Claim: 'Kyiv is the mother of all Russian Cities'

Turtwig · 01-08-2014 9:39pm

Brown Bomber wrote: »

Also, I am not sure how you are speaking from first hand experience in declaring Russia being responsible for the Malaysian plane.

Because he was speaking of his first hand experience with Russia being "a country filled with large numbers of red-eyed, semi-fascist thugs". No where there does he mention he plane incident being Russian responsibility coming from first hand experience. He is clearly talking about the attitudes of the Russian people in general. Then applying his first hand experience to that.

This type of misunderstanding and misrepresentation is all too frequent in your posts.

Brown Bomber · 01-08-2014 9:54pm

Turtwig wrote: »

Because he was speaking of his first hand experience with Russia being "a country filled with large numbers of red-eyed, semi-fascist thugs". No where there does he mention he plane incident being Russian responsibility coming from first hand experience. He is clearly talking about the attitudes of the Russian people in general. Then applying his first hand experience to that.

This type of misunderstanding and misrepresentation is all too frequent in your posts.

There is no misrepresentation. Maybe he mispoke but he clearly claims to have first-hand experience regarding the plane. This is the post I responded to:

robindch wrote: »

Delete the word "filled" if you wish. As for the rest, I'm speaking from first-hand experience, so I feel it's an accurate description rather than a "russophobic" one.

"the rest" including:

it was almost certainly indirectly or directly responsible for shooting down MH17

Hotblack Desiato · 01-08-2014 11:47pm

Brown Bomber wrote: »

It is self-evident that timings are significant. The question is whether they were cynically intentioned this way.

The burden of proof is on those who make an assertion, not those who question an assertion.

Still waiting.

oscarBravo · 02-08-2014 12:03am

Brown Bomber wrote: »

I was under the impression that your position was that the timing of these 3 events all occurring within the same week was insignificant or coincidence.

As is so often the case, you can correct this impression by reading what I wrote, not what it suits you to read into what you think I wrote.

I made no claim about the timing of these events. I answered a question. If you hold the view that the timing of these events has a specific significance in the context of current affairs, perhaps you'd be so good as to point out how the timing of these events has differed in any appreciable way from what it would have been had recent events not transpired.

Brown Bomber · 02-08-2014 1:09am

oscarBravo wrote: »

As is so often the case, you can correct this impression by reading what I wrote, not what it suits you to read into what you think I wrote.

I made no claim about the timing of these events. I answered a question. If you hold the view that the timing of these events has a specific significance in the context of current affairs, perhaps you'd be so good as to point out how the timing of these events has differed in any appreciable way from what it would have been had recent events not transpired.

In fairness, you did thank a post which wrongly conflated a very reasonable suspicion with examples of the absurd, hence my impression.

I did ask you to clarify or correct me if I was mistaken, but you cut that part out and haven't responded.

Brown Bomber · 02-08-2014 1:13am

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

The burden of proof is on those who make an assertion, not those who question an assertion.

Still waiting.

Your assertion was implied. I would pose the same question to you - What evidence is absent that we would certainly possess if the timings of these events were politically motivated?

Correct me if I am wrong but at this moment it is not proven one way or the other whether the timings here are politically motivated or not?

Hotblack Desiato · 02-08-2014 10:08am

Brown Bomber wrote: »

Your assertion was implied. I would pose the same question to you - What evidence is absent that we would certainly possess if the timings of these events were politically motivated?

Correct me if I am wrong but at this moment it is not proven one way or the other whether the timings here are politically motivated or not?

Wrong. An assertion was made of political motivation, but it remains groundless unless and until evidence is presented. So far, not a shred.

oscarBravo · 02-08-2014 12:22pm

Brown Bomber wrote: »

Correct me if I am wrong but at this moment it is not proven one way or the other whether the timings here are politically motivated or not?

It's also not proven one way or the other whether there's a teapot in solar orbit.

As has been repeatedly pointed out, it has been suggested that the timing of certain events is politically motivated. The default position, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, is that the timing of those events is unaltered. There is no requirement to adduce evidence to disprove a conspiracy theory when no evidence has been adduced to support it.

So, what's your view? Do you believe the timing to be politically motivated? If so, what evidence do you have for this belief? If not, why are you arguing about it?

Brown Bomber · 02-08-2014 12:53pm

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

Wrong.

To avoid being accused of misrepresentation again I shall repeat the question you responded to again.

Correct me if I am wrong but at this moment it is not proven one way or the other whether the timings here are politically motivated or not

So I am to take it that you believe that it has been proven? Which way?

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

An assertion was made of political motivation,

Which was re calibrated to a suspicion.

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

but it remains groundless unless and until evidence is presented. So far, not a shred.

You are muddling up "groundless" with suspicion here.

It is a reasonable suspicion and is line with the British Government's position of Russia, the avalanche of anti-Russian propaganda; especially the Murdoch rags "Hitler-Putin's missile and his mission to expand the Soviet Union" type nonsense, and Rupert Murdoch's history of attempting to influence the EU.

Rupert Murdoch did try to dictate government policy on EU, says Sir John Major

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/rupert-murdoch-did-try-to-dictate-government-policy-on-eu-says-sir-john-major-7845036.html

And then all in the space of a week you have the ECHR ruling against russia, (The ECHR is reliant on donation from member states. The member state's themselves get to decide on what cases this money is spent), the sanctions and most of suspicious of all the launch of a UK government enquiry into Litvinenko, who has been dead for 8 years. All this with the background of the US accusations taken as fact and then parroted by the media - the same media who sold the lies of WMD in Iraq, Iraqi's throwing babies out of incubators etc - of the Russians being responsible for MH17, and all this based on "super-secret evidence that we have but we can't tell anyone about, just trust us".

A sidenote here is that the Russian's prime suspect in the Litvinenko murder will be the main beneficiary in the ECHR ruling.

So once again, "What evidence is absent that we would certainly possess if the timings of these events were politically motivated?"

stevejazzx · 02-08-2014 1:02pm

I think the people saying there is no evidence about timing or release of these awards being related to, or influenced by the US, are correct. It would be a very silly way to derail the thread to continue to argue it.

Back on topic, the thread title - the complex relationship has that existed between the Ukraine and Russia for over a thousand years - how many people here think that the US have disproportionately involved themselves in this conflict and if so what is their agenda? The promotion of democracy? Containment of Russian expansionism? The containment of Russia as an economic threat?

Brown Bomber · 02-08-2014 1:14pm

oscarBravo wrote: »

It's also not proven one way or the other whether there's a teapot in solar orbit.

As has been repeatedly pointed out, it has been suggested that the timing of certain events is politically motivated. The default position, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, is that the timing of those events is unaltered. There is no requirement to adduce evidence to disprove a conspiracy theory when no evidence has been adduced to support it.

So, what's your view? Do you believe the timing to be politically motivated? If so, what evidence do you have for this belief? If not, why are you arguing about it?

Falsely conflating the absurd with the reasonable achieves nothing. There is a long history of politically motivated enquirys and using courts of law as political tools as well as Western ideological subversion. Take this an example: Modern art was a CIA weapon. There is no history of any teapot in solar orbit.
You still haven't shared how you even know at all if any timeline has been altered, nor provided any evidence of same.
You still cannot point to a single piece of evidence that we would certainly have that is missing here if it was politically motivated.
My view is that it is unknown whether one or both of these events occurring within the same week were politically motivated. The means and motive are present though we are unlikely to know for sure. There are only so many Edward Snowdens around.
What is your view?

Brown Bomber · 02-08-2014 1:15pm

stevejazzx wrote: »

I think the people saying there is no evidence about timing or release of these awards being related to, or influenced by the US, are correct. It would be a very silly way to derail the thread to continue to argue it.

Sorry. Agreed. And shall say no more about it.

stevejazzx · 02-08-2014 2:36pm

The disproportionate involvement of the US gets worse, or should I say painfully transparent.

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2014/08/01/world/europe/01reuters-ukraine-crisis-usa-training.html?ref=world

oscarBravo · 02-08-2014 3:57pm

Brown Bomber wrote: »

You still cannot point to a single piece of evidence that we would certainly have that is missing here if it was politically motivated.

I will admit that it was stupid of me to get into yet another discussion with someone whose favourite debating tactic is to ignore answers that have been given, while continuing to stridently demand those same answers.

What is your view?

My view is that the person who proposes a conspiracy theory has a responsibility to adduce evidence for it, and that asking others to disprove something for which there is no evidence - on an Atheist discussion forum - is a risible debating tactic.

recedite · 02-08-2014 5:25pm

robindch wrote: »

Just to clarify, I imagine that the "large numbers" I'm talking about are in the hundreds of thousands, possibly less, possibly more - the kind of people from any population who are easily led by the kind of predatory propaganda which Russia is filling its airwaves with.

OK, these "imaginings" of yours are valid as opinions, but they cannot be presented as facts. Not that you are pretending they are facts, but you present them in such a way that they may easily be conflated with facts, just as the US/UK administrations do likewise.

The actual known movement of "hundreds of thousands" consists only of civilian refugees fleeing from eastern Ukraine into Russia.

robindch wrote: »

Russia has invaded and annexed Crimea; it has armed its own citizens who have then invaded East Ukraine with the help of local thugs and its own military resulting in the deaths, so far, of somewhere between 1,000 and 2,000 people;

Is there any proof of Russian state involvement in the arming of the rebels?
Steve has just posted an admission by Obama that the US intends to openly arm and train the counter-insurgency paramilitary force from next year.

Not even the Ukrainian army, but the paramilitary force recruited from extreme right wing nationalists in western regions, and which is rapidly gaining a nasty reputation for atrocities against civilians in the east; the so called "National Guard".

If Crimea has been invaded by a foreign power, why is there no resistance movement there? Why is it peaceful?

If Kiev regards the cities in Eastern Ukraine as loyal, why do they launch air strikes, and rocket strikes, and artillery bombardments against these cities, and the civilians living within them? Surely the loyal citizens would turn on the "foreign Russian thugs" and find ways to invite in their western "liberators".

The situation only makes sense if Kiev regards these eastern Ukrainian citizens as disloyal, and in need of severe punishment.

oscarBravo wrote: »

As has been repeatedly pointed out, it has been suggested that the timing of certain events is politically motivated. The default position, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, is that the timing of those events is unaltered. There is no requirement to adduce evidence to disprove a conspiracy theory when no evidence has been adduced to support it.

Incorrect, the default position is not "that the timing has been unaltered".

Occam's Razor applies to the default position; the simplest solution.
What are the chances that the 3 events coincided, by pure chance, with third stage sanctions which are designed specifically to inflict political damage on Putin, internally within Russia?

oscarBravo · 02-08-2014 6:18pm

recedite wrote: »

Incorrect, the default position is not "that the timing has been unaltered".

In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, that's the default position.

Occam's Razor applies to the default position; the simplest solution.

The solution that requires the fewest assumptions is that nothing changed.

What are the chances that the 3 events coincided, by pure chance, with third stage sanctions which are designed specifically to inflict political damage on Putin, internally within Russia?

I don't know what the chances are; neither do I know what the chances are of those events not coinciding. I strongly suspect that you don't know what the chances are either, but that you're invoking the "appeal to probability" logical fallacy, and dressing it up as Occam's Razor.

As I've pointed out to Brown Bomber (although he doesn't seem to have noticed that I did so), if you believe that the timing isn't a coincidence, then you believe (necessarily) that the timing has been altered. It should be easy to demonstrate if this is the case, by finding out when these events were expected to occur. If that information isn't available, then it can't be known whether the timing was altered, and the conspiracy theory will remain a conspiracy theory.

Of course, people will choose to believe conspiracy theories without evidence, but the raison d'être of this forum (as I understand it) is supposed to be to challenge beliefs for which there is no evidence.

Brown Bomber · 02-08-2014 7:02pm

stevejazzx wrote: »

The disproportionate involvement of the US gets worse, or should I say painfully transparent.

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2014/08/01/world/europe/01reuters-ukraine-crisis-usa-training.html?ref=world

I would say that any involvement by the US is disproportionate despite their billions of dollars they have invested in orchestrating regime change in Ukraine. They have no business there nor any actual national interest.

This is ominous news, truly frightening for the people of Eastern Ukraine. It's like putting guns in the hands of the EDL and National Front and allowing them kill UK Muslims at will with impunity.

So much for President Hope and Change. The US has gone full circle and devolved back into financing, arming and training fascist death-squads and Islamic radicals simultaneously to fight their proxy wars for them. Depressing.

recedite · 02-08-2014 7:44pm

oscarBravo wrote: »

It should be easy to demonstrate if this is the case, by finding out when these events were expected to occur. If that information isn't available, then it can't be known whether the timing was altered, and the conspiracy theory will remain a conspiracy theory.

Yes. It was brown bomber who first pointed this out.
So, in the case 2 of the events, (Hague arbitration and the separate ECHR judgement, both concerning the effective nationalisation of Yukos) I don't know what the expected timescale was, so I concede the point.
On the third event, the polonium poisoning inquiry, I know that the coroner holding the inquest asked the British govt. in June 2013 to upgrade to a full public inquiry, on the basis that an ordinary inquest would not be allowed access to the full facts of the case, due to the govt having just issued a "public interest immunity certificate" which would effectively stymie and stonewall his efforts to find the truth. Which request was denied. That govt. suddenly made a u-turn on this and initiated the inquiry last week, which means it was a political decision, with no advance timescale. No additional new evidence has been put forward which would justify escalating the inquest into an inquiry.
So Occam's Razor applies here; the simplest explanation is that the escalation was politically timed to coincide with other international events.

Interestingly, in this recent ECHR judgement, three out of seven judges (including the sole Russian judge) disagreed with the original "principle ECHR judgement" made back in 2011 that the Yukos tax bill was unlawful. But, due to the fact that the judgement had already been made, they had to consider the state tax demand as "unlawful" when deciding on this case which was concerned with the compo payment. So there is an issue as to whether Yukos shareholders would be due any compensation at all, if the tax liabilities of the company were taken into account. So that will presumably be the basis of the Russian appeal.

As pointed out earlier, if such compensation can be awarded by ECHR to an oligarch who gained and then lost a state asset, then what should be the compensation awarded to a family who have lost their child and their home in an indiscriminate artillery or rocket strike perpetrated by their own (or a foreign) government?

recedite · 02-08-2014 9:10pm

Anyway as regards sanctions, Egypt seems quite keen to deal with Russia; this from a few months ago.

oscarBravo · 02-08-2014 11:58pm

recedite wrote: »

So, in the case 2 of the events, (Hague arbitration and the separate ECHR judgement, both concerning the effective nationalisation of Yukos) I don't know what the expected timescale was, so I concede the point.

Thank you.

On the third event, the polonium poisoning inquiry, I know that the coroner holding the inquest asked the British govt. in June 2013 to upgrade to a full public inquiry, on the basis that an ordinary inquest would not be allowed access to the full facts of the case, due to the govt having just issued a "public interest immunity certificate" which would effectively stymie and stonewall his efforts to find the truth. Which request was denied. That govt. suddenly made a u-turn on this and initiated the inquiry last week, which means it was a political decision, with no advance timescale. No additional new evidence has been put forward which would justify escalating the inquest into an inquiry.
So Occam's Razor applies here; the simplest explanation is that the escalation was politically timed to coincide with other international events.

Fair enough: in the absence of evidence to the contrary, you've made a prima facie case that this, at least, was a politically-motivated decision.

stevejazzx · 03-08-2014 10:47am

Finally a western paper covers this story
The story first broke over a week ago and was reported only in Russian sources -

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/29/world/europe/civilian-death-toll-rise-in-ukraine.html?_r=0

I am amazed how people in the west think Russian propaganda is all encompassing when clearly the vast majority of headlines are those (perhaps rightly to a fair extent) criticizing Russia. With the obvious and transparent propaganda emanating from Israel in relation to ongoing Palestinian crisis and with big brother US in almost unanimous support as usual you would think people would treat the situation with a more levelheaded approach. It is further embarrassing that many posters here have thanked posts condemning Russian fascism while simultaneously ignoring the that American backed fascists in the Ukraine, large numbers of which are estimated to make up the Ukrainian National Guard, which in its current iteration was literally thrown together overnight, an organisation that the US now says it will train.

Remember how well the training of the Mujaheddin turned out? It helped create in no small way the state of terrorism that exists around the world today yet people here say we should trust the US.

The claim has been from the start that the US have been disproportionately involved in this dispute (i.e involved way before even early negotiations between Yanukovych and the EU) and claims of such were called conspiracy theories.

Considering their (the US) activities around the world in the last few years the default position on US foreign policy now should be one of distrust - they are only serving themselves and their own economic interests. They couldn't make that more obvious for the rest of world without coming out with a press conference and a diagram.

stevejazzx · 03-08-2014 11:01am

Brown Bomber wrote: »

This is ominous news, truly frightening for the people of Eastern Ukraine. It's like putting guns in the hands of the EDL and National Front and allowing them kill UK Muslims at will with impunity.

So much for President Hope and Change. The US has gone full circle and devolved back into financing, arming and training fascist death-squads and Islamic radicals simultaneously to fight their proxy wars for them. Depressing.

I think you are right, the more I look into it the UNG seem to be comprised of large numbers of untrained far right volunteers some proudly displaying Wolfangels. I am both amazed and horrified at the double standard that has been set in this thread in relation to the rise of new age eastern European fascism. Those in rapturous and rhetorical condemnation of Russian fascism are completely ignoring similar if not worse elements in the Ukraine; in one post they were reduced (read excused) to having ideologies similar to the UKIP - this information garnered by the poster from a couple of interviews!

http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2014/06/10/fasc-j10.html

article wrote:

The US Republican Party also has decades-long connections with Ukrainian fascists. The American government invested large sums of money in the preparation of the coup against Yanukovych. Victoria Nuland, US undersecretary of state for Europe, stated that Washington had “invested” around $5 billion in political projects in Ukraine over the past two decades.
On May 9, the government-aligned Russian newspaper Izvestia reported that a Right Sector member had flown to Washington at the end of April for talks with the US administration. Nuland offered Right Sector $5-$10 million to give up its weapons and transform itself into a party. But Dmytro Yarosh, leader of Right Sector, rejected the offer.
The strong support from Western governments for Ukrainian fascists is directed not only against workers in Ukraine, but against workers around the world. Berlin and Washington have deliberately built up fascist forces in Ukraine and are now using them to impose social attacks on the working class and prepare for a major war with Russia.

Brown Bomber · 04-08-2014 1:02am

UKIP may be accused of many things but they are not even on the same chart of fascists as the violent Neo-Nazis who led from the front the Kiev coup against the democratically elected government and have since cemented their influence within the new power structure.

For a start UKIP don't restrict their membership to ethnically-pure white Britons and UKIP don't have their own fascist paramilitary wing. Svoboda has C14.

"14" in neo-Nazi circles = The 14 words (of Hitler in Mein Kampf)

"We must secure the existence of our people and a future for White Children.

They don't wear badges and pins and so on saying "8-8" mean "Heil Hitler". H being the 8th letter of the Alphabet,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SBo0akeDMY

Can you imagine Farage at a UKIP rally giving such a fascist salute as Svoboda's leader here?

UKIP didn't start life as the Nationalist Socialist Social National Party. UKIP don't involve themselves with their extremist, white supremacist neo-Nazi and anti-semitic brothers across Europe. Unlike Svoboda...

Who in the last year have met amongst others, Hungary's fiercely anti-semtic Jobbik, Germany's Nazi party the NDP and Italy's fascists "New Force" who were formed by two members of NAR, the fascists responsible (with assistance from the US and NATO as part of Operation Gladio) for over 30 deaths in a campaign of terrorism including the Bologna massacre.

The old and new European friends of Ukraine’s far-right Svoboda party

Bild13-kl%281%29.jpg

Holger Apfel NDO und Mychajlo Holowko, Svoboda
http://web.archive.org/web/20130608121413/http://www.npd-fraktion-sachsen.de/index.php?s=3&aid=2096

240x180n_photo_35ea7ef0c669b08483785c3bc64bdca2_1.jpg?itok=CxqNuk31

A Svoboda delegation meeting New Force
http://www.forzanuova.org/sites/default/files/styles/content_img_totalview/public/upload/240x180n_photo_35ea7ef0c669b08483785c3bc64bdca2_1.jpg?itok=CxqNuk31

I could go on and on proving this. And this is before I even mention Right Sector, Trident, UNA-ANSO and some others. You only have to scratch the surface to see the truly ugly (and exclusively WHITE) ugly face of this movement and anyone else can see it for themselves if they are bothered enough to look.

The immediate concern for me is the pseudo-liberal in the White House arming/training/funding these neo-Nazis.

Not that they need any arming or training as these pictures claimed to have been sent to a Russian paper of a Nazi paramilitary training course show.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/213086639/Translation-of-Russian-article-about-military-trainings-of-the-Ukrainian-UNA-UNSO-with-Estonian-special-forces-and-NATO

It is virtual ethnic cleansing of a minority through fear. The only real options for Ukranian ethnic Russians is now flee or flight, forever.

These extremists already have two batallions and are currently recruiting for a third. Lord knows how much non-Ukrainian blood they will spill.

stevejazzx · 05-08-2014 6:48pm

AP: Obama Administration Program Secretly Sent Young Latin Americans To Cuba To Gin Up Rebellion

Certainly adds further plausibility to the claims they have done the same in Ukraine.
I've posted this a few times

http://pando.com/2014/02/28/pierre-omidyar-co-funded-ukraine-revolution-groups-with-us-government-documents-show/

Seems to be entirely in line with these opening lines from the Cuban article

WASHINGTON — An Obama administration program secretly dispatched young Latin Americans to Cuba using the cover of health and civic programs to provoke political change, a clandestine operation that put those foreigners in danger even after a U.S. contractor was hauled away to a Cuban jail

Also remember that US have already failed in another proxy war with Russia
I've posted this before here

WikiLeaks exposes US cover-up of Georgian attack on South Ossetia

In case the above links are seen as blindly pro-Russian; they're not - I'm simply attempting to evenly represent the facts. It's also not anti-US although they should be held to the same standard as Russia and Israel - they can't criticize Russia while plotting against them, they can't sell weapons to Israels and then say that the bombings are terrible. With behavior like this why should any Russian person believe their media, why should anyone?
Despite the many things I admire in US culture, politically and militarily they are currently the ultimate rogue state. Here's a recent Guardian article on their human rights issues.

grols · 06-08-2014 9:22pm

Brown Bomber wrote: »

UKIP may be accused of many things but they are not even on the same chart of fascists as the violent Neo-Nazis who led from the front the Kiev coup against the democratically elected government and have since cemented their influence within the new power structure.........................

What are you talking about?

You even have to Euromaidan?
In the video not Nazi symbols.
On the photo with Tiagnybok - Svoboda Party leader only indicates something hand. Photo cut out of context.

Brown Bomber · 07-08-2014 1:41am

grols wrote: »

What are you talking about?

You even have to Euromaidan?
In the video not Nazi symbols.
On the photo with Tiagnybok - Svoboda Party leader only indicates something hand. Photo cut out of context.

Hi,
I am talking about the vioelnt Ukrainian fascists involved in the coup.

This should clear up the photo for you.

recedite · 08-08-2014 6:12pm

^^^ That's an interesting photo, with the fiery fingers poking out of a barn brack.

Speaking of foodstuffs, now that the ill conceived EU sanctions against Russia have resulted in tit-for-tat sanctions against Irish exports, I hope Robinch will be increasing his personal consumption of cheese in order to help offset the loss of this multi million euro market to the Irish agricultural sector.

Brian Shanahan · 09-08-2014 12:32pm

recedite wrote: »

Speaking of foodstuffs, now that the ill conceived EU sanctions against Russia have resulted in tit-for-tat sanctions against Irish exports, I hope Robinch will be increasing his personal consumption of cheese in order to help offset the loss of this multi million euro market to the Irish agricultural sector.

Given that:
A) Total EU agricultural exports to Russia ammounted to €11.7bn. The EU agricultural industry as a whole generates about €780bn per annum (based on EU wide figure for the agricultural industry at 6% of GDP and an EU economy worth roughly €13tn per annum). Losing €11.7bn is a drop in the ocean. In fact the threat to Ireland is even more miniscule at €70m out of a €164bn economy. That's at homeopathy levels of small!

There are many countries with money such as China which are food poor and are happy to buy off the EU. There will be a short period of adjustment while the new markets come on line but that €11.7bn will be earned elsewhere.

It will not be the EU which suffers from Putin's ban on agricultural imports, but the Russian people. Russia is already a massively food poor country, and with Putin deciding that his people don't need to buy food it will ultimately be the Russian state and people which will suffer.

This ban on foodstuffs from the US, EU, Australia, Canada &c. (i.e. the vast majority in size of the food exporting groups) smacks of the impotent raging of an increasingly unsettled tin-pot dictator, and could very well be the final undoing of Putin.

stevejazzx · 10-08-2014 1:00am

Brian Shanahan wrote: »

Given that:
A) Total EU agricultural exports to Russia ammounted to €11.7bn. The EU agricultural industry as a whole generates about €780bn per annum (based on EU wide figure for the agricultural industry at 6% of GDP and an EU economy worth roughly €13tn per annum). Losing €11.7bn is a drop in the ocean. In fact the threat to Ireland is even more miniscule at €70m out of a €164bn economy. That's at homeopathy levels of small!
There are many countries with money such as China which are food poor and are happy to buy off the EU. There will be a short period of adjustment while the new markets come on line but that €11.7bn will be earned elsewhere.

It will not be the EU which suffers from Putin's ban on agricultural imports, but the Russian people. Russia is already a massively food poor country, and with Putin deciding that his people don't need to buy food it will ultimately be the Russian state and people which will suffer.

This ban on foodstuffs from the US, EU, Australia, Canada &c. (i.e. the vast majority in size of the food exporting groups) smacks of the impotent raging of an increasingly unsettled tin-pot dictator, and could very well be the final undoing of Putin.

Not that it will do any good for feverish anti-Russians like you Brian but maybe have a read of this to get a better idea of what's actually going on

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/vladimir-putin/11023577/Fresh-evidence-of-how-the-West-lured-Ukraine-into-its-orbit.html

Perhaps months from now or years from now we will be able to say (admit), just like the middle east conflict that the role of US was actually disastrous and in many ways the main contributory factor to the whole thing but some people will forever cling to the bankrupt ideology that the US exports democracy and that they represent the lesser of two evils.

The evidence of covert, corrupt and duplicitous behavior from the US is now staggering. Where are the sanctions against them?
This situation is preposterous. As much as I don't like Putin the west is just as guilty, even more so.

Brian Shanahan · 10-08-2014 1:15am

stevejazzx wrote: »

Not that it will do any good for feverish anti-Russians like you Brian but maybe have a read of this to get a better idea of what's actually going on

A) I am not a feverish anti-Russian, I am a realist, and I realise that having a neo-Nazi dictatorship in charge of the second biggest nuclear power is a bad thing, unlike certain people. Less of the insulting behaviour please (I'd ask for a reasoned defence of your position, except that over the course of this thread it has become obvious that there is no reasoned defence of Putin, it is simply a case of "two legs good, four legs bad").

I don't as a rule go to the Torygraph for my news and analysis, it was always a stranger to truth, but ever since the weirdo feudalist Barclay twins (see what they're trying to do with the Channel Island they live on) they have gotten worse, flying the flag for any right-wing dictator willing to pretend to be interested no matter how odious. And it gets worse, you're sending me to the reality denier Christopher Booker (who if he told you it was raining you'd litterally have to stick your head out the door so often does he lie), who believes among other things that asbestos is good for you and climate change is a myth, going so far as publishing seriously libellous claims against respected scientists which have costed the Torygraph serious money to compensate the victims.

Seriously that article is so bad that if it were on print I wouldn't even wipe my arse with it.

Claim: 'Kyiv is the mother of all Russian Cities'

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