Russia - threadbanned users in OP

I think that it goes beyond that..its personal too. Having gotten away with 20 years of getting his own way, he believes that he is all powerful, and anything else is unthinkable. Of course he wanted Ukraine for its natural wealth, sea and air ports, factories etc. as well, but it was his own sense of invincibility, which is now being successfully challenged that is driving him to the extent that he is quite prepared to kill the last Russian (and of course the last Ukrainian too, or anyone else he considers his enemy) And all this against a background of yes men and ass-licking sycophants who keep him shielded from the truth. in order the perpetuate their own positions of power. It's only going to end one way though, and Russia will never be the same again after comrade Putin.

The West facilitated him for a long time. The small acts of aggression, the trolling, sponsoring troll farms, ransomware attacks etc. Putin shrugged his shoulders and smiled while he told blatant lies, the poisonings in Salisbury, all pushing the envelope a little further and getting no blowback, no wonder he felt invincible.

I'm sure he's sorry he didn't attack Ukraine while Trump was in Power. Imagine the **** show we'd be in then.

You are right about Trump.

Strike while the iron is a baddun and all that.

Yes ,Trump would have bent Zelensky over backwards for Putin to slide his knob in.

What would he have expected in return ,I wonder?

It's worth remembering that the U.S. began arming and training the Ukrainian military in 2014, presumably a bit after Russia annexed Crimea and propped up the Donbas rebellions. We know it was going on in Trump's time as well, given he attempted to extort Zelensky regarding the military aid the U.S. was sending. If Trump had somehow retained the presidency in 2020, there is every chance he would have been a lame duck as the invasion kicked off, so although he could possibly have vetoed aid packages approved by Congress, it would have meant he'd get little to nothing done of his own agenda as he'd have needed Democrat support to pass a lot of legislation.

Not that Trump himself has much of an agenda, if any agenda - I should really say the agenda of Mitch McConnell et al. Not only that, but in one of those cases of corporate interest actually aligning with what the right thing basically is, there would be lobbyist pressure to get arms to Ukraine.

In this hypothetical, Trump would have done an awful lot of bird-brained speeches where he waffled ignorantly about the situation, mostly for the appreciation of his screeching followers, but he would have had to go with the flow.

I do think, though, that he probably would have invited Putin to the White House for a 'peace summit'. Actually, no, Putin wouldn't have gone for that - Trump would have offered to meet him in a 'neutral' venue - possibly China, North Korea or India. Possibly also a cruise ship in international waters...

Trying to figure out what's going on at Kerch. Allegedly up to 3 explosions heard, also picked up by other countries. Russian telegram giving info but possible the explosions not on the bridge itself, perhaps drones were blown up.

Russia did install nets or fenses around the bridge to protect it, similar to protecting subs being docked. Could have been a Ukrainian drone caught up in it. But targeting the bridge while it's still being repaired doesn't make sense, unless they wanted to take the rail bridge out.

Regardless, that bridge will not be long for this world.

It was probably the explosion from the tanker caught on camera not the bridge.

THANKFULLY, history is FULL of DESPOTS, DICTATORS, ALL POWERFUL men who thought that they would be permanently all-powerful, etc, etc, etc. and we’re eventually ‘brought down’ in various ways . Hitler, The Shah of Iran, Gadaffi, Chauscheu -spelling? - Sadam Hussain come to mind. I wonder who will be next? Although sometimes it does not end up well - at least in the short term eg Iraq .

A room upgrade when next in Moscow ++++++!?

Looks like parts of the Black Sea are going to become no go zones, not just for Ukrainian related grain ships but for all Russian and their allies commercial shipping. The Master Strategist may well have cut off his own nose to spite his face.

Not sure if that's entirely fair on Obama, Biden's administration might well have handled things much the same then. Likewise if Obama was in office there last year, he would likely have acted similar to now.

Trump is the unknown though, as imo he benefited from all sorts of social media and voter manipulation assistance to get his disruptive messaging across and his bum on the seat. Some of that help came from Russia as far as I can see, so he is/was compromised to some extent.

Interesting item appearing on Twitter, claiming that Putin is a pedophile. The tweet claims that this is the hold Prigozhin has over Putin. It mentions also that the real reason Sergei Skripal was poisoned, while other more damaging ex-Russian spies were not touched was because he knew about Putin's pedophilia. Interesting story.

abouttwitter.com/generalsvr_en/status/1684846979682017280/photo/1

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