Ukraine-invasion-part-16

[PestorPeston]

Warsaw Russian is letting out a lot of smoke - there has been no decision on who among them will be the next pontiff.

Biden is going there Friday

Is Boris Johnson the designated survivor?

Who the heck let me be in charge?

@Jisforjelly

I was talking to a friend today who said she thinks we are being orchestrated into begging for world war three.

What do you all think?

I don’t know why they would do this if that is the case?

Only if the West saw an opportunity to push some buttons at the The Kremlin, could foresee the response and guarantee an outcome that would result in a free and democratic Russia.

I can see the first two may have happened, but the third seems remote at the moment. And what a risk.

It is almost American.

I think it’s quite telling that the Russian’s keep setting out what they consider to be NATO involvement (e.g. a ‘dangerous’ peacekeeping mission). To my mind what that tells us is that they want to avoid an escalation along the lines of a direct NATO-Russia conflict.

I’m not overly concerned about Russia’s lack of willingness to directly rule out the use of nuclear weapons. I’d their conventional forces are as useless as we’ve seen in Ukraine then the only way for them to hold the US and NATO at arms length is with the continued ambiguity around nuclear weapon use. It’s their trump card, they aren’t likely to rule it out any time soon.

Re compassion and sanction fatigue - I don't get this at all. Instead, I see a ramping up of awareness and anxiety. Maybe that manifests in some heads in the sand. But we also create our own echo chamber so I think this depends who you talk to and what you read. I agree other items are infiltrating the news more and more but conversation (irl and on Twitter) is still dominated by this for me

I wouldn't be suprised to start seeing stuff that will try to blame the cost of living crisis on the war in Ukraine, to try and dial down the public support and sympathy. Waiting for the first DM headline exposing 'fake' Ukrainian refugee's.

I think there are stages you go through with something like this and it was similar with the pandemic. It's a bit like the stages of grief except denial was shock at the invasion happening on European soil in this century. It's not linear, it has ups and downs with events.

@Wrongkindofovercoat - and there will almost inevitably be a few fakes, but there are millions who are not and we need to remember that.

You'd never get Ben Wallace to rule out not using Trident either, no point having a "deterrent" if you say you wont use it under any circumstance.

Its brilliant the Americans are boosting NATO forces and now Zelenskyy is calling for more advanced missile systems, hopefully anti ship, so Russia's navy is kept back from Odesa, which is essential for Ukraine's longer term economic survival.

Johnson needs to step up and boost defence spending, not wasting money on a 1% cut in income tax as an election bribe.

Fancy some theorising? Here's a thread asking what the hell has happened to Shoigu and Gerasimov. I mean, really, where are they?! Theories range from squirrelled to safety in the big plane exodus to under house arrest. Answers on a postcard...

twitter.com/anders_aslund/status/1506818821667102723?s=21

@Wrongkindofovercoat

I wouldn't be suprised to start seeing stuff that will try to blame the cost of living crisis on the war in Ukraine, to try and dial down the public support and sympathy. Waiting for the first DM headline exposing 'fake' Ukrainian refugee's.

I do think people should accept sanctions have bite for the countries implementing them to be effective in those they are imposed on.

There are many things going on but this war will impact cost of living.

I think far more likely they’ve pissed someone off and have been disappeared (who knows if it’s temporary) thank they’re squirrelled away safe.

@RedToothBrush

Also why this thread is quieter. Its not about who said what. Its about it being just another story and just another dead Ukrainian

I read this thread several times a day and in fact it's the very first thing I check in the morning. I don't currently have the brain power to understand things the way the amazing posters on this thread do but I am avidly following and I expect I'm not on my own. Just because it seems quiet doesn't mean that everybody isn't still watching.

There are many things going on but this war will impact cost of living

Only positively for the Sunaks.

Sunak’s wife, Akshata Murthy, owns a £500 million stake in the Indian IT consultancy firm Infosys, which operates an office and has one of its delivery centres in Moscow. The company has remained eerily quiet during the conflict. In fact, Infosys – founded by Akshata’s father, the Narendra Modi-supporting billionaire Narayana Murthy – told Private Eye it “does not see any impact on delivery or services” from its Russian operations as a result of sanctions imposed by the British government

Bare in mind India is backing Putin and hence the murder and destruction of Ukraine.

Once again "Do as i say, not what i do" now when did that last happen in Downing St?

On a public level there needs to be more awareness that it’s related

It’s the same as the pandemic and demanding support / lockdowns and restrictions that we would feel later on.

Personally I’d go for better economics education but it’s a bug bear of mine reading many posts on here

@MarshaBradyo

On a public level there needs to be more awareness that it’s related

It’s the same as the pandemic and demanding support / lockdowns and restrictions that we would feel later on.

Personally I’d go for better economics education but it’s a bug bear of mine reading many posts on here

On the flip side the Govt must not be allowed to blame everything on the Ukraine war, many of these issues are the result of Tory policy and nothing else. We mustn’t let the Govt use Ukraine as a facade for poor policy like they did with Covid.

We were facing an economic crisis/hi inflation pre invasion, of course its made matters worse but there is also a lot of profit catch up going on.

China and supply chain issues are the elephant in the room, as they deal with rising CV and port factory closures, plus Russia supplies so much raw materials, effecting products from EV to Phones.

So much for the many posters predicting a 1920s style boom post Covid :(

We will be feeling it from the pandemic and this war combined.

I knew it was going to hit which was part of posting re harms we were accumulating whilst ongoing.

Shoigu and Gerasimov.

I don't know if its true. Some speculation about the suitcases and who has them. They supposedly were the other two who have to approve the big red button.

Theo Usherwood @theousherwood
Asked whether a red line would be crossed if Putin used biological or chemical weapons in Ukraine, Boris Johnson tells Nick: “For me, a red line already has been crossed.”

Plan is to now also “go-after Putin’s gold reserves”.

Zelenskyy “has been absolutely brilliant… a remarkable figure” in mobilising global support for Ukraine.

Compares him to Churchill, for having given the Ukrainian people “their roar”.

It’s “right that President Putin appear before the ICC”.

*no easy off-ramp then.

Boris Johnson says that “tough property laws” in the UK meant it was difficult to target the homes of oligarchs initially.

He says that by “targeting gold” it will be possible to cut short the war in Ukraine.

On the Budget says he will be bringing forward a British energy security strategy, which will “make good on the mistakes of the last 25 years” by setting out how Britain will have its own independent energy sources.

He's currently on a plane to Brussels

Nikos Chrysoloras @nchrysoloras
Russian market just reopened - and stocks rally after the shutdown. Index is up more than 5% now

Now Russian stocks up more than 11%. Gazprom, Lukoil, oil majors rallly

A reminder that this is not a functioning market:
Russia will restart "trading" in some local stocks, ending a month-long shutdown
But...
(a) Short selling is banned
(b) Actually, selling all-together is banned for foreigners

@zelenskyyua
Had a phone conversation with @BorisJohnson. Received assurances of his support on the eve of tomorrow's important meetings. Discussed the course of hostilities and defense assistance to Ukraine. We will win together.

Morning…if I could just rewind quickly back to last night’s discussion about where are the Ukrainian air force?

There’s were various outlandish claims early on about the Knight of Kiev or somebody seemingly shooting down whole Russian Air Force in on day but the reality is there’s been little reliable info about what they’ve been up to…

Some footage from day one one did show that the Russians had attacked Air Force assets early one (standard doctrine pretty much world wide) so it’s anybody’s guess how many aircraft the Ukrainians actually have flying…

Next sunny point is that as the Russians have found out with some of their aircraft and crews there are a lot of MANPADS (one person shoulder launched surface to air missiles) kicking around and ground attack aircraft can be very vulnerable to those (counter measures are not a panacea)..

That may be one reason the Russian Air Force are increasingly resorting to using stand off (long range) munitions for some attacks.

[speculation] Fundamentally it’s possible the Ukrainians want to keep what fighters they have left for air defence (e.g. against stand off weapons or their carriers), they perhaps do not want to risk them over the battle area doing close air support/ground attack…[/speculation].

And finally as a general point about air forces almost world wide - yes they have generally got smaller…modern fighter aircraft have become v expensive, all the airfields, support facilities, personnel are expensive. Pilot training is lengthy and expensive and then there’s the cost of the recurrent training that needs doing even after initial qualification training is complete.

Hope that helps.

redToothBrush and other military folk: From what I've read the Russian battle units can produce a lot of firepower and are even better defensively.

Given that they are not making ground and possibly even losing some around Kyiv, is it possible that they really could be pushed back around there?

Is it feasible they could even retake the red-controlled rim around the borders to the East, NE and South-East? Or will reclaiming that area have to be part of a peace deal?

I know there are no guarenteed answers, but your thoughts would be appreciated.

@notimagain Thanks. When someone posted that 2 new aircraft and some minor upgrades cost 110m, well, that puts things into perspective!

Some footage from day one one did show that the Russians had attacked Air Force assets early one (standard doctrine pretty much world wide) so it’s anybody’s guess how many aircraft the Ukrainians actually have flying…

It's becoming hard to escape the feeling that scrapping the Harrier was - in hindsight - a fucking stupid thing to do.

Stanley Pignal @spignal
Volodymyr Zelensky speaking at G7, NATO, EU summits today. On top of appearing in parliaments across the world.
When the history of the Ukraine war is written, his use of the bullhorn will be a fascinating chapter.
It is seriously slick and it works.

@DGRossetti

Some footage from day one one did show that the Russians had attacked Air Force assets early one (standard doctrine pretty much world wide) so it’s anybody’s guess how many aircraft the Ukrainians actually have flying…

It's becoming hard to escape the feeling that scrapping the Harrier was - in hindsight - a fucking stupid thing to do.

Ah ha…...that’s always been a feisty debate over the years and a whole mega thread in itself….