Russia-Ukraine War (continuing)

Thanks for your welcome I guess. However, you may have me mistaken with someone else as I'm not here to apologize for Putin.

It's great to see some old contributors back for an attempted pile on. Ukraine need be held to the highest of standards. "Look look! They picked their nose. How dare they."

Russia blows the actual noses off civilians. <crickets>

It's important to chip in with your tuppence though and reaffirm what you class as worthy of making a contribution to the thread. Be it defending Russia as a tourist destination, appearing to decry the term Orcs, the attempted pile on over corruption in Ukraine etc. We can see you then.

I'm reading mixed things about this bill. Apparently another angle it was signed in is because it's too hard to prosecute and jail people under corruption charges and there are many people walking around freely that should be jailed if the anti corruption agencies could do their job.

That Russia would infiltrate and abuse institutions of democratic states is classic Russian influence operations

We should watch and learn, the thoughts of Russians influencing the Gardai for example is chilling, we can already see how deep they got their tendrils into the US political system and the **** storm (and dismantlement of the republic) those agents are causing there

I can see Putin going “so they want to reduce corruption by creating an anti corruption agency? Well let’s corrupt that agency from within”

The “who polices the police” is a perennial question for which the solution lies in interconnected web of checks and balances

Have to say on the face of it I was very concerned about the new corruption law, however, with Brickster, et al. Pushing it as being a bad move for Ukraine, I'm fairly happy to side with the govt. in it being a necessary step.

Interesting although irrational observation. In Ukraine, Zelensky is preventing men from leaving but in Gaza Israel is preventing people from leaving so very significant difference.

I'm not a friend of Russia whatever that's meant to mean or imply. I guess you see yourself as a friend of Ukraine, the common trait of such friends is the complete unwillingness to discuss the situation outside cheering on murder videos and using dehumanizing slurs to describe Russians.

Quick question for those "concerned" about the anti-corruption bill: yiz are very slow to post videos of the protesters being rounded up and battered into silent compliance by FSB/ICE-style security agents. I mean there must be hundreds of clips of such a clamp-down, mustn't there? Ukraine being a morass of corruption and all that …

/s

You cheer on every criticism of Ukraine, despite them being the victims in the war.

It's not murder when Ukraine, in defence against an illegal invasion into Ukraine, kills the invading Russian scum.

It is murder when Russia commits atrocities like Bucha, and murders civilians in indiscriminate attacks.

The common trait if friends of Russia is their attempts to delegitimize Ukraine and its government and its resistance to Russian invasion and aggression.

So the post cheering on murder are those from you and those like you pumping out dishonest vatnik propaganda to obscure that Russia is the one murdering civilians not Ukraine.

When have you ever posted a single unprompted unreserved* criticism of Russia?
* One that you haven't rendered meaningless with both sides, whataboutery or false equivalance.

When have you ever unprompted defended Ukraine's legitimate right to exist as an independent state and defend itself against Russian attacks?

So yes you are a friend of Russia, and that means as a political position you support their murder, rape, child abduction, torture and atrocity against civilians in this illegal war.

In other news: the brief appearance (and subsequent eradication) of a few Russian saboteurs in the logistics hub Pokrovsk prompted an outpouring of "concern" from the usual suspects … but the attack by Ukraine of the logistics hub in Novocherkassk, Rostov (Russia) doesn't seem to have had the same effect.

It's almost like some posters have gotten used to the idea that Russia is incapable of defending its own territory, land that wasn't under daily attack until some old guy in Moscow decided to launch a "special military operation" three years ago.

If Ireland was being invaded by Russia, and people you know were being slaughtered, would you be repeating Russian propaganda? No

Would you be endlessly blaming countries that were supporting us? No.

Would you be constantly attempting to blame "both sides" and drawing false equivalence between ourselves and the Russian invaders? No.

Would you be continually trying to deflect away from your friends and family being bombed to talk about some other conflict in the world? No.

Yet here you are - your posts contain all those elements of apologism for Putin, blaming the West and whataboutery - speaking volumes.

That's all topped off with this self-deluded view that you don't support Putin, whilst sharing the same page as his views.

"I'm not a friend of Russia whatever that's meant to mean or imply. I guess you see yourself as a friend of Ukraine, the common trait of such friends is the complete unwillingness to discuss the situation outside cheering on murder videos and using dehumanizing slurs to describe Russians."

Clutching your pearls over Russians being called "Orcs", but never seen you once express any genuine iota of sympathy or real concern for the Ukrainian men, women and children being blown to bits.

Your posts give away twisted world views, no matter how much you attempt to spin them for fake objectivity

I strongly suspect this angle of attack on Ukraine might spectacularly backfire on Putin

1. It raises questions about corruption in Russia itself which is on a completely different level of corruptness, whole Putin power vertical depends on corruption to function
2. It shows that Ukraine has a free and open society and functioning parliament where disagreements on policy and war are publicly discussed while in Russia holding a blank paper gets your arrested
3. It shows Ukraine has free and open media in stark contrast to Russia

Yeh last point raises interesting questions about how friends of Russia actually reach this site and if there are exemptions for erm … “operators”

as Russia blocks a good chunk of internet

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/01/29/russia-blocks-a-record-417k-websites-in-2024-a87778

And this week made it illegal to even search never mind use VPNs

https://cybernews.com/security/russia-criminalize-online-searches-extremist-content-vpn/

This is the one point that's been overlooked in this discussion. The mere fact that Ukrainians can protest, especially during such sensitive political times contrasts massively with the situation in Russia. The conclusion can only be either that nobody in Russia has anything they consider worth protesting about, or… the regime cracks down on any dissent like a tonne of bricksters.

Valid Comment

About those lads, fresh video