We can’t, you will be the first crying when you have no power to cook your potato waffles.
Something like this?:
"The European Union must move towards the creation of an EU army after Vladmir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, Emmanuel Macron has said.
The French president said EU leaders would meet to discuss plans to pool military resources on March 10 at a summit in Versailles." https://politpost.com/2022/03/03/emmanuel-macron-steps-up-eu-army-plan-to-deter-russian-threat/
You make some interesting points, but could he really withdraw from Ukraine without it widely being perceived as an absolute PR catastrophe for him? Without going all Godwin, he strikes me as a Hitler type figure who cannot withdraw from anywhere.....the Fuhrer practically banned the words 'withdraw' and 'retreat'.
Meanwhile on Craggy Island.....😉
Time to ratchet sanctions up another level.
Europe stop buying Russian gas NOW!
We can survive without it.
Terrorism, like the IRA terrorism, worked over the long-term. They made themselves a long term thorn in the side and brought the British to the negotiation table. Now they need to hold out and stall the Russian offensive in the short term. Terrorism might be a good strategy for a long term occupation resistance, but it's not good now.
Amazing how comfortable we've become with terrorism in the last week. Terrorist used to be bad up until then.
No, Europe appears to have learned a lesson the hard way that Russia is it's enemy and they can no longer line it's pockets and enable it to grow in strength. Unfortunately it seems it might take 3 years for Germany to fully wean off Russian gas, but that process has started. I think they announced 3 new LNG terminals to be built to facillitate all this, but it's going to take time.
Talk about the absolute worst time ever to have the German Green party stupids sharing power and trying to stop all the necessary things that need to be done, like restarting all the nuclear power stations and extending the life of the existing ones instead of shutting them down.
Of course the Greens in this country are also covering themselves in glory by currently trying to field legislation making LNG terminals in this country illegal. Instead we should be going full tilt on exploiting all of Irelands gas reserves instead. Locking them away is crazy. First the diesel is better than petrol disaster of 2007/8 and now this. Will this country ever learn not to vote for these utter morons?
Only one solution for that
Warning NSFW unless you work in the BDSM field
It’s looking like Putin will use the Syrian playbook and flatten Ukraine - that’s a very clear prospect so I hope European leaders decide what they’re going to do- if Putin progresses further with this approach it’s obvious Europe has said, better Ukrainian falls than Europe - so yet again Putin wins.
Yes this is true and there were many UN debates on the legitimacy of the NATO air strikes. It's one thing attacking the Yugoslavians to stop mass ethnic cleansing and another attacking a nuclear superpower on humanitarian grounds. It might be one of the reasons why Putin has held back his air force and big bombers. He had no qualms about using them in Syria.
Troops are demoralised and disillusioned because its going very badly, if that changes then they'll be fine
All this nonsense of relying on the humanity of Russian Troops and the Russian public to end this needs to be knocked on the head. Demoralize the **** outta them then they might think about ending it.
The oil and gas is still flowing, but the astronomical investment already made in building Nordstream 1 and 2 will take a long time to recoup.
While a regime change in Russia seems the most likely way to remove Putin, it all depends on who comes next. My thoughts are the following:
Elections under this regime are a joke so it won't be happening that way. Any politician winning an election under this regime (even if Putin is out of the picture) will be a safe choice in their eyes.
His inner circle are most likely yes men and anyone who showed initiative or ambition has probably been rooted out long ago (see how Venezuela went from the charismatic Chavez to the clueless Maduro) so the 'natural' order of succession wouldn't give me much hope either (Medvedev was probably a taste of this).
A coup d'etat can go either way. Look at all those African armies in the last few years who ousted the President and formed transitional councils as they prepared new constitutions and free elections: A lot of them are still in the same bother they were before and some are even more fractured and this is if they were lucky enough to get free elections.
I wouldn't have too much faith in the desires of the upper echelon of the Russian military for anything too drastic. Shoigu, for example, has been in the military since the late 70s; I can't seem him being too interested in letting the plebs rule the roost. At best, they'll remove Putin if they think he's gone too far and push for someone more balanced and easier to control.
The oligarchs would probably want someone like Putin was previously; not drawing too much attention to the country and just letting them get on with their business interests and luxury lifestyle in the West. So they'd probably go for a similar candidate to the military (less of a warmongerer but one who'll protect their interests in exchange for their support). I can't see the oligarchs being in the mood for any great upheaval, either.
A popular revolution seems far-fetched. We have some posters claiming that Russians have been brainwashed into thinking that nothing's wrong while others claim there's a lot of apathy and/or acceptance of the way things are while there's also big ethnic and religious divisions. I haven't met many Russians in my life and I can't say that I have a good idea of what they are like, generally, so I can't offer any insight on that. However, I doubt a popular uprising would be a smooth transition.
What would Kadyrov have to say about a popular movement, for example? I doubt he's the only minority figure who's been empowered by Putin in exchange for support. I can also see it being a fractured election with no outright winner, just a few decent-sized blocks at odds with each other.
The most realistic way for me is one where Putin is forced to one side and the military and the oligarchs install someone to their liking and with some guarantees that there won't be any repetition of what Putin did towards the end. It might be better than what is currently happening but I can't see any wholesale changes for the time being.
FFS, no surprises here:-
There’s not too many Nazi’s out there that I like but Ukrainian Nazis are the carlsberg beer of Nazis- probably the nicest Nazis in the world.
The Russians will certainly survive the current sanctions as we're still buying their oil & gas. As we've seen with Iran, a country can still operate even under full sanctions. Iran still has enough funds to operate dozens of proxies in various countries including operating Hezbollah which costs hundreds of millions of dollars annually. There's a huge black market in Iran with its own currency. They manage to smuggle oil to Syria and other nations. Russia will be no different. Especially given that China will still buy from them. Even if we stop importing their oil & gas, Russia's economy will tank but reach a sustainable rock bottom. Meaning that the country will not enter some sort of dystopian anarchy of hungry people wandering the streets.
And don't underestimate the Russian people's ability to sustain hardship. They will survive a tanked economy for many years.
Not that they will have many planes to fly soon enough anyway.
No they were not ... If they wanted it destroyed the place would have been levelled. Just think about it, what benefit would russia gain from creating Chernobyl x10 so close to Crimea ?
NATO carried out an entirely offensive campaign in the former Yugoslavia, born out of frustration with Russia's veto preventing UN action. There is a precedent on humanitarian grounds and they can absolutely argue that the instability caused by this invasion is a real threat to NATO countries.
Yeah, I have heard stories like that too.
More romantic fondness of the "gold old days" than anything anchored to reality IMO.
She may get a chance to revisit those days in the next few years, you can ask her then how she getting on.
I did and I stand by it ..... A big change was/is needed regarding dependance on fossil fuels in general and specialy from tin pot dictators. europe's issue is that it is always devided when it comes to impementing significant change .... Brexit forced us to be united and now Putin does ...And all for the greater good. Europe needs to be a super power in their own right and not being dependant on medical supplies from China and oil and gas from Russia. It was fukcing embarassing watching the antics used to get a few facemasks from Beijing
IMHO what we learned from Putin's television appearance seems to be:
It's like when someone asks about something you've not paid much attention to. "Yeah it's all good", "Cool, will you show me it tomorrow?", "Yeeeah, it's totally ready". They probably knew (and knew Putin might not know) that they would be sending lambs to the slaughter in places.
It would be idiotic for NATO to attack Russia in Ukraine or directly. NATO is a defensive alliance first and foremost. You pick your battles when it comes to a potential nuclear war.
There are enough countries within NATO in Russia's crosshairs and NATO's resolve/unity will have been strengthened by the Russian invasion. NATO are also learning a huge amount about Russia's military capability. If anything, the invasion of Ukraine has protected Eastern Europe and the Baltic states like never before. Russia knows now that NATO will not be passive when it comes to defending one of it's members. Putin wont dare.
Sick Russian TV propaganda
Denis Polunchukov, a TV presenter displaying all of the predatory instincts of a pedophile - hope you’re looking in on this thread Denis, you sick bastard
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10577095/Kremlin-forces-children-watch-propaganda-videos-Russia-limits-access-BBC-website.html
.
I must have watched the power plant stream for an hour, not fun.
I thinks it's a mix. There are lots of people against the war and they are justifiably scared of protesting.
But I spent quite a long time in Russia in more peaceful times during the noughties and even then found particularly Russian men were incredibly chauvinistic and nationalistic and I expect a lot of them are very supportive of Putins war.
![Photo of [Deleted User]](https://we.vanillicon.com/v2/e050b53be62f0ae2404c620976170938.svg)
![Photo of [Deleted User]](https://wc.vanillicon.com/v2/c33618a99b1d02afaf5370e8c02bf147.svg)
![Photo of [Deleted User]](https://w2.vanillicon.com/v2/282101dc2976956f9dfc87f7a2ef2413.svg)
