Russia - threadbanned users in OP

Actually we have quite an abundance of the exact military supplies they need.

Also there is no constituently bar on sending weapons to Ukraine or troops for that matter if it came to it.

It's all academic anyway, we are giving millions into the EU defence fund for Ukraine, we are just winking saying our money is for "medicine".

I agree 100% , there is a time for neutrality and a time to be stand up and be counted, history wont reflect well on us. The bloody arms we have are never going to be used in anger here anyhow, why not give them to Ukraine and make a friend. Of all countries we should know what its like to stand up to a bully, did the brave Irish men and women who died in the GPO and elsewhere for our freedom not teach us that?

@Curious_Case

I'm seeing this a few times, now, the idea that the West is sitting back and watching Ukraine fight a battle on the West's behalf, and that it's wrong that the West is not helping more than it is.

Principally, the average Ukrainian soldier is fighting to defend his or her country from an invasion. If the Ukrainians do not want to do this type of fighting, they don't actually have to. They could have just allowed Russian troops into their country, offered no resistance, and given over Zelenskyy in handcuffs to let Putin have his way. Puppet in, carry on with life. But that's not what they're doing. They're taking what is the much harder path, to stand up to Russia and put lives on the line in order to be able to take the path it wants to take as a country. The West is supportive of the direction Ukraine wants to go in, but we've all been over the reasons why Western powers are reticent to put actual boots on the ground.

Finally, also exporters like Canada are going to increase their production to help cover the shortfall

Volodymyr Zelensky thinks Ireland are half in half out in our support for Ukraine, he wants our anti-tank weapons to prove him wrong?

He may even have been misquoted. A Ukrainian speaker on Twitter is suggesting he said 'Well, practically' and not 'Well, almost'.....very easy for things to get lost in translation if English is not being used.

The "West" absolutely should have done more - humanitarian air drops at a minimum, but with an implicit threat that the shooting down of a plane would be met with a response.

This escapade has exposed and weakened Russian capability, thereby giving the "West" a huge advantage in terms of assessment.

I understand the reasons for not enforcing a no-fly zone and I'm only in favour of it now because NATO didn't go in immediately.

Even when that Government was hijacked, and is not a true representation of of the people? Putin's reign was born in blood, 3 apartment blocks blown up, hundreds dead. A 4th apartment was also to be blown up, but the people living there caught the bombers red handed. and they turned out to be FSB. Since then Putin has rode a coach and four through the Russian Constitution every election, stealing them, stuffed ballot boxes, coercion etc. You name it Putin has done it. Putin is no more the genuinely elected President of Russia than I am. See what happens protesters on the streets of Moscow ( or any other Russian City) the present day. If in the past if free fair and democratic elections had been held, so you honestly think Putin would have been elected? Personally I doubt it very much.

Yes and people call Putin a chess player and a genius. Easy be a genius and a chess player when you can murder and ‘suicide’ your opponents at will.

@Curious_Case

Therein lies the problem. NATO/the West are not going to volunteer an intervention, even a humanitarian one, where it risks an escalation, so threatening to retaliate if the mission is shot at risks that very escalation. It's a conservative policy, for sure, but the stakes of escalation in conflict are quite high, to put it mildly. In stark realpolitik terms, it seems they've weighed the risk of that as being more significant than the devastation being wreaked upon Mariupol.

It's more likely that the Russians could agree to more robust humanitarian corridors be put in place and let the Red Cross and such organisations work unencumbered, although they have even resisted that. Given that the Russian tactic appears to be to starve the city into submission, they're going to try to prevent anything getting in any which way.