin NOT to invade Ukraine and accuses him of 'criminal policy' | Daily Mail Online

 

Yeah I've just seen a few, very brave people but I was hoping to see more fury than protesting. The Russian people surely must be able to view this objectively as their own sons/daughters/friends/family being sent off to be killed or kill innocent people because some insane, power hungry old man has decided it would be funny to play Risk in real life, I don't care how patriotic you are surely you wouldn't tolerate that? 

Now I'm aware the unbelievable sacrifice that would be required by ordinary people to enact such a change, revolutions don't occur without indescribable loss and sacrifice, but it is the only way to end this particular type of evil. We're in an age now where nuclear weapons mean that other countries are powerless to do anything, the burden unfortunately has to fall to it's own citizens. 

[Badger 2,405]

 

 

[1902 1,167]

Honestly, this has very little to do with Brexit, very little to do with Trump (and I was and am opposed to both).

The one thing I would say is that if you look at the the telegraph comments, that is just a load of people blaming "woke" and BLM. Equally irrelevant.

We are ridiculously divided in the West and unfortunately that has crept into the centre of politics, whereby relatively rational people are now blaming each other and a series of unconnected political events as being the cause of a an invasion ordered by a cabal of Ethno-nationalists who have smashed dissent in their own country and have now turned to empire building.

It used to just be the far right and left who looked like Putin's stooges, now loads of us do because we can't stop navel gazing long enough to realise that its not because of ourselves that this crisis was caused, so instead we argue with each other.

Nobody in the West has spent enough on defense outside the US, we are all going to have to cough up now. That's not the EUs fault, but neither are many European countries excused. Also, we have scraped 2% by creative financing, our capabilities are also pretty poor nowadays. It's going to have to go up and eventually we will have to confront Putin, probably over one of the Baltic's.

 

[1902 1,167]

1 minute ago, Christoph Stiepermann said:

Yeah I've just seen a few, very brave people but I was hoping to see more fury than protesting. The Russian people surely must be able to view this objectively as their own sons/daughters/friends/family being sent off to be killed or kill innocent people because some insane, power hungry old man has decided it would be funny to play Risk in real life, I don't care how patriotic you are surely you wouldn't tolerate that? 

Now I'm aware the unbelievable sacrifice that would be required by ordinary people to enact such a change, revolutions don't occur without indescribable loss and sacrifice, but it is the only way to end this particular type of evil. We're in an age now where nuclear weapons mean that other countries are powerless to do anything, the burden unfortunately has to fall to it's own citizens. 

They can see what they see on TV, which is faked footage of Ukrainian artillery hitting nurseries. 

[Yellow Fever 3,783]

3 minutes ago, 1902 said:

 

Nobody in the West has spent enough on defense outside the US, we are all going to have to cough up now. That's not the EUs fault, but neither are many European countries excused. Also, we have scraped 2% by creative financing, our capabilities are also pretty poor nowadays. It's going to have to go up and eventually we will have to confront Putin, probably over one of the Baltic's.

 

That's what I fear 1902. We'll need a leader as bat-**** crazy as Putin to stare him down.  

Edited February 24, 2022 by Yellow Fever

[1902 1,167]

I'm not sure that's true, we just need to very firm on our lines, which is that NATO is a no go, and in order to keep NATO unity, Finland and Sweden are beyond the pale as well. We also need to ready ourselves for similar behaviour in Moldova and Central Asia.

[Rock The Boat 1,332]

6 hours ago, Badger said:

?

Appeasement of Russia began in 1944/5 at the Potsdam and Yalta conferences. Despite the pledges that the British govt made to Poland in 1939 we appeased Stalin by giving him Eastern Poland at the Yalta Conference. Churchill took a lead in this by agreeing with Stalin a "spheres of influence" agreement at Potsdam.

The historical truth is that Chamberlain saved the UK from being defeated in 1940 by buying time in 1938. The real appeasement was Churchill's in 1944/5.

What you say about Poland's (and eastern Europe's) future at the time of Yalta is true, without doubt. But let's place ourselves at the table and what we see is Stalin with many divisions of battle-hardened troops occupying Poland. If Stalin says he's not leaving Poland then what were the options for the West? It would have meant the continuation of the second world war, and since the war had not yet finished at Yalta then we might have seen the breakaway of the Russians from the Allies, weakening our joint attack against Hitler. And after Hitler was eventually defeated then our weapons and military would be turned on to the Russians. The second world war would have run on for years and we may have lost, or required the Americans to use the nuclear option on Moscow. 

The price we paid in not keeping our promise to Poland was far too great for the world to bear. That was tough on Poland but that was the reality of the time.

[1902 1,167]

1 minute ago, Rock The Boat said:

What you say about Poland's (and eastern Europe's) future at the time of Yalta is true, without doubt. But let's place ourselves at the table and what we see is Stalin with many divisions of battle-hardened troops occupying Poland. If Stalin says he's not leaving Poland then what were the options for the West? It would have meant the continuation of the second world war, and since the war had not yet finished at Yalta then we might have seen the breakaway of the Russians from the Allies, weakening our joint attack against Hitler. And after Hitler was eventually defeated then our weapons and military would be turned on to the Russians. The second world war would have run on for years and we may have lost, or required the Americans to use the nuclear option on Moscow. 

The price we paid in not keeping our promise to Poland was far too great for the world to bear. That was tough on Poland but that was the reality of the time.

The UK even explored the option if what would happen if we stood up to Stalin without American help. 

The military assessment was clear. We would have been crushed.

[cambridgeshire canary 6,717]

Taking civilians hostage? Pretty sure that's illegal.. then again would you expect Putin to care?

[Rock The Boat 1,332]

24 minutes ago, 1902 said:

Honestly, this has very little to do with Brexit, very little to do with Trump (and I was and am opposed to both).

The one thing I would say is that if you look at the the telegraph comments, that is just a load of people blaming "woke" and BLM. Equally irrelevant.

We are ridiculously divided in the West and unfortunately that has crept into the centre of politics, whereby relatively rational people are now blaming each other and a series of unconnected political events as being the cause of a an invasion ordered by a cabal of Ethno-nationalists who have smashed dissent in their own country and have now turned to empire building.

It used to just be the far right and left who looked like Putin's stooges, now loads of us do because we can't stop navel gazing long enough to realise that its not because of ourselves that this crisis was caused, so instead we argue with each other.

Nobody in the West has spent enough on defense outside the US, we are all going to have to cough up now. That's not the EUs fault, but neither are many European countries excused. Also, we have scraped 2% by creative financing, our capabilities are also pretty poor nowadays. It's going to have to go up and eventually we will have to confront Putin, probably over one of the Baltic's.

 

The UK's defence spending is on a par with Russia, a much larger country in terms of area and population, so our spending cannot be complained about. i would hope, given our alliance with the US, our equipment is more technically advanced over the Russians.

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

Maybe the West should look at launching cyber attacks on Russia in the same way as they do when it suits them.

Crippling their communications and internet might be something they would respond to.

[The Real Buh 3,432]

1 minute ago, keelansgrandad said:

Maybe the West should look at launching cyber attacks on Russia in the same way as they do when it suits them.

Crippling their communications and internet might be something they would respond to.

I think we should definitely be doing this 👍 

[KernowCanary 214]

13 minutes ago, cambridgeshire canary said:

Taking civilians hostage? Pretty sure that's illegal.. then again would you expect Putin to care?

Are there still staff at the plant?. It closed in about 2001, so must be abandoned.

[The Real Buh 3,432]

3 minutes ago, KernowCanary said:

Are there still staff at the plant?. It closed in about 2001, so must be abandoned.

It’s a constant effort to contain the radiation. Has a full staff at all times.

[1902 1,167]

14 minutes ago, Rock The Boat said:

The UK's defence spending is on a par with Russia, a much larger country in terms of area and population, so our spending cannot be complained about. i would hope, given our alliance with the US, our equipment is more technically advanced over the Russians.

So is France's but they also recognise that their capabilities are below what they would need to be. 

This is partially because our economy is so much better off, defense spending has to be adjusted to price level.

Also, Russia almost certainly engages in hidden defense spending for R and D and communications. We have had a vested interest in including more things in the defense budget to reach the 2%, for Russia it's better to go the other way.

Edited February 24, 2022 by 1902

[Creative Midfielder 1,996]

3 minutes ago, Rock The Boat said:

The UK's defence spending is on a par with Russia, a much larger country in terms of area and population, so our spending cannot be complained about. i would hope, given our alliance with the US, our equipment is more technically advanced over the Russians.

Russia may be much larger in area and population but their GDP is only around half of the UK so in economic terms we are only spending 50% relative to Russia.

And let's not forget, as has already been pointed out, that the Tories claim that we are spending 2% of GDP on defence is based on some extremely 'creative' accounting.

When you consider that of the actual budget we do spend a huge amount is completely wasted on costly white elephants/massive cost overuns on projects and an even bigger proportion is sucked up by the very expensive nuclear deterrent that we are never going to use, then our practical and deployable capability is very small and that is definitely something to complain about.

[Herman 9,764]

5 minutes ago, KernowCanary said:

Are there still staff at the plant?. It closed in about 2001, so must be abandoned.

I'm certain there are a few hardy men there monitoring it still.

[Herman 9,764]

13 minutes ago, keelansgrandad said:

Maybe the West should look at launching cyber attacks on Russia in the same way as they do when it suits them.

Crippling their communications and internet might be something they would respond to.

It looks like this maybe happening. The Kremlin and other government sites were down earlier. If the Russians can do it I am sure the US and others have very strong capabilities.

[GodlyOtsemobor 2,309]

3 minutes ago, The Real Buh said:

It’s a constant effort to contain the radiation. Has a full staff at all times.

Don't they also do tours of the site and pripyat too? Surely there's safety "staff" for that there also. 

[1902 1,167]

3 minutes ago, Herman said:

It looks like this maybe happening. The Kremlin and other government sites were down earlier. If the Russians can do it I am sure the US and others have very strong capabilities.

This could also be Ukraine not NATO.

[The Real Buh 3,432]

2 minutes ago, GodlyOtsemobor said:

Don't they also do tours of the site and pripyat too? Surely there's safety "staff" for that there also. 

It’s a very complex operation. Not “a couple of handymen” as the resident expert on everything suggests