PUTIN

I wonder if we're in the realm of damned if we do, damned if we don't?

Is humiliating a nutter a good idea? If he's backed into a corner, what will he do? What levels would he stoop? What may China do?

If Russia and China decided to align and counter western democracy, we're now in an age where they could hurt us significantly given our reliance on energy and products. Of course, we could hurt them too. But is the appetite there in the West to go through pain to do whats right?

 

I think you wrong mate, I can’t stand Tory party but I see our country being fully behind NATO,Europe and more importantly Ukraine....sanctions going to be tough for Russia here I reckon, it’s the only way to go

 

And the most sense on this whole issue comes from the most unexpected source….

“It was at the UN that Russia felt its isolation most keenly, as three African council members: Kenya, Gabon and Ghana, spoke out against Moscow’s actions for violating Ukraine’s territorial integrity. A few weeks earlier, Kenya and Gabon had abstained on a Ukraine-related vote.

On Monday night, Kenya’s permanent representative, Martin Kimani, delivered a powerful address, suggesting Russia learn to live with ethnic grievances just as African states have done.

“Kenya and almost every African country was birthed by the ending of empire. Our borders were not of our own drawing,” Kimani said. “Had we chosen to pursue states on the basis of ethnic, racial or religious homogeneity, we would still be waging bloody wars these many decades later.”

We rejected irredentism and expansionism on any basis, including racial, ethnic, religious or cultural factors. We reject it again today,” he concluded."

Well said that man.

 

I read that article this morning. Powerful words... such a shame that our televised media will be so reluctant to show them being expressed.

 

Are you a member of the armed forces?

 

Well put DWLC, my thoughts exactly.
A few years ago I spent a weekend with a Russian family, the mother was a lawyer based in the UK, her daughter was married to a Russian sportsman who played overseas (from Russia), they told me what a nasty b***ard Putin was and how they dare not go home while he was still in charge, with hindsight I should have paid more attention.

 

He's a despot. Stalin mk2

 

You're right. Doubt those words could be bettered. Even Putin couldn't argue against that.

What do we get instead? Johnson with his Churchill tribute act of a "barrage of sanctions" rallying his followers to a comic book war aimed at saving his own skin.

 

I've never seen anyone poke a crazy wild animal with a stick and come out of the experience the better for it. Quite the contrary as YouTube can easily testify to. If that's the plan again can someone hail me down a passing alien spacecraft because I want off this rock.

 

One of my friends is from Odessa, worked in London for a while and now in Switzerland and told several stories handed down through her family of the Soviet days. It's hard to imagine what happened as recently as the early 90's. She'd left the region before Putin took office, but her family is still there and though I've not spoken with her since this posturing pending an invasion, she'd mentioned the tensions building up to the annexing of Crimea and the so called freedom fighters that just seemed intent on creating fear and compliance.

I visited Lviv (close to the Polish border) just before the pandemic and there were certainly still telltale signs of Russian influence. One huge building surrounding by forest with armed guards that the locals referred to as the library. It certainly wasn't that, and outside were rows of black official looking vehicles. It was very surreal. And fairly close by, next to a building that used to be a prison, now a hotel, had a similar octagonal building that had fencing around it and a guard on a plastic chair. It looked derelict, yet we were told if anyone tries to get near the entrance, an increase in guard numbers from inside the structure follows.

In Tallinn, there is now a museum at the top of a hotel. A whole floor that was a Soviet listening station where all the rooms were bugged and sympathisers positioned on every floor to count people in and out ad watch what they did. Spies stationed outside to follow where those staying there went. That was in place until Estonia gained independence in 1991. I'd be surprised if there aren't still Soviet sympathising officials somewhere within those baltic nations given Putins actions over the years.

It's easy to think of these days as gone as we're surrounded with technology and information galore with an abundance of choice. But if you think of Putin, he's managed to hold onto power longer than mandated, even gerrymandering the system and to become leader by proxy for a 4 year term, and only fairly recently, rewriting the constitution to give him unlimited occupancy. Rigging elections. Killing protestors, jailing opposition leaders and their senior supporters. Supporting the same in Belarus. Hijacking and rerouting a plane in one case to capture an opposition leader.

Then we've things like the Salisbury poisonings and that of Litvinenko. No doubt there are many more we're just less aware of.

Then you've the military actions in Chechnya and Crimea, and no doubt other efforts under false flags or that haven't made it to western news outlets.

He's certainly more of the evil ilk of Russian leaders than a modernising liberator with democracy at his heart,

 

He had quite a 24hrs DePfeffel.

Criticised Russia for breaking international law. Called for the UK public to take personal responsibility (re Covid) and latterly had a pop at Putin for surrounding himself with yes men who were too weak to challenge him.

I mean, the brassneck of the man!

 

I do wonder how many times the West has tried to whack Putin on the sly

 

Not enough.

 

In a Russian poll 2 days ago there was between 6-8% support for invading Ukraine.
That said, he is a despot so won't really care, he's not getting voted out anytime soon. The Russians are also a very proud people who would quickly fall in behind him if they thought Russia was being attacked or singled out. Putin is clever enough to manipulate that.

 

How about the hard working people in Ukraine? Decisions like the ones Putin is currently making have very real impacts on normal people, we must come down on them extremely strongly to prevent unneccessary bloodshed in Ukraine and beyond.

 

Russians are now way too steeped in Western culture, they have seen how easy it is to enjoy life as lived by "the west".
After the second world war returning Russian prisoners of war were sent to Siberia because it was thought they had been corrupted by the non communist ways in the west as they fought and were captured.
If only Putin could do that now, ruling by fear with his party officials enforcing his will, like Stalin and his successors. That will not happen. The vast majority of Russians are probably more like us than he would want and he's certainly not going to to send them to the gulags. They are just resigned to the fact that he's a lying crazy S.O.B.
The problem is that like in the USA there is a top level Military Industrial Complex which feeds off these situations and encourages them, what's the point of guns and tanks, bombs and bullets if there's nobody to aim them at.
As has been shown throughout history the ones that seem to profit from conflict are the war industries. The M.I.C.

 

+10 point poll surge for the Tories and all scandals forgotten then, about right

 

Agreed, but I'm not sure how bankrupting regular Russian folk is going to help matters. OK it might lead to more domestic unrest which in theory could lead to Putin's ouster sooner, but in general civilians should be kept out of warfare as much as possible, be it military, economic or any other form.

Big city Russians are indeed pretty European in many ways, but Moscow and St Petersburg do not make up the whole country. Far from it in fact. However, it's my opinion that a full scale invasion is going to be an absolute catastrophe for his popularity. Most young lads who join the army are from quite impoverished provincial backgrounds - Putin's core area of support. Those towns are not going to be full of joy at kids coming back in body bags after fighting a war against their extended family in some cases, bearing in mind how many Russians have friends and family in Ukraine. I honestly think that it's the beginning of the end for Putin. It's just a question of how long, and what form that end will take.