UK v Russia

Started by bennydorano, March 17, 2018, 01:20:21 PM

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Keyser soze

Quote from: Syferus on March 17, 2018, 11:15:18 PM
Quote from: Keyser soze on March 17, 2018, 11:14:16 PM
Quote from: Syferus on March 17, 2018, 03:10:59 PM
Quote from: bennydorano on March 17, 2018, 03:01:30 PM
Funny enough if you follow UK politics on this board you'd know I'm not in anyway a fan of Corbyn, so barking up the wrong tree again.

Also, if you read my opening post you'd realise I haven't in anyway said Russia are innocent, it's the UK Government's actions / reactions that I'm questioning. It's like a PR war being hastily waged by a flailing & failing Government and dissenting voices are being demonised.

I think Corbyn is a better alternative to May and the Tories which is why I think it's even sadder that he played into the worst perceptions about himself. What he did was more damaging than saying nothing at all.

Russia have been engaging in a proxy war with the West for years - ffs, they helped that cowboy in America get elected and have been implicated in many hacks of governmental organisations and large corperations. Forget about PR wars - the West have let Russia get away with being a bad actor for too long because we don't want the hassle of a trade or energy war.

There should be no descent on the fact that Russia is behind the attack - everything points towards that. But that won't stop people using their biases and to justify ignoring the evidence because they don't like the injured party. This is bigger than the Tories v the Left or even the UK v Russia. It's western values versus Russian lies and violence.

I would like to descent!!

If I do would that constitute a climbdown?

Maybe in future u should stick to smaller words that u understand!

Like 'u'?

It's called predictive text, bud.

No not like me at all.

I'm not a complete f*****g know it all.

And I am not stupid unlike you who repeatedly confuses the size of their ego with the size of their IQ.

Owen Brannigan

#31
Facts:

Two people seriously ill in hospital with symptoms that are related to being affected by a nerve agent
Nerve agents are produced by Russia and known to be used by other countries such as Syria
Nerve agents are available in UK in the Porton Down facility

Media speculation:

Russian state used nerve agents to attempt to kill two of its (former) citizens in UK
Russian state facilitated other Russians to use nerve agent to attempt to kill two people in UK

Note this morning that McDonnell is going around correcting Corbyn's earlier statement and supporting May's position on the nerve gas attack.

Why bother to bring a nerve agent to the UK to kill specific people when it could be done much more simply given the resources of the Russian state.

Esmarelda

Quote from: Owen Brannigan on March 18, 2018, 10:34:49 AM
Facts:

Two people seriously ill in hospital with symptoms that are related to being affected by a nerve agent
Nerve agents are produced by Russia and known to be used by other countries such as Syria
Nerve agents are available in UK in the Porton Down facility

Media speculation:

Russian state used nerve agents to attempt to kill two of its (former) citizens in UK
Russian state facilitated other Russians to use nerve agent to attempt to kill two people in UK

Note this morning that McDonnell is going around correcting Corbyn's earlier statement and supporting May's position on the nerve gas attack.

Why bother to bring a nerve agent to the UK to kill specific people when it could be done much more simply given the resources of the Russian state.
Nice summary Owen. Just one thing on the bit in bold above https://twitter.com/ValLisitsa/status/975041088271548417

imtommygunn

Quote from: Owen Brannigan on March 18, 2018, 10:34:49 AM
Facts:

Two people seriously ill in hospital with symptoms that are related to being affected by a nerve agent
Nerve agents are produced by Russia and known to be used by other countries such as Syria
Nerve agents are available in UK in the Porton Down facility

Media speculation:

Russian state used nerve agents to attempt to kill two of its (former) citizens in UK
Russian state facilitated other Russians to use nerve agent to attempt to kill two people in UK

Note this morning that McDonnell is going around correcting Corbyn's earlier statement and supporting May's position on the nerve gas attack.

Why bother to bring a nerve agent to the UK to kill specific people when it could be done much more simply given the resources of the Russian state.

Yeah something does not feel right about this.

Also feels like a bit of , very erroneous, political opportunism by the tories which they could be very sorry about.

It really doesn't feel like there is enough, or any, proof on this. In the court of law you have to prove beyond reasonable doubt so what is different here.

Then again maybe my anti brit/tory bias makes me unable to look at it completely rationally.

sid waddell

Quote from: Owen Brannigan on March 18, 2018, 10:34:49 AM

Why bother to bring a nerve agent to the UK to kill specific people when it could be done much more simply given the resources of the Russian state.
Why did Russia bother to kill Litvinenko in the way they did?

Why would Kim Jong Un decide to have his brother poisoned with a nerve agent in a crowded international airport in full view of hundreds of people and CCTV?

There's a very obvious answer to those questions.

The other chestnuts I've heard dangled as to why Russia wouldn't do this are i) the presidential election today and ii) the World Cup.

i) The "election" is a sham, in which widespread vote rigging will occur and in which any "opposition" candidates have only got on the ballot with Putin's approval
ii) What are FIFA or anybody else connected with the World Cup such as football associations, teams, players, sponsors and media going to do over the poisoning of a spy? The answer is nothing. The World Cup being on only strengthens Putin's hand as regards an act such as the poisoning of Skripal.



Tony Baloney

Sid beat me to it. Why use a nerve agent? Why bother with polonium-210?!

Theresa May said it was "highly likely" that it was at the hand of the Russian government and I would agree.


Owen Brannigan

Quote from: sid waddell on March 18, 2018, 11:04:37 AM
Quote from: Owen Brannigan on March 18, 2018, 10:34:49 AM

Why bother to bring a nerve agent to the UK to kill specific people when it could be done much more simply given the resources of the Russian state.
Why did Russia bother to kill Litvinenko in the way they did?

Why would Kim Jong Un decide to have his brother poisoned with a nerve agent in a crowded international airport in full view of hundreds of people and CCTV?

There's a very obvious answer to those questions.


Share your wisdom with us>

sid waddell

Quote from: Owen Brannigan on March 18, 2018, 11:29:47 AM
Quote from: sid waddell on March 18, 2018, 11:04:37 AM
Quote from: Owen Brannigan on March 18, 2018, 10:34:49 AM

Why bother to bring a nerve agent to the UK to kill specific people when it could be done much more simply given the resources of the Russian state.
Why did Russia bother to kill Litvinenko in the way they did?

Why would Kim Jong Un decide to have his brother poisoned with a nerve agent in a crowded international airport in full view of hundreds of people and CCTV?

There's a very obvious answer to those questions.


Share your wisdom with us>

I will.

It's because they want to send a message of warning to those they consider traitors by inflicting agonising and public deaths on them.

It's terrorism in the purest form of the word - to engender terror in others.

Poisoning has a long history in Russia, going back at least as far as Rasputin.

The KGB poisoned Georgi Markov on Waterloo Bridge in 1978. Russia poisoned Viktor Yuschenko in 2004 and Litvinenko in 2006. All of these incidents were very public.

There at least 14 other unexplained deaths of Russians or people linked to Ruusia in England since 2004, all associates of Boris Berezovsky. Nikolai Glushkov, an associate of Boris Berzovsky, was murdered a week ago.  Russia has a long record of this sort of stuff.

What's your "wisdom"?

The problem with your "wisdom", is to believe in it, you have to suspend disbelief that Russia is involved in any such nefarious activity.

Putin is a man who has no problem whatsoever murdering Russian citizens for personal gain. He revels in it.




Syferus

Quote from: Itchy on March 18, 2018, 07:44:13 AM
Quote from: Esmarelda on March 17, 2018, 11:16:09 PM
Quote from: bennydorano on March 17, 2018, 01:20:21 PM
What do people think of this? The UK seemed to have reached conclusions long before anything has been proven. Woe betide anybody who doesn't weigh in behind the jingoistic Government line. The rapidity & rashness  of the response is worrying imo. Boris and the Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson 2 utter clowns as per normal.
For balance  ;D ;D ;D ;D here's the view from Russia. WARNING, may contain whataboutery

https://www.fort-russ.com/2018/03/zakharova-completely-rubbishes-britains-anti-russian-campaign-in-must-see-video/

Russian propaganda vrs British propaganda. Both the same to me.

You actually think British media is as state-controlled as Russian media? C'mon man.

sid waddell

Quote from: Syferus on March 18, 2018, 01:09:49 PM
Quote from: Itchy on March 18, 2018, 07:44:13 AM
Quote from: Esmarelda on March 17, 2018, 11:16:09 PM
Quote from: bennydorano on March 17, 2018, 01:20:21 PM
What do people think of this? The UK seemed to have reached conclusions long before anything has been proven. Woe betide anybody who doesn't weigh in behind the jingoistic Government line. The rapidity & rashness  of the response is worrying imo. Boris and the Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson 2 utter clowns as per normal.
For balance  ;D ;D ;D ;D here's the view from Russia. WARNING, may contain whataboutery

https://www.fort-russ.com/2018/03/zakharova-completely-rubbishes-britains-anti-russian-campaign-in-must-see-video/

Russian propaganda vrs British propaganda. Both the same to me.

You actually think British media is as state-controlled as Russian media? C'mon man.

He's a classic example of a useful idiot who parrots the mantra of false equivalence to avoid hard questions.

It's no wonder false equivalence is such a widely used technique by defenders of Trump.

The Russians are the masters of it.


sid waddell

Putin has won re-election with 74% of the vote.

That's about 30 percentage points lower than I was expecting.

screenexile

Staggering the amount of people giving Russia the benefit of the doubt!!

Put in is slowly destabilising the world to diminish the term alliances that are there to keep him in check!!

johnnycool

Quote from: screenexile on March 19, 2018, 09:11:23 AM
Staggering the amount of people giving Russia the benefit of the doubt!!

Put in is slowly destabilising the world to diminish the term alliances that are there to keep him in check!!

And even some with a working knowledge of the intelligence industry;

https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2018/03/boris-johnson-issues-completely-new-story-on-russian-novichoks/

Esmarelda

Quote from: screenexile on March 19, 2018, 09:11:23 AM
Staggering the amount of people giving Russia the benefit of the doubt!!

Put in is slowly destabilising the world to diminish the term alliances that are there to keep him in check!!
There seems to be a very basic misunderstanding of what some people are saying on this thread. The opening piece, and therefore the thread, has little to do with Putin. It has to do with an allegation made by the UK government, the substance of the allegation and the evidence produced.

By your logic, if Putin was accused of anything by the UK, anything at all regardless of the evidence produced, then he is automatically guilty, because of your, and others' views on his past performance.

Applying that logic almost sounds like whataboutery; "well he did A, B and C in the past so this is just what you'd expect him to be up to and therefore it's definitely true." Not quite whataboutery, but a close relation.

If I applied the same argument to the UK government I could say, well they lied about the WMDs to justify the war in Iraq so this spreading of lies is exactly the type of thing they'd get up to.


It appears to me that bennydorano, Bennycake and Itchy are saying that they don't necessarily believe this specfic UK story. They're not saying anything about Putin. The "other side" have the case closed.

That's my reading of it anyway.

Hardy

Notwithstanding the particular rag in which it's published and the wilder excesses of which the writer is capable, this, to me, is the right take on the whole subject:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-5486149/PETER-HITCHENS-goading-Russia-dirty-war-win.html