Russia - threadbanned users in OP

This surgery post May 9th is growing traction. If he does go under the knife he will be very vulnerable. A lot of people are loosing a lot of money because of putins war.

“#Israeli mercenaries are fighting together with #Azov Nazis in #Ukraine,” #Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman #Zakharova

so the nazis and the jews are fighting russia together now

Our over indulgence and reliance on others wasn't going to end well. Look at all the industry we had during the 80's and 90's especially the Shannon free zone.

Apparently a factory that was producing Russian language text books for schools that were in occupied Ukraine Burned down down last night in Russia 🔥

Does the pope ever wonder,as I have done, why his boss,God, doesn't put an end to all this war and human suffering. I don't need to hear about this free will horse ****, I just wonder why he doesn't make an appearance and stop it. Same goes for Allah and all the other supreme powers.

I wouldn't say the West has been naive at all. It's quite normal to expect other countries to want to live with freedom in liberal societies where the endeavours of your efforts can reap rewards, and your freedom of speech is not punished by half a lifetime in prison or death. It's hardly a product of the "European enlightenment era thinking" as you put it. It's what all citizens of the world would aspire to want... but the rulers/governments of certain countries prevent them from having it.

That fact is purely down to money, and not a continuation of tradition and political culture as you infer. Putin is a billionaire. All of his inner circle and hundreds of oligarchs are either billionaires or close to it. Then you have the next level down... all wealthy and living in luxury in Moscow and other major cities. These are the people who keep Putin in power, simply because almost all their wealth is from corrupt means. All Russian public utilities have been bled dry. Huge sums in the hundreds of billions have mysteriously vanished into the pockets of the elite.

Then you have the other 140 million or so of the Russian population. Recent figures showed that over 20 million Russian people lived in poverty. The figure is likely much, much higher than that. All of these 140 million people have no say in anything. I am sure they would welcome the living standards of the West and the freedoms that go with it. Instead they eke out an existence that's more akin to medieval times.

They can't vote for change as elections are corrupt, opposition candidates are either imprisoned or assassinated, and Putin has manipulated everything that's ensured he's stayed in power for over 20 years. If you protest then you risk 15 years in prison for holding up even a blank piece of paper, or even worse you just disappear for good.

Nonsense.

They seek a fair life. It's something they don't get in Putin's Russia because Russia is a country you dare not complain in. All these figures about most of Russia supporting the war are nonsense. People are too damn scared to say anything different because they'd be immediately arrested.

If an open election overseen by outside officials were to be conducted in Russia, with no fear of reprisals to voters, then Putin would be out on his ass tomorrow, and within a decade Russia would be most of the way along the road to becoming a true democratic nation - with the right leadership of course. Putin and his cronies prevent this. And money is the reason.

Ordinary Russians don't seek a "good or powerful king". They're no different to you or I. They seek freedom from oppression and fear.

I suppose it was prosperity for those who worked in a factory and getting great wages, production bonuses and it got them through tough times. I'm told factory wages are only one third of what they were. Minimum wage in a lot of cases, the recruiting agencies are coining it.

That's the reason I don't live in the UK.

There seems to be a high rate of sudden death syndrome there.

Thankfully I moved away in time.

So called "peace deal" with the tyrant would leave Europe very unstable for years to come, with a madman on its borders planning his next invasion.

So your little jaunt means your wee microcosm is representative of 150 million people?

Were you all over rural Russia I wonder? Did you visit every village, which would have taken you decades? Or more likely just seen a city or two.

And perchance it escaped your memory, Putin was not in charge of Russia then.

He can declare victory all he wants and attempt to hold what limited territorial gains Russian forces have made, but Russia will remain under sanction and Ukraine will continue to receive heavy weapons. This is not a recipe for being able to consolidate gains made. Saying he's demilitarised Ukraine would look ridiculous to us, and awful fishy to many in Russia considering what Ukraine are getting for an arsenal right now. Funnily enough the concept of getting rid of the Azov battalion is something that I believe Zelenskyy would have been open to discussing back when we thought there was a chance of negotiation in all this.

It's really not been worth it for Putin, but this we know. Time for him to retire, or even better have a good long, long, long sleep.

He says numerous times he wants the ussr back and it’s demise was a catastrophe (for Russia). None of this should come as a y surprise to any of us. The mistake was not fostering a western style democracy and the time to do it would have been in the 90s. Too late now.