@MindlessDrugHoover said:
If the war escalates, the season is curtailed and Wycombe somehow make the play-offs on PPG Alan Swann's meltdown will make Chernobyl look like a back garden barbecue.
@MindlessDrugHoover said:
If the war escalates, the season is curtailed and Wycombe somehow make the play-offs on PPG Alan Swann's meltdown will make Chernobyl look like a back garden barbecue.
Is there a place where you can read up on both sides of the story that is fairly accurate or respected? I'd be interested to get a little more perspective on some of the views about the perceived aggressions the West has committed which Putin believes have cornered him.
What he has done is absolutely despicable and must be stopped. I just wanted to try and get some further understanding of the things that he has taken umbrage against.
It used to be called the BBC @Commoner . I have defended the BBC against the attacks of the populists for a while now. Sadly the BBC has switched in this conflict to full state propaganda mode and seemingly abandoned its role to provide the unbiased factual information you request. Sad to see.
@DevC said:
It used to be called the BBC @Commoner . I have defended the BBC against the attacks of the populists for a while now. Sadly the BBC has switched in this conflict to full state propaganda mode and seemingly abandoned its role to provide the unbiased factual information you request. Sad to see.
And the @Onlooker Award for loony post of the day goes to...
It's a sad day when a friendly, open, caring, wealth creator who loves his sport and just wants a bit of extra room from his neighbours for his expansion plans (planning permission pending) is vilified by an openly biased press when actually most other people do the same things every day.
@Commoner - Here's my attempt to help, based on stuff I've read, watched, and listened to. I'm not a historian, and it's certainly very difficult to take the subjectivity out of the situation...
Putin is not just upset with (perceived) recent NATO aggression (despite being happy about previous perceived Russian aggression) which he identifies as actions in Iraq, Afghanistan, etc and the addition of nations into NATO since the end of the Soviet Union which creep the NATO border ever closer to Russian territory, but also the (largely cultural) Ukranianisation of Ukraine, particularly since the elections in 2019 (e.g. re-introducing the Ukrainian language instead of Russian - hence Kiev-Kyiv, for example) and (whilst ignoring his own failures to adhere to it), the failures on the Ukraine side to adhere to the Minsk agreement. Putin feels that ethnic Russians living in the Donbas area have been aggressively treated by Ukraine over the last 8 years since the (somewhat lesser noticed) mini-invasion of Ukraine by Russia in 2014 since which time Russian backed separatists have been engaged in a kind of civil war - via the setting up of two Independent People's Republics within Ukraine, namely Donetsk and Lugansk - between the Separatists and Ukrainian forces. He further finds distasteful the semi-recent re-naming of streets in Ukraine after Ukrainian nazi sympathisers/nationalist activists from the early 1950s, a time when the world order was entirely different. He seems to have confused the notion of 'liberal nationalism', as democratically exercised in Ukraine via open and free elections, with National Socialism. He also 'believes' Ukraine has the ability to quickly re-arm itself with nuclear weapons, despite the fact that they militarily de-nuclearised themselves as a country in 1994 as a condition of becoming a free democratic independent nation. All of this adds up to why his objectives are to demilitarise, de-nazify and neutralise Ukraine.
At the end of the day, he's just completely unhinged and none of his 'justification' ultimately matters. And, terrifyingly, there don't seem to be any lengths he won't go to in pursuit of his deranged fantasy. Barely a week into this war and already in 'shell the largest nuclear power plant in Europe' mode.
@DevC said:
It used to be called the BBC @Commoner . I have defended the BBC against the attacks of the populists for a while now. Sadly the BBC has switched in this conflict to full state propaganda mode and seemingly abandoned its role to provide the unbiased factual information you request. Sad to see.
Thanks everyone for the insights and particularly @LeedsBlue
I understand the Ukraine army is about 200k and the Russian Army in and around Ukraine is 190k. Putin also appears to have severely underestimated how the West would react. I suspect he thought there would be infighting in the EU, the UK and US would take time to react but the speed and unity has perhaps caught him by surprise.
It looks like the only thing that will really put a stop to this is someone in Russia taking him out. I suspect the longer the economic woes hit them hard then there will be a coup. I suspect the leader of the coup to withdraw from Russia and open the floodgates to western money again, this becoming a bit of hero of the Russian people.
The key to this will probably be how hackers and family members living outside Russia can get the truth into Russia.
Who will be the next Gorbachev and how long will it take…
@DevC said:
It used to be called the BBC @Commoner . I have defended the BBC against the attacks of the populists for a while now. Sadly the BBC has switched in this conflict to full state propaganda mode and seemingly abandoned its role to provide the unbiased factual information you request. Sad to see.
And the @Onlooker Award for loony post of the day goes to...
Probably not a huge surprise that I agree with @DevC - for balance point your VPN to Georgia and you can still watch RT ?
@Commoner said:
Is there a place where you can read up on both sides of the story that is fairly accurate or respected? I'd be interested to get a little more perspective on some of the views about the perceived aggressions the West has committed which Putin believes have cornered him.
...given that the founder is a brexiteer, the Leave Means Leave campaign was likely funded by (and possibly operated by) Russia, and several ERG MPs have been frantically deleting tweets from campaign time since it became clear that the government declined to investigate Russian interference into the vote.
You love a conspiracy theory @Onlooker, I would have thought you might have been more interested in why UnHerd is parroting RT.
Correction: And it's possibly worse, the MPs aren't deleting the tweets, Leave Means Leave has deleted its entire account which is triggering the deletedbyMPs bot. And weirdly, the Westminster Russia Forum (formerly known as Conservative Friends of Russia) has disbanded. There's a lot of people on the UK right desperate to hide stuff right now.
...given that the founder is a brexiteer, the Leave Means Leave campaign was likely funded by (and possibly operated by) Russia, and several ERG MPs have been frantically deleting tweets from campaign time since it became clear that the government declined to investigate Russian interference into the vote.
You love a conspiracy theory @Onlooker, I would have thought you might have been more interested in why UnHerd is parroting RT.
No, just free speech, hence the RT mention. All we are hearing is hatred toward the Russians from our politicians and the mainstream media.
Western companies are deserting Russia, nations are imposing sanctions and pledging more armaments and military to Ukraine. Oil and metal prices are going ballistic and so is inflation.
There is no discussion of freedom, peace or justice. We have to stop this war. All it is going to do is kill more people and make a bad situation worse.
Agreed, the corruption in the Nasty Party is so intrenched, that normal political lines have been discarded. Hopefully the other parties and the few decent Tories can somehow find a path forward for voters to regain trust in the system.
So many of the replies to that Tweet show just how tribal football is and too many fans simply cannot see any wrong in anything their club does or how it achieves trophies. "There is a campaign against Chelsea" whinged one fan, to which someone succinctly replied, "there's a bigger one against Ukraine."
I am bewildered and appalled at the lack of support by the football club and the 11 man/women Trust board) shown yesterday to the victims of the ongoing Ukrainian genocide.
If we support people shaking tins for the North Chidlington Sea Scouts, or whatever, then we surely we should support the victims of the Putinistas?
If standing up against Putin does not represent our club's values, what does?
Given the kleptocrats (TGF) snaffled the training ground from under the noses of our Community Benefit Society - they continue to wine and dine on a match day as per yesterday - I would have thought we would have known better.
Apparently they let yellow and blue fireworks off at the Cambridge game. Which is laughable really - and arguably insensitive to have fireworks given the circumstances.
Comments
Chairnobyl
Cymbol crash!
Is there a place where you can read up on both sides of the story that is fairly accurate or respected? I'd be interested to get a little more perspective on some of the views about the perceived aggressions the West has committed which Putin believes have cornered him.
What he has done is absolutely despicable and must be stopped. I just wanted to try and get some further understanding of the things that he has taken umbrage against.
It used to be called the BBC @Commoner . I have defended the BBC against the attacks of the populists for a while now. Sadly the BBC has switched in this conflict to full state propaganda mode and seemingly abandoned its role to provide the unbiased factual information you request. Sad to see.
And the @Onlooker Award for loony post of the day goes to...
It's a sad day when a friendly, open, caring, wealth creator who loves his sport and just wants a bit of extra room from his neighbours for his expansion plans (planning permission pending) is vilified by an openly biased press when actually most other people do the same things every day.
@Commoner - Here's my attempt to help, based on stuff I've read, watched, and listened to. I'm not a historian, and it's certainly very difficult to take the subjectivity out of the situation...
Putin is not just upset with (perceived) recent NATO aggression (despite being happy about previous perceived Russian aggression) which he identifies as actions in Iraq, Afghanistan, etc and the addition of nations into NATO since the end of the Soviet Union which creep the NATO border ever closer to Russian territory, but also the (largely cultural) Ukranianisation of Ukraine, particularly since the elections in 2019 (e.g. re-introducing the Ukrainian language instead of Russian - hence Kiev-Kyiv, for example) and (whilst ignoring his own failures to adhere to it), the failures on the Ukraine side to adhere to the Minsk agreement. Putin feels that ethnic Russians living in the Donbas area have been aggressively treated by Ukraine over the last 8 years since the (somewhat lesser noticed) mini-invasion of Ukraine by Russia in 2014 since which time Russian backed separatists have been engaged in a kind of civil war - via the setting up of two Independent People's Republics within Ukraine, namely Donetsk and Lugansk - between the Separatists and Ukrainian forces. He further finds distasteful the semi-recent re-naming of streets in Ukraine after Ukrainian nazi sympathisers/nationalist activists from the early 1950s, a time when the world order was entirely different. He seems to have confused the notion of 'liberal nationalism', as democratically exercised in Ukraine via open and free elections, with National Socialism. He also 'believes' Ukraine has the ability to quickly re-arm itself with nuclear weapons, despite the fact that they militarily de-nuclearised themselves as a country in 1994 as a condition of becoming a free democratic independent nation. All of this adds up to why his objectives are to demilitarise, de-nazify and neutralise Ukraine.
At the end of the day, he's just completely unhinged and none of his 'justification' ultimately matters. And, terrifyingly, there don't seem to be any lengths he won't go to in pursuit of his deranged fantasy. Barely a week into this war and already in 'shell the largest nuclear power plant in Europe' mode.
That's a superb rundown @LeedsBlue. The only thing I can add is that Putin is a tiny man with tiny man vibes and needs to pretend not to be tiny.
Estimated by Kremlin insiders to be between 5'1" and 5'5" apparently
But stop at his jacket and underpants
And let's not forget that when the Chechens would not surrender in the 1990s with a heavy heart he flattened Grozny with massive loss of life.
Seriously !! Ffs
Thanks everyone for the insights and particularly @LeedsBlue
I understand the Ukraine army is about 200k and the Russian Army in and around Ukraine is 190k. Putin also appears to have severely underestimated how the West would react. I suspect he thought there would be infighting in the EU, the UK and US would take time to react but the speed and unity has perhaps caught him by surprise.
It looks like the only thing that will really put a stop to this is someone in Russia taking him out. I suspect the longer the economic woes hit them hard then there will be a coup. I suspect the leader of the coup to withdraw from Russia and open the floodgates to western money again, this becoming a bit of hero of the Russian people.
The key to this will probably be how hackers and family members living outside Russia can get the truth into Russia.
Who will be the next Gorbachev and how long will it take…
Withdraw from Ukraine not Russia
Probably not a huge surprise that I agree with @DevC - for balance point your VPN to Georgia and you can still watch RT ?
This article is a good read.
https://unherd.com/2022/03/how-western-elites-exploit-ukraine/
Some good writers on there.
All of this is worth reading if you’re going to read that article. https://www.vice.com/en/article/a3d95p/the-unherd-and-the-whining-of-the-perfectly-well-represented
...given that the founder is a brexiteer, the Leave Means Leave campaign was likely funded by (and possibly operated by) Russia, and several ERG MPs have been frantically deleting tweets from campaign time since it became clear that the government declined to investigate Russian interference into the vote.
You love a conspiracy theory @Onlooker, I would have thought you might have been more interested in why UnHerd is parroting RT.
Correction: And it's possibly worse, the MPs aren't deleting the tweets, Leave Means Leave has deleted its entire account which is triggering the deletedbyMPs bot. And weirdly, the Westminster Russia Forum (formerly known as Conservative Friends of Russia) has disbanded. There's a lot of people on the UK right desperate to hide stuff right now.
No, just free speech, hence the RT mention. All we are hearing is hatred toward the Russians from our politicians and the mainstream media.
Western companies are deserting Russia, nations are imposing sanctions and pledging more armaments and military to Ukraine. Oil and metal prices are going ballistic and so is inflation.
There is no discussion of freedom, peace or justice. We have to stop this war. All it is going to do is kill more people and make a bad situation worse.
The old left and right divide is history. For me it’s between freedom and control now.
Agreed, the corruption in the Nasty Party is so intrenched, that normal political lines have been discarded. Hopefully the other parties and the few decent Tories can somehow find a path forward for voters to regain trust in the system.
Not sure of the author's political leanings @drcongo but this is a great read on how the financial war may play out.
https://tomluongo.me/2022/03/06/thanks-putins-war-ukraine-race-great-reset/
Christo Grozev is worth a follow on Twitter. One of the directors of Bellingcat, as well as actually being out there at the borders.
So many of the replies to that Tweet show just how tribal football is and too many fans simply cannot see any wrong in anything their club does or how it achieves trophies. "There is a campaign against Chelsea" whinged one fan, to which someone succinctly replied, "there's a bigger one against Ukraine."
Naive people who thought you could separate football from politics are getting rather a rude awakening at the moment
I am bewildered and appalled at the lack of support by the football club and the 11 man/women Trust board) shown yesterday to the victims of the ongoing Ukrainian genocide.
If we support people shaking tins for the North Chidlington Sea Scouts, or whatever, then we surely we should support the victims of the Putinistas?
If standing up against Putin does not represent our club's values, what does?
Given the kleptocrats (TGF) snaffled the training ground from under the noses of our Community Benefit Society - they continue to wine and dine on a match day as per yesterday - I would have thought we would have known better.
Beyond disappointing, shame on you.
Apparently they let yellow and blue fireworks off at the Cambridge game. Which is laughable really - and arguably insensitive to have fireworks given the circumstances.
Is there something we as fans can do? Maybe on here? To raise money for refugees, the IRC etc.
It beggars belief that we even have to discuss it. Shameful.