The Russian Invasion of the Ukraine.

[Oystein]

Its a valid debate, but we may need a split thread for this.

Per "UN General Assembly Resolution 3314" sending material support is not a listed act of war.
https://www.britannica.com/topic/law-of-war/Legally-defining-war

Is that the universal definition that everyone on the planet should or must use? No of course not.

Thanks.

 

[theprestige]

Who will take up the contract: The Jackal or Deadshot?

Red Robin - the Western equivalent of Red Sparrow (also fictional): A deep-cover agent embedded during the Soviet Era, gone totally native, and now called out of de facto retirement to get close to Putin and do what needs to be done.

 

[Olmstead]

Red Robin - the Western equivalent of Red Sparrow (also fictional): A deep-cover agent embedded during the Soviet Era, gone totally native, and now called out of de facto retirement to get close to Putin and do what needs to be done.

I was idly scribbling ideas for an assassination plot story a few days ago. It made me wonder whether assassinating Putin would help, make things worse, or not change a thing because there's already a next guy in line.

 

[Oystein]

I was idly scribbling ideas for an assasination plot story a few days ago. It made me wonder whether assasinating Putin would help, make things worse, or not change a thing because there's already a next guy in line.

There's practically never a next guy in line in dictatorships, unless a dynastic succession is in the making. No one wants to play Prince Charles to King Vlad.

 

[Andy_Ross]

The BBC has launched a new shortwave radio service in Ukraine to ensure the resilience of its news operations in Ukraine and Russia, the corporation has announced.

The new broadcasts will make four hours of World Service English news available every day and will reach audiences in Ukraine and parts of Russia.

Listeners in the area will be able to tune into the broadcasts at 15735 kHz from 16:00-18:00 GMT and 5875 kHz from 22:00-00:00 GMT.

 

[lobosrul5]

I was idly scribbling ideas for an assassination plot story a few days ago. It made me wonder whether assassinating Putin would help, make things worse, or not change a thing because there's already a next guy in line.

My thinking is probably better, though we'd need to know more about the next guy in line. Russian government is essentially a kleptocracy, whoever the next guy is will probably decide in his own best interests which will be to withdrawal from Ukraine and "play nice". If Putin can be assassinated then so can he. This is unlike the Cold War era, where we had serious ideological differences. Assassinating Khrushchev would have likely led to global thermonuclear warfare or at the least a successor who may be much more hardline.

There's practically never a next guy in line in dictatorships, unless a dynastic succession is in the making. No one wants to play Prince Charles to King Vlad.

Or this. It would lead to a temporary power vacuum.

 

[Andy_Ross]

BBC Rolling

Downed cruise missile caused Kyiv explosion, Ukraine says

An explosion near Kyiv's central railway station earlier this evening was caused by wreckage from a cruise missile shot down by Ukraine's air defences, an interior ministry advisor says.

Anton Herashchenko posts on Facebook that the debris hit a heating pipe, causing the blast.

But he says if the missile had hit the centre of Kyiv, the casualties and damage would have been appalling.

Herashchenko does not say whether there had been injuries as a result of the explosion.

 

[blutoski]

B) Everybody who claims that "we" (meaning any Western country opposing the Russian invasion) are actually "at war" - where "war" is a word with objective meaning and not just tough talk. Where that meaning implies legal consequences which in effect limit civil liberties and expand government's power. Are those posters really thinking that their civil liberties are, in principle, in question - now?

No, it isn't and that's possibly where your confusion comes from.

Maybe it's my age, and the fact that I was born on the other side of the Iron Curtain, but growing up in the Cold War (notice the word 'war' in that phrase) helped me understand that conflict is a continuum rather than a binary condition.

The West was not in a state of war with the Comintern, but damned if we didn't execute their spies. The Rosenbergs were sent to the chair in the 1950s, for example.

I'd consider wilful propagation of a foreign government's propaganda, intended to undermine my country's security and democratic system, as seditious or treasonous, as others have suggested. There are many exceptions to free speech, ranging from commercial fraud to others, and I'd include distributing lies for the goal of long term elimination of the constitutional right to free speech to be one of them.

We had a good run for a couple of decades, where we let things get slack, and now we're paying the price. A democracy is not only built on having free speech, but on defending its long term viability. The opposition's goals to undermine democracy are in and of themselves a threat to these constitutional freedoms and need to be handled accordingly.

It's sort of like those people who defend commercial fraud as 'free speech' because they have a black and white, short term, simplistic view. Having seen what it's like to try to operate an honest business in a very deregulated environment in the early post-Soviet breakup, it's precisely this experience that leads me to appreciate the danger in binary thinking about conflicts with intermediate conditions. It's the intermediate conditions that provide plausible deniability and give time for enemies to accumulate resources beyond tipping points, at which time it will be too late.

And Skeptics are almost certainly aware of the moral hierarchy. "But is it Legal?" is not the final word on what is morally right. It is, in fact, considered a lower and more juvenile level of morality. The Holocaust was 100% legal. And that was very influenced by the American segregation and anti miscegenation laws, which were perfectly legal. But both were morally wrong. We're in the same situation with foreign interference propaganda unfortunately.

Western politicians may be dragging their feet on managing foreign interference because they're receiving truckloads of donations from the social media platforms and Russian billionaires, but the public opinion has been shifting, and my hope is that they will update our protection sooner rather than later.

 

[blutoski]

I'm afraid you are right. But I have hope that the Russian troops are going to start just flatly refusing to obey orders. I mean this is kinda like if a certain ex-prez ordered the US Army to invade Canada and when they resisted to just start committing murder.

Sadly, if there's one thing the Russian armies have nailed down over the last century, it's how to manage reluctant conscripts. It's not just "we'll shoot you," it's "and your family too," that keeps them in line.

Another danger that may be more method than madness is the absence of food and medicine supply lines. This heavily motivates an army in place to conquer the territory, in order to loot food and medical supplies.


Weird coincidence, but one of my hobbies is violin, and in the spirit of Two Cellos, I have been working on some string covers of 80s pop songs from my teen years. Flaco's Der Kommissar being one I have put on the back burner since November, observing that it wasn't funny anymore.

 

[blutoski]

No. With SWIFT down, he could not transfer the bounty to that brave policeperson's bank account...

I was actually thinking about this, and if it's BTC, then it's probably entirely doable since the transfer could be through the blockchain itself as an intermediary.

USD->BTC->RUB

At least for now... and I don't see RUS blocking blockchain access since it's probably a huge store of value for Russians right now, especially those operating in the shady side of things, which is Putin's clan.

BTC was in a slump since Nov, and this week it's popping up a bit - my theory is that it's considered a safer store of value for Russians than RUB right now, and there's significant enough activity moving some RUB to safe havens that it's impacting the smaller asset classes.

 

[lobosrul5]

I was actually thinking about this, and if it's BTC, then it's probably entirely doable since the transfer could be through the blockchain itself as an intermediary.

USD->BTC->RUB

At least for now... and I don't see RUS blocking blockchain access since it's probably a huge store of value for Russians right now, especially those operating in the shady side of things, which is Putin's clan.

BTC was in a slump since Nov, and this week it's popping up a bit - my theory is that it's considered a safer store of value for Russians than RUB right now, and there's significant enough activity moving some RUB to safe havens that it's impacting the smaller asset classes.

On that note I am wondering if the US stock market is being propped up in part due to oligarchs moving their money out of the Russian market. RUB->BTC->intermediary shell company->US broker.

 

[Mike!]

The BBC has launched a new shortwave radio service in Ukraine to ensure the resilience of its news operations in Ukraine and Russia, the corporation has announced.

The new broadcasts will make four hours of World Service English news available every day and will reach audiences in Ukraine and parts of Russia.

Listeners in the area will be able to tune into the broadcasts at 15735 kHz from 16:00-18:00 GMT and 5875 kHz from 22:00-00:00 GMT.

Early in the thread I brought up the old "Radio Free Europe" ads I would see and hear on TV and radio and wondered if/why such a thing couldn't be done today. Cool to know it can and is.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

This was the context. The guy was not well-known so I was actually defending you against dudalb's statement that "If you had been paying any attention to what has been going on in Russia, you would have know that".

I know you were defending me. I should have thanked you for that.

Thank you for that.

 

[dudalb]

Peacemaker?

I definently should have included him.

 

[dudalb]

There might be a impact in UK politics;Apparetnly a lot of interesting facts about Tory Politicans who have been raking in Russian money is being exposed.

 

[angrysoba]

I know you were defending me. I should have thanked you for that.

Thank you for that.

You're welcome.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Early in the thread I brought up the old "Radio Free Europe" ads I would see and hear on TV and radio and wondered if/why such a thing couldn't be done today. Cool to know it can and is.

This is London

 

[Klimax]

My posts implicitly distinguish between you as an individual German, you as a German citizen in a representative democracy and therefore bearing some (small) measure of responsibility for the actions of your government, and the German government that represents you.

Any time you find me saying something that you believe would make more sense if applied to your government rather than you personally, please feel free to interpret it in the way that makes more sense.

Oystein made same mistake with my post. At least he was consistent.

That certainly was quite a provocation, to say the least.

Okay, so let's say Czechia is currently, and has been since 2014, in a state of war.
Suppose the Czech government - without going to parliament! - had imposed restrictions on the freedoms of speech and of press in, say 2016 with the reason given that the country is at war now. Would you have been cool with that?

Russian paid idiots were dancing for a long time on the very thin line of treason and condoning various criminal acts. They were monitored. Most of time they managed to keep on the right side of the line. With invasion they crossed it and are now in jail for condoning and justifying war and war crimes, websites blocked and everybody else is busy trying to pretend they are against Russia.
We have learned long ago how to deal with such crap. Like between 1933-1938...

Little reminder: There are very few limits on free speech. But they do exist.

 

[jimbob]

This is London

I do prefer it to the modern World Service idents. And I'm not sure the brand change to something more like any other news outlet was a good move.

 

[abaddon]

I can also not read RT.com's Twitter account: https://twitter.com/rt_com.

I quote:


Which EU's country are you in?

I'm in Ireland. RT is still available, so that is a flat out lie by RT.com. Their twitter account is suspended. Does not stop anyone from reading their website.