Ukraine war mega thread

[BLD]

The Ukrainian ambassador to Australia was today reassuring Australia that there's not gonna be an invasion. Meanwhile the attack potato known as Peter Dutton is all for it. That asshole as defence minister is frothing at the gob to flex his authoritive muscle. He enjoys poking sticks at china to. SIT DOWN BOOFHEAD. Election coming up here soon. Endless lies and propaganda

[bsnub]

Ignorant moron

You really are a pathetic waste of skin. I know exactly who Zbigniew Brzezinski is, you imbecile, and he had nothing to do with the Maidan revolution.

Zbig is a racist anti Russian Polish zealot who's tenticals spread all over the American establishment and all its spheres

You are a pathetic conspiracy theorist with a pathetic lack of brainpower.

Brzezinski served as the Robert E. Osgood Professor of American Foreign Policy at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies, a scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and a member of various boards and councils.

Far from the puppet master you tin foiled morons try to paint him as. You idiots need a figurehead for your bogus unsubstantiated claims that he was the person behind Maidan, and it is beyond idiotic.

Once again, proving yourself to be a co-opted propagandized moron.

[harrybarracuda]

I'll try without your usual invective . . . Germany has contingency agreements for all of the above, aside from which Germany is increasing locally produced energy from wind, coal, nuclear, natural gas, solar, biomass, hydro . . .

Somehow I would rather trust the brainpower in Germany confronted with the Russian supplies problems than . . . you.


Continue your rant.

And clearly you're too stupid to realise that Germany can't replace a third of its gas and crude overnight, you fucking plank.

[harrybarracuda]

Some more utter drivel from Pepe Escobar-

FTFY.

[HuangLao]

The continuous drive for invented and tradition boogiemen runs deep.

[panama hat]

And clearly you're too stupid to realise that Germany can't replace a third of its gas and crude overnight, you fucking plank.

Again, Harry . . . I'd rather place my trust in a group of professionals rather than a washed-out TEFler - no offence.


Did anyone say anything about "overnight"? If you're starting to invent your own narrative then it's time for you to quit this line of discussion.

Germany asked for Nord Stream 2. Russia didn't even want it.

Good grief, you're the opposite of Harry in this debate . . . but both full of shit.

[bsnub]

A terrible thing may be impending in Ukraine. Undoubtedly, subversion, sabotage, and murder await, although such miseries have been going on for some time without the West paying much attention. But a Russian onslaught, to include air and missile strikes followed by an invasion, would be a lot worse. Thousands of people may die, and the foundations of European security would be rocked as they have not been since the early days of the Cold War.

Even so, the degree of public hand-wringing and even despair in the United States is excessive, and not just in comparison with the relative phlegmatism of the Ukrainian population. The commentary on the Russian buildup and threats has taken many forms—pointless quarter-century-old recriminations about NATO expansion, foolish psychotherapeutic diagnoses of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s need for “respect,” assertions that the Biden administration’s weakness created this situation, and, above all, the belief that Putin has not only Ukraine, but the whole West, including the United States, exactly where he wants it. A more balanced consideration is in order.

Ukraine is a problem for Putin’s Russia not because it may join NATO, but because it is democratizing—slowly, awkwardly, imperfectly—and after 30 years of independence is constructing a new national identity. So, too, have the other former Soviet republics, a number of which (Azerbaijan, for example) have quietly sided with Kyiv. The aim of reconstructing if not the Russian empire, then a 21st-century version of it, is slipping out of Putin’s grip, and he knows it. In many ways, what we’re seeing now from Moscow is a spasm of atavistic postimperial assertion, which, rather like British and French intervention in Egypt in 1956, may begin well but will probably end poorly.

The Russian dictator has made demands that he knows cannot be met. He has issued them publicly when such things are usually done in private, meaning that he is looking for a fight on any terms. He has mobilized a large army on Ukraine’s borders—more than 100,000 troops—but not nearly one big enough to subjugate a country of 40 million people, many of whom are not only willing to fight but ready to do so. Urban areas absorb armies as blotting paper absorbs an ink drop, and a Russian invasion will lead to a stream of coffins headed home to a population that has little taste for losses.

The stakes are high enough for the West. The Russian post-Soviet state is large but not a superpower, save for the matter of nuclear weapons. A restored Russian empire would make it the most powerful entity in Europe. Even more: The precedent of conquest, or of the massive savaging that the Russian military could inflict, would shatter the European peace that has held (with the exception of the Balkan conflicts) since 1949. It would, moreover, represent the further demolition of interstate-behavior norms that serve smaller countries everywhere.

But the stakes are higher for Russia. It can temporarily insulate itself from economic sanctions, but the cost of war with Ukraine will eventually be even more instability at home. The secret police can poison, imprison, or kill dissident leaders such as Alexei Navalny, but it will have a lot more difficulty massacring crowds of angry mothers of wounded or dead soldiers. A Russia isolated from the West and punished by economic sanctions will become, more than it already is, a kind of vassal state to China, and Russian diplomats and soldiers know that the Chinese are unsentimental in their treatment of their dependents and satellites.

The Western reaction thus far has been prudent and effective. The United States has led effectively, and President Joe Biden has behind him a remarkably bipartisan consensus. The administration has made appropriate threats, prepared appropriate sanctions, and begun taking the most important step, delivering anti-tank and antiaircraft missiles to the willing hands of Ukrainian soldiers. The more and faster, the better.

NATO has not crumbled—just the reverse, in fact. Sweden and Finland have muttered about joining the alliance, the Eastern European allies have been particularly staunch, and even French diplomatic overtures reflect more President Emmanuel Macron’s desire to be the leading statesman in Europe than a desire to appease Russia. Indeed, Putin has given NATO a gift. If the alliance had something of an identity crisis in the 1990s and aughts, now its members can hardly question its necessity. Georgii Arbatov, one of Mikhail Gorbachev’s advisers, had a point in 1987 when he wryly observed that Russia was going to do the West a great disservice by depriving it of an enemy. Having reversed that, Putin has given NATO not only renewed life but vigor.

Western strategic clichés usually portray the Russians as incomparably deft chess masters, wily manipulators of the use of force to support policy, who consistently outplay their Western opponents. But that characterization is less true than one might think. Indeed, American and British intelligence were shrewd in warning of Russian false-flag operations and provocations and in naming a range of Ukrainian quislings who were being vetted to take power. These revelations are an antidote to the poisoned needles being prepared by the Russian secret services.

More to the point, although Putin has hitherto played a weak hand very well, the fact is that the Russian military is not the Wehrmacht, or even the Red Army of old. It has some first-rate bits, some well-trained special forces, and good technology. But it still suffers from all of its old faults, including in maintenance, morale, and initiative. Armed forces reflect their societies, and although Russia is a lot better off than it was in the ’90s, it remains a society with poor public health; a crude, resource-based economy; and a deeply corrupt and self-seeking elite. Russia is also vulnerable to sanctions and cyberattacks. And at the top, the country is led by an aging dictator who does not hear many uncomfortable truths from advisers who know better.

In May 1864, Union forces launched the Battle of the Wilderness, a bloody fight inaugurating the campaigns that ultimately destroyed the Confederacy. But at the outset, a lot of the Army of the Potomac’s leaders had a bad case of nerves. One of Ulysses S. Grant’s staff officers, Horace Porter, recalled after the war an incident when a general bolted into the field headquarters breathing rapidly and saying, “General Grant, this is a crisis that cannot be looked upon too seriously. I know [Robert E.] Lee’s methods well by past experience; he will throw his whole army between us and the Rapidan and cut us off completely.”

Porter recalled that Grant took his cigar out of his mouth, stood up, and replied to the agitated general:

Oh, I am heartily tired of hearing about what Lee is going to do. Some of you always seem to think he is suddenly going to turn a double somersault and land in our rear on both of our flanks at the same time.

And then he tartly ordered the despondent general to go back to his command and think about what the Army of the Potomac was going to do to Lee, rather than the other way around.
Vladimir Putin is not Robert E. Lee. But at a time when statues of Lee are coming down, a bit more of the spirit of Ulysses S. Grant is clearly in order.

Vladimir Putin’s No Chess Master - The Atlantic

[OhOh]

You are a fucking idiot, spewing complete garbage as usual.

Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the stupidest one of all.

You stated that no barracks at the current Russian "invasion" forces in western Russia, 400 km from the Russia/Ukraine border, by highway.

An article and cropped photo utilised to push a NaGastan military agenda to their unexceptional inhabitants of a city south of Vancouver?
Satellite images show new Russian military buildup near Ukraine

The deployments come as tension is rising between Moscow and the West.

Satellite images show new Russian military buildup near Ukraine- POLITICO

Lots of boxes/????

An image of the same military base, 5 km SW of Yelnya, Smolensk Oblast, Russia, expanded to show many mature buildings. Possibly even "barracks, saunas, dance halls, ..... ".

Allegedly taken 2022.

Google Maps


Go to the site, zoom around, it's easily done.

[OhOh]

Janis Kluge, an expert on Eastern Europe at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, SWP)

Ralf Fücks, the director of the Center for Liberal Modernity (LibMod - Zentrum Liberale Moderne), a Berlin-based think tank which recently had to cease its activities in Russia after being included on a government list of "undesirable organizations,

Stefan Meister, head of the program for international order and democracy at the German Council on Foreign Relations (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Auswärtige Politik, DGAP)

None are official German government speakers/departments. One wonders who funds these "experts".

Whereas the elected Ukrainian Defence Minister, the elected German Chancellor, the elected French President .... do actually have some actions they can instigate.

Ukrainian defense minister sees no threat of Russian invasion in near future

Alexey Reznikov said that a scenario of a Russian attack in the near future was also unlikely.

25 Jan, 09:34

"Ukrainian Defense Minister Alexey Reznikov said early on Tuesday he had received no information so far indicating the possibility of Russia’s invasion of his country in the near future.

"As of today, the armed forces of Russia created no strike groups, indicating they were ready to launch an offensive tomorrow," he told Ukraine’s ICTV television channel, adding that a scenario of a Russian attack in the near future was also unlikely.

When asked about the likelihood of Russia attacking Ukraine on February 20, the final day of the Olympic Games in Beijing, the minister said the probability was "low."

The West and Kiev have recently been spreading allegations about Russia’s potential ‘invasion’ of Ukraine. Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov castigated these claims as "empty and unfounded," serving as a ploy to escalate tensions, pointing out that Russia did not pose any threat whatsoever to anyone. However, Peskov did not rule out the possibility of provocations aimed at justifying such allegations and warned that attempts to use military force to resolve the crisis in southeastern Ukraine would have serious consequences.

At the same time, the Russian Foreign Ministry published the draft agreements between Moscow and Washington on security guarantees and measures for ensuring the security of Russia and NATO member states on December 17. The document was designed to address, among other things, NATO’s ongoing ‘military development’ of the Ukrainian territory. The sides conducted several rounds of negotiations, including a personal meeting between the top diplomats of Russia and the United States, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken. During the meeting, Lavrov reaffirmed that Russia had no plans of attacking its neighbor."

Ukrainian defense minister sees no threat of Russian invasion in near future - World - TASS

Scholz, Macron say diplomacy can fix Ukraine-Russia standoff

"German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron embraced talks with the Kremlin as a means to de-escalate the crisis. At the same time, they said Russia would pay a "high price" if it attacked Ukraine."

Continues at:

Scholz, Macron say diplomacy can fix Ukraine-Russia standoff | News | DW | 25.01.2022

French Politician: Puzzled by US Warmongering, France & Germany Trying to Avoid EU Militarisation

05:00 GMT 26.01.2022

"Political advisers from Russia, France, Germany, and Ukraine are expected to hold security talks in Paris on Wednesday. France and Germany aren't interested in dancing to the US, the UK, and NATO's tune – for good reason – says French politician and journalist Karel Vereycken.

Radio France Internationale reported on Monday that French President Emmanuel Macron suggested an initiative along the lines of the Normandy format talks amid the reinvigorated US-NATO scaremongering rhetoric about Moscow's plans to "invade" Ukraine. Last week, Macron called upon EU member states to draw up proposals for a new security deal with Russia and hold a "frank dialogue" with Moscow."

Continues at:

French Politician: Puzzled by US Warmongering, France & Germany Trying to Avoid EU Militarisation

As for the "elected" NaGastan POTUS .....

[NamPikToot]

A couple of issues batting around atm. First is Biden's lack of faith in his EU NATO partners backing a NATO response and second below is the dirty Russian cash washing through London. Mind you the US is hardly an exemplar and has long hated London's financial position.

US government fears dirty money in ‘Londongrad’ would kneecap sanctions on Russia

US government officials fear suspected dirty money flowing into London would undermine efforts to sanction Russia over the Ukraine crisis.

US State Department officials have expressed “dismay and frustration” at the British government’s failure to tackle the flow of Russian funds into the city which has been dubbed “Londongrad”, according to The Times.

“The fear is that Russian money is so entrenched in London now that the opportunity to use it as leverage against Putin could be lost,” a source in Washington said. “Biden is talking about sanctioning Putin himself but that can only be symbolic. Putin doesn’t hold his money abroad, it is all in the kleptocrats’ names and a hell of a lot of it is sitting in houses in Knightsbridge and Belgravia right under your government’s noses.”

It comes as tensions in Ukraine continue to mount. British organisations have been warned to bolster their digital defences due to “malicious” cyber incidents in Ukraine.

The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) has updated its guidance to UK firms and groups and said it is investigating the recent reports of “malicious cyber incidents in Ukraine”.

In 2016, the government put the amount of corrupt money flowing into the UK at £100bn a year. In 2020 parliament’s intelligence and security committee said that oligarchs were drawn by “a light and limited touch to regulation, with London’s strong capital and housing markets offering sound investment opportunities.”

Duncan Hames, director of policy at Transparency International UK, said: “It’s no secret that Britain provides a ‘laundromat’ for the dirty money and reputations of those from Russia and elsewhere. This not only impacts the citizens of the countries living under corrupt regimes, but also presents security concerns for the UK. The government should bring forward long-overdue reforms to prevent criminals and the corrupt from stashing their ill-gotten gains in premium real estate here.”

On Tuesday Tory MP John Penrose, Boris Johnson’s anti-corruption chief, accused the government of delaying an economic crime bill that would have exposed the kleptocrats’ use of shell companies to buy British property.

The Tories are reported to have received £2m from donors with Russian links since Johnson became prime minister in 2019 prompting calls from select committees for the government to shut down the “London laundromat.”

American financier Bill Browder, who led a campaign against Russia’s global reach since the murder of his lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky, a decade ago, said British enforcement had become a “laughing stock” and had become a “haven” because of a lack of enforcement rules.

When the intelligence and security committee released its 2020 Russia report, it concluded - as many campaigners warned - that Russians who owed their fortunes to connections with President Putin and the Kremlin had embedded themselves in London assets using suspect money from the state.

Alongside this, the National Crime Agency (NCA) is also understood to be preparing to help hit high net worth individuals with Unexplained Wealth Orders in the event of an escalation in Ukraine.

Unexplained Wealth Orders could be deployed against Russians with multi-million-pound property assets in London, and would force those suspected of having close links to President Putin to explain where their wealth originates or face having all the UK assets confiscated by the government.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/russia-ukraine-us-government-sanctions-b2002591.html

[harrybarracuda]

Again, Harry . . . I'd rather place my trust in a group of professionals rather than a washed-out TEFler - no offence.


Did anyone say anything about "overnight"? If you're starting to invent your own narrative then it's time for you to quit this line of discussion.

Good grief, you're the opposite of Harry in this debate . . . but both full of shit.

I'm trying to work out why you are so fucking thick but can only assume it was something to do with the umbilical cord getting wrapped around your neck or something.

You don't think Germany is dependent on Russia when a third of its gas supply can be cut off at a stroke?

Maybe there's a head trauma you forgot about.

[harrybarracuda]

the National Crime Agency (NCA) is also understood to be preparing to help hit high net worth individuals with Unexplained Wealth Orders in the event of an escalation in Ukraine.

Which wouldn't sit well in any court, looking as it does as a politicial manoeuvre.

No need to wait, hit them now.

[NamPikToot]

The UK has frozen Ruskie assets before, after the Russian nerve agent hit (OhOh will deny) was one time - quite frankly the US should be glad that cash ain't in the ME (the new Switzerland).

[OhOh]

after the Russian never agent hit

I would if I understood what you were referring to.

[Backspin]

You really are a pathetic waste of skin. I know exactly who Zbigniew Brzezinski is, you imbecile, and he had nothing to do with the Maidan revolution.




You are a pathetic conspiracy theorist with a pathetic lack of brainpower.



Far from the puppet master you tin foiled morons try to paint him as. You idiots need a figurehead for your bogus unsubstantiated claims that he was the person behind Maidan, and it is beyond idiotic.

Once again, proving yourself to be a co-opted propagandized moron.

Haha wut. I posted his fucking quotes. Those were his words. This isn't a conspiracy.

Zbig was the one who masterminded the policy to arm the
mujahideen in Afghanistan and he brags about it in his books.

He then masterminded the Chechnya wars in the 2000's. They armed those islamists too, to try and split Russia down the middle. And it almost worked.

Ukraine is the latest project. It's in his quotes

[NamPikToot]

I would if I understood what you were referring to.

Hmmm that was BBesque

[Backspin]

A terrible thing may be Vladimir Putin’s No Chess Master - The Atlantic

Is that why they are all moving to Russia ? The same old BS was said about Iraq. And how Iran had a problem with it because it was gonna be successful

In 2019, Ukrainians accounted for more than 60 percent of people getting Russian citizenship.



Peru clean-up brigades work after second oil spill

The large influx of individuals seeking asylum in Russia began in July 2014 when the most intensive hostilities evolved. By the end of 2014 (data from 5 December 2014) the number of Ukrainian citizens who stayed in the territory of Russia increased by more than 0.9 million and went up to 2.5 million persons

[OhOh]

BBesque

Does not compute?

[NamPikToot]

BuckerooBanzi - the holder of the prize for best typos on TD imo.

[Backspin]

�� Ukrainian civilians in Kharkov, 2nd largest city in Ukraine when asked about taking arms against Russia: “No. I wouldn’t. None of the people I know would. No one of the civilian population of Ukraine would fight with the Russian brothers.”

https://twitter.com/colonelhomsi/status/1486769192464486400/video/1

Don’t forget that over 80% of the Ukrainian soldiers in Crimea just walked over to Russians and switched sides against Ukraine and got their ���� passports. Same thing would happen again ��

[NamPikToot]

You don't think Germany is dependent on Russia when a third of its gas supply can be cut off at a stroke?

I had this out with him before. He asked for links to demonstrate Germany's reliance of Russian fuels, i gave them and he still insisted Germany would not be affected if the taps were turned off. For a self confessed man of intelligence and and one who "teaches" business English, he spends 90% of his time calling others all manner of names and seems to frequently prove himself unable to comprehend English.

[OhOh]

Moved to

Wang Yi Speaks with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on the Phone at Request

[Backspin]

Ex German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder is the chairman of Nord Stream AG and Rosneft. No matter what happens, Russia isn't turning off the gas to Germany. Russia and Germany would be allies if left to their own devices. This is what the Anglo powers work to prevent. Because a Russo-German partnership would eventually be more powerful than the US and UK.

[Backspin]

From Nato's own website

Lord Ismay

Lord Hastings Lionel Ismay was NATO’s first Secretary General, a position he was initially reluctant to accept. By the end of his tenure however, Ismay had become the biggest advocate of the organisation he had famously said earlier on in his political career, was created to “keep the Soviet Union out, the Americans in, and the Germans down.”


There's a lot of Germans who know what Nato is really about.

[harrybarracuda]

I had this out with him before. He asked for links to demonstrate Germany's reliance of Russian fuels, i gave them and he still insisted Germany would not be affected if the taps were turned off. For a self confessed man of intelligence and and one who "teaches" business English, he spends 90% of his time calling others all manner of names and seems to frequently prove himself unable to comprehend English.

So he actually is a TEFLer.


'splains it.