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Russia - threadbanned users in OP

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Comments

  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 23,246 ✭✭✭✭Dyr


    What's enabling them? The EUs ability to block its members from acting as nation states



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,349 ✭✭✭fly_agaric


    I hardly think it is some Russian influence right now.

    An honest question, is it the same in Germany as with the Greens here?

    A kind of a fetish or secular religion where Man generating Nuclear Power is one of the deadly sins or whatnot, and so funding/supporting it (by the EU) would be promoting literal evil?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,093 ✭✭✭thomil


    It's a combination of that and a couple of other factors. There's a general conflation of nuclear energy and nuclear weapons in public consciousness, meaning that for many people, every nuclear power plant is a combination of Hiroshima and Chernobyl waiting to happen. Then, there's a general undercurrent of techno-, and science skepticism in Germany, something that has been growing since the 1970s and 80s and which has seen on one hand a relatively slow take-up of new technologies such as the internet, and on the other hand the outright denial of science and rejection of technology, as outlined by the "Querdenker" and anti-vax movement in Germany and the resulting low COVID-19 vaccination rates. These loons have gotten homeopathy to be provided under Germany's national health insurance system, for crying out loud!

    Finally, there's a general skepticism towards the government in Berlin actually being able to ensure that nuclear power plants are run in a safe manner. Given that energy & utility companies in Germany are generally very closely entangled with state and federal governments, there is a feeling that those in power won't let their friends suffer any economic "hardships" and will tend to sweep incidents under the rug, rather than report them and get the issues fixed. It's this last issue that I actually tend to agree with. There were numerous nuclear power plants that suffered significant issues in the past that were either unreported, or covered up, and even one nuclear power station, Mülheim-Kärlich near Koblenz, that was built and went live without planning permission. It was later shut down and is currently being dismantled. Meanwhile, the list of incidents at plants such as Biblis, Neckarwestheim or Brunsbüttel/Niederelbe is enough to fill several posts on its own.

    I'm not saying that the anti-nuclear movement is right, I'm an ardent supporter of nuclear power myself, but there are some merits to some of their arguments.

    Good luck trying to figure me out. I haven't managed that myself yet!



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,349 ✭✭✭fly_agaric


    Thanks for that. As you probably know, here there is no big general "science scepticism" component to opposition to nuclear power I think.

    With the general public (and the Greens too - they would be more ideologically rigid about it though, hence my comparison to religion) it has an apparently indelible association with serious accidents and creating pollution problems, despite how useful it could be now in helping reduce amount of CO2 pollution human activities dump into the atmosphere.

    Chernobyl, Fukushima, and more locally Sellafield of course. For years it was claimed to linked to cancers on East coast in Ireland etc. (incorrectly I believe?) as well as irradiating the Irish sea. Connection with "nuclear weapons" and "nuclear war" (hmmm..."nuclear power" also has the word nuclear!) as well.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,612 ✭✭✭Cordell


    The thing is, even if there are good arguments to the anti nuclear and anti fracking movements the fact that Russia is backing them is still true, and that is interfering with the energy policy to their own benefit. And if some politician legislated against fracking or nuclear while being supported or lobbied by them they should be prosecuted, going as far as treason if it's needed.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,029 ✭✭✭✭Dohnjoe




  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,062 ✭✭✭Hobgoblin11


    another saboteur has been foiled, it must be so hard to tell collaborators from nationalists

    Dundalk, Co. Louth



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,029 ✭✭✭✭Dohnjoe




  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,062 ✭✭✭Hobgoblin11


    4 portuguese are expelled from Russia

    Dundalk, Co. Louth



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,029 ✭✭✭✭Dohnjoe



    Russia stating that Ukraine must pay Russia for the electricity from the captured nuclear power plant



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,093 ✭✭✭thomil


    I think the main difference here is quite literally Germany's location. In Germany, everyone knew where the battles would be fought if the Cold War ever got hot. People knew it would eventually go nuclear, and when it did, that the first nukes would not fall on London, Paris or Washington, but on Hamburg, Bremen, Frankfurt, Fulda or Cologne. Given that up until the 1970s and 1980s, many Germans who had witnessed the large scale air raids on German cities were not only still alive, but still part of the work force, the fear of a repeat was very real, and anything that was connected to it was automatically viewed with suspicion. Given that NATO forces were often highly technologically advanced, this over time led to an association of technology with war, especially nuclear war, and as such as something that had to be treated with caution, if not outright suspicion or hostility. That was the fertile ground upon which anti war and later anti nuclear sentiments grew.

    Whilst this would definitely have been true in the 1980s, I'm not sure this can still be applied today. Elimination of nuclear power is generally treated as a good thing across significant parts of the political spectrum, it's not just a green fantasy trip. You'll find majorities in favor of a nuclear exit across all political parties, though it is admittedly decidedly more popular amongst left-leaning circles.

    Where Russian influence is very likely at play though is in the question of what should replace nuclear power. The Greens advocate for phasing out fossil fuels as well, replacing it with wind and solar power plants, as well as with a massive R&D investment into power storage systems, construction of additional pump-storage power stations (akin to Turlough Hill here in Ireland or Geesthacht outside of Hamburg). It is mostly the big parties, SPD & CDU, who have been advocating the use of Russian gas & oil to compensate the gap left by the dismantling of nuclear power, the same parties whose leaders would have been close buddies with the heads of utility & power companies as mentioned in my earlier post on this topic.

    So it's not the replacing as such in my eyes that is being manipulated, it's the question of what's it (nuclear power) being replaced with.

    Good luck trying to figure me out. I haven't managed that myself yet!



  • Posts: 10,049 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    You'll find majorities in favor of a nuclear exit across all political parties, though it is admittedly decidedly more popular amongst left-leaning circles.

    As a result of fear, misinformation and inherent bias rather than any fact based analysis



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,612 ✭✭✭Cordell


    I'm not making an argument for nuclear or for fracking, it's not the point here and now. What you don't do is give up nuclear while have nothing but the russian gas and oil to replace it with, this is the problem that needs some looking at.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,503 ✭✭✭Fighting Tao




  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,836 ✭✭✭dmc17



    "The president noted that Russia recently announced its intention to produce Lada and Moskvitch cars. “What is wrong with it? They are a far cry from the Soviet-era Moskvitch cars, of course. Yet, maybe they are not as good as Mercedes cars. Yet, one day we will have our own Mercedes-class cars."


    The future is bright 😅



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 40,291 ✭✭✭✭Gatling


    Russia wants sanctions lifted before agreements to allow Ukrainian grains to leave .

    Would much rather nato ships broke any blockade on humanitarian grounds

    Screenshot_20220519-151648_Sky News.jpg




  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 22,177 ✭✭✭✭Ash.J.Williams


    asking putin for consessions is weak, if russian ports are required to avoid famine, then we need to eliminate russia and look elsewhere



  • Posts: 0 [Deleted User]


    The German Green Party were the only ones (not sure about FDP actually) against the Nord Stream 2 project, and not just for reasons of climate concern, but also in their statements they consistently mentioned how the deal would undermine the security of the Ukraine and other eastern european countries as well as russian human rights abuses.



  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 16,959 Mod ✭✭✭✭Manic Moran


    Out of curiosity, what was their position on the funding of the Bundeswehr?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 40,291 ✭✭✭✭Gatling


    Not Russian ports ,the Russians are blocking ukraines ports and in a lot of cases stealing thousands of tons of grain to keep or to sell abroad



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,093 ✭✭✭thomil


    The Greens evolved out of the environmental & peace movements, so they've traditionally been an anti-war party. Having said that, this has changed since the late 1990s however, though not without some extreme infighting, including some bouts of violence. It was the Greens who were in government when Germany went to war with NATO in Kosovo and Afghanistan, and they removed their insistence on a pacifist foreign policy from their party program in 2002. These two decisions, combined with the change in the party program, drove a lot of the more radical anti-war activists, including those who may have had connections to Moscow back in the day, out of the party.

    Whilst I haven't been able to get detailed figures on their budget proposals for the Bundeswehr, or indeed if they had any, they have continually supported a common military & security policy in a European context. I'd say at this point, they're probably one of the more hawkish parties in the Bundestag, as counterintuitive as it may sound.

    Good luck trying to figure me out. I haven't managed that myself yet!



  • Posts: 0 [Deleted User]


    I'm not an expert, but seems to be in favour of investment. Along the lines of 'we should be able to do what we need to do', which of course isn't super specific



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,489 ✭✭✭zv2


    It looks like history is starting up again.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,836 ✭✭✭EltonJohn69


    Fucckk these guys. To quote the great President Harrison Ford “We don’t negotiate with terrorists” also “get off my ship”



  • Posts: 7,946 ✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    I thought the Sanctions weren't having any impact on Russia.

    So, the Russians are threatening to starve the poorest countries if they don't get their Big Macs.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 40,291 ✭✭✭✭Gatling




  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,489 ✭✭✭zv2


    I'm sure it would be easy to show the physical crossing was from the Russian side of the river.

    It looks like history is starting up again.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,029 ✭✭✭✭Dohnjoe




  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,790 ✭✭✭greenpilot


    A small point. Mir actually does not exist. It was de-orbited on the 23rd March 2001 due to...

    ......lack of funding.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,062 ✭✭✭Hobgoblin11


    Russians soldiers will be wearing the child sex offender jacket if this can be proven

    Dundalk, Co. Louth



This discussion has been closed.
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