Russia - threadbanned users in OP

Well done Poland well fecking done.

Leppards tanks 10 from Poland incoming hopefully the gates are open and others follow

Again Poland leading the way in Europe along with Ukraine. This will start the snowball effect. I hope we can see many of them in action come summer.

If true,this is huge.

You and some other posters really have a hard on for the Swiss. In fairness you are not totally wrong (in my opinion) but your claims are very exaggerated and much out of date. The exception being their neutrality and the policy of arms sales. Hopefully further pressure will force the Swiss to cave but I wouldn't count on it. They can be a very stubborn and procedural people where the rules are the rules until the people vote to change it.

Russian money is frozen in Switzerland just like in other countries. Currently over 7 billion is frozen with more being identified all the time. If you have articles stating the contrary from a reliable source then I would be very interested to read it.

7.5 billion of Russian assets have been frozen in Switzerland | Euronews

Secondly Nazi money (from Germany) totaled around 8billion from WW2 in today's money. Not exactly enough to run a war on let alone a country like Switzerland whose Central Bank lost over 120billion just last year due to currency fluctuations. Of that 8 billion of Nazi gold, approximately 1.5 billion is estimated to have been stolen from the Jewish people and with a tiny minority remaining unclaimed.

Thirdly, Swiss money laundering laws are more or less on par with the majority of Europe and improving all the time. The Swiss are actively changing laws and ended Banking secrecy in 2018. Incidentally they are only slightly worse than Ireland (4.5 vs Irelands 4 and Germany's 4.2) for money laundering according to the Basel Anti Money Laundering Index.

Dirty money remains threat to society, says watchdog - SWI swissinfo.ch

Finally, the arms were sold with the countries knowing full well the Swiss stance on reselling arms which in theory is good practice in the majority of cases. It is unfortunate that in this case, in my opinion, the Ukranians are losing out but you can't quickly change laws in Switzerland though I am confident that a clause will eventually be inserted to allow for exceptions in the future using Ukraine's defensive war as an example.

We Irish expect our "neutrality" to be respected but expect other countries to fold when their neutrality is under fire.

" I reckon the number could well double before they start to baulk."

What's that Wibbs? 200,000 dead Russians?

The other poster was talking up figures of 2 million Russian dead.

What matters is it's actually happening

So Wagner supposedly have controls of the salt mines. Maybe Ukrainian officials could as Uncle Sam for one or two MOABS to drop down their. [Mother of all bombs]

The price cap is estimated to be costing Russia 160m a day, or $58.4 b/pa

There are demands within Switzerland to allow the sale of arms to Ukraine. If I were to say that Ireland changing its corporate tax rate would allow our European friends to have a higher tax take and allow them to tackle societal issues for our European friends you'd think what? You'd rightly tell me to get lost.

I know they are not equivalent but my point is that as soon as the countries tax rate is brought up, their is venomous defence of it and calls for other countries to mind their own business. While the subject is different, and much more serious, the principal is the same. Countries and in extension their populations to not like being told what to do. The only way to hit them where it hurts is to lobby countries to buy their arms elsewhere or , in the tax example, to convince companies to locate elsewhere.

Swiss neutrality and the arms industry is not at all an oxymoron if you think about it logically. In order for a country to be truly neutral, it must be able to defend itself and in order to defend itself it needs to be able to arm itself without overly relying on other countries. An arms industry is expensive to run however , especially when you don't go to war in order to use up what you have stockpiled so the only way to keep it going is to sell it. Selling it however can make you enemies which would threaten your neutrality so you have to be very careful to who you sell to in order not to make enemies who could hold it against you hence Switzerland's contracts limiting the re-sale of its arms into ongoing wars. Switzerland wants countries to be reliant on it for whatever reason (arms, banks, cheese, chocolate) so that it can be on friendly terms with them to minimise the chance of conflict but allowing the sale of arms to Ukraine would certainly put it in the bad books of Russia. Personally I, as someone who lives in Switzerland, wouldn't care if Switzerland or Ireland is considered a hostile enemy of Russia as the cause in the defence of Ukraine is just, but not everyone wants to put their country in the crosshairs of a major (if dwindling) world power, especially when you have no allies to rely on.

UK has announced they will send 10 Challenger 2 MBTs to Ukraine.

Good news, as unlike Poland they wont be stuck waiting for export permission from Germany for Leopard 2s

A bit confusing to the numbers of leopard's Poland willing to hand over.

Some polish articles quoting duda has pledged a full company of tanks.

How many would that be.

Not surprised by the news Germanys foreign minster payed a surprise visit to ukraine yesterday and alo met with polish ministers.

Abrams wouldn't make sense anyway. While they are a deadly and absolutely impressive tank, they require a lot maintenance and spare parts. Leopards could be perfect. Unsure of how reliable the Challenger ² are.