Russian invasion of Ukraine

Thornliebank said:
Putin has been clever here. Building up nuclear energy and plotting while the West grovels to a tantrum throwing Swedish teenager and plant eating hipsters.
Luckily for us, his army is useless other than bombing civilians from a distance.
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I'm putting my tin hat on here and say you're not wrong, not to sure about his army yet, time will tell.....
 
BobKowalski said:
The Times seems to take issue with our ‘world leading efforts’.

‘Britain will not be able to sanction Roman Abramovich and other oligarchs for weeks of months - if at all. Foreign Office and National Crime Agency have been unable to prove 'reasonable grounds' for designating oligarchs’ @TheTimes
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Fucking British and their due process bollocks.
 
tolmie's hairdoo said:
If an army is said to march on its stomach, then it needs the cash to feed it. Companies like BP, Shell, they don't usually write off stakes worth billions of dollars?

If Abramovich is writing off the £1.5bn in loans he is owed by Chelsea, it also shows the flip side of this coin?

He can't afford not to write it off, because whatever he recoups back is better than nothing?
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I hope the putin loving cockroach loses as much as possible
 
west didsblue said:
To speed it up Germany would have to shut down half its economy so they can stop importing Russian gas. I know I'm sat in the UK saying this but I think it's a price worth paying. They will be better off in the long run as will everyone else.
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I've said similar. No-one in the UK is under any (non-war) circumstances going to have to suffer even 1% as much as the poor Ukrainians, no matter what happens to our petrol prices and heating bills.

And the government can subsidize for as long as it takes, things like heating bills for the poorest who genuinely cannot afford it.

We cannot expect to get out of this unholy mess completely unscathed and whilst none of us want to be poorer, or see our savings take a hit, or even lose our jobs... in the scheme of things, that is getting off lightly. We should be turning up the sanctions wick to 11 IMO. Anything and everything that can be done short of all out war, should be done. No trade with Russia whatsoever should be allowed, despite the very obvious adverse consequences to ourselves.

I would also consider sanctioning countries which refuse to apply sanctions themselves.

Whilst I am posting, I might also add that I hope we are engaged in one enormous charm offensive with China. They are not our enemy. They sell us half the things we buy and half the things we want, they make for us. The language started by Trump in particular about China being our enemy (principally because American manufacturing the rust belt is shite and China make better goods, cheaper) was a ridiculous and counter-productive move.

China has FAR more to gain from increased collaboration and closer relations with the US and the EU, than it does with Russia - an economy roughly the size of Italy.

Get China on board and Putin's empire building aspirations are finished.
 
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Danny Hoekman said:
Is he writing off the £1.5bn?? Surely the (ambitious) £3.5bn he is asking would recoup that.
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He will be lucky to get £2bn, probably closer to £1.5bn.

People know his situation and will wait to kick him in the bollocks.

The pool of buyers is also very small now.

China wouldn't be allowed, Saudi, Qatar and Abu Dhabi, all boxed off.

Any interested American will struggle to get business with a Russian signed off.
 
west didsblue said:
Your faith in our government playing by the rules is touching.

I still think it's far more likely that they are giving their donors time to get the bulk of their assets away from UK jurisdiction.
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Have any of the donors (individuals or entities) been sanctioned by other jurisdictions? Genuine question; I’ve not checked. If the answer is yes then I’ll have to concede my point.
 
Chippy_boy said:
If the choice was "should we stop him now, or stop him later? Oh decisions, decisions", then of course everyone would agree it's better now.

But what about "should we stop him now by using means that could invoke WW3 and hundreds of millions, conceivably even billions dead, or should we apply maximum sanctions now and wait to see if we really do have a threat of further Russian expansion later, because actually we may very well not"?

A bit more nuanced decision I think. There's plenty on here who have the opinion that Putin is hell bent on restoration of the USSR. They key word is opinion. No-one actually knows, and moreover even if that was his aspiration, no-one knows whether he might have changed his mind after the shit storm he's led his country into already.

What if he genuinely is a deranged lunatic who is quite prepared to nuke half the planet rather than to lose in Ukraine? Is it a great strategy to just "hope" that he isn't? Fingers crossed, like?
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Oh, I agree. I don't envy any of the politicians making these decisions. Nobody knows if he'd press the button if the west intervened. By the same token, nobody knows if he'll press the button regardless of what the west does.

It's very hard the watch what he's doing to millions and think that it's possible something could be done but at the same time I totally understand why NATO can't be seen to be doing anything.

Who knows, if the Ukrainians manage to use NATO equipment to destroy hundreds of tanks and planes, Russia may view this as a western attack on Russia anyway.

Protein Junkie said:
Not seen much on here about Lavrovs latest rant.
Sounds a bit like he’s shit the bed stating Russia not thinking about Nuclear War.
Laughably states we are trying to bolster our security to their cost - can’t think why ?
Also states US trying to subjugate Europe - let us decide that ffs.
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You listen to what he says and you think how can he stand there are say these things? I've just come to the conclusion that it's for the Russian audience. Hopefully his comments about nuclear war are designed to tell the west that they didn't really mean it, but who knows? As somebody said, it's like Comical Ali all over again except with much higher stakes.
 
Thornliebank said:
Putin has been clever here. Building up nuclear energy and plotting while the West grovels to a tantrum throwing Swedish teenager and plant eating hipsters.
Luckily for us, his army is useless other than bombing civilians from a distance.
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Gr8 b8 m8, r8 8
 
SWP's back said:
I believe he thought he would face similar toothless sanctions to what he faced when he invaded Georgia and annexed Crimea. There’s not a chance he expected exactly what he’s facing right now.

The economy is shagged, absolutely shagged. Our analysts are basically righting off anything based in Russia.
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I want this to be the case, but to use the American phrase, there's Wall Street and there's Main Street. Damaging oligarchs I see as a political move rather than an economic one. These robber barons got rich off Putin, they're a support group, hurt them and that support evaporates.

But economic sanctions have such a poor record. This might not be a great analogy, but the Royal Navy blockaded Germany in the First World War, no goods came in to the country via the North Sea and the Channel for over four years, a nation with a population of 67 million in 1914. Yet it took those four years to bring Germany to her knees.

Economic sanctions are not a blockade, people will be inconvenienced but they won't starve. I do so want these economic sanctions to work, but if Putin can spin this as the evil west punishing mother Russia for trying to save fellow Russians from Ukrainian Nazis, it might work in his favour.

Difficult to gauge the zeitgeist in Russia, I suspect, but I don't know, that these sanctions are more about undercutting a specific Putin support group, rather than stirring discontent amongst the general population. To "inconvenience" powerful people in Russia, to motivate them, old time Chicago gangster style, to pull the plug on the man who's bad for business.
 
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As well as the thousands, tens of thousand, hundreds of thousands the **** is responsible for bombing to death, the millions he has forced to flee their homes, how many innocent Ukrainians are going to be starved to death? I am 62 and this is the most disgusted I have been in my life, by a long way. The fact that Europe is still buying russian gas and oil, and to support that trade haven’t cut them anything like fully off SWIFT is also disgusting. There’s a big part of me that thinks we should declare war on the cunts, but to think we haven’t even stopped trading with them is unfathomable
 
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Apparently,Russian soldiers,dead or fucked off,I don't know,left behind some "battle plans/documents".
One of them estimating the invasion would last for 15 days.
 
BringBackSwales said:
Just about every child leaving Ukraine is leaving their dad behind, as well as their homes and belongings. Fucking disgusting, we need a stronger swear word than **** for Putin. These sanctions need to be stronger and need to last for decades. Stop buying their gas and oil, fuck them fully out of SWIFT, seize all the western assets of russian oligarchs INCLUDING THOSE IN THE UK JOHNSON. Russia needs to pay for this for decades to ensure putin or a successor doesn’t do it again; bankrupt and humiliate the cunts
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I won't be happy until the **** is dead.
 
tolmie's hairdoo said:
He will be lucky to get £2bn, probably closer to £1.5bn.

People know his situation and will wait to kick him in the bollocks.

The pool of buyers is also very small now.

China wouldn't be allowed, Saudi, Qatar and Abu Dhabi, all boxed off.

Any interested American will struggle to get business with a Russian signed off.
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In the current circumstances - is he even allowed to sell it? Can a new owner even be allowed to pay him? Where would any payment be accepted?
 
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tolmie's hairdoo said:
If an army is said to march on its stomach, then it needs the cash to feed it. Companies like BP, Shell, they don't usually write off stakes worth billions of dollars?

If Abramovich is writing off the £1.5bn in loans he is owed by Chelsea, it also shows the flip side of this coin?

He can't afford not to write it off, because whatever he recoups back is better than nothing?
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Surely if we sanction him he can’t get his hands on those proceeds anyway? Anyroad is it on eBay? I want to have a cheeky £1 bid.
 
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