Westminstenders: From Russia with Love

[RedToothBrush]

Things just got scary.

The colony of US puppet state or a vassel state of the EU?

Why not just let market forces take their course and let Russia buy the UK?

How did we get to stories of spies and mafia who buy politicians?

Just who are our enemies and allies?

Won't someone think of the effect on house prices in Salisbury?

Try not to don your foil hat, brace yourself and resist shouting 'money laundering too loud'.

More turbulence ahead.

Brexit still seems like such a cracking idea doesn't it?

I think in both personal and political contexts, not sharing stuff, often says more about the secretive person than the other one.

Not sharing info with Corbyn is to do with the cabinet and TMs tendency for a lack of openness in many spheres. As a comment on Corbyn it's incidental.Vince Cable would have been treated in the same way . Incidentally has the DUP been in the inner circle on this?

Math is always very insightful, so I'm a bit confused about the alternative explanations about the Russian agents.

I can see that implicating the gov in assassinations would be a good fake news way to try and stop Brexit or perhaps accelerate it,I'm not sure. But no fake news on this thread, as it's my safe place!

So Russia has no stockpile of chemical nerve agent since 1992 but U.S.A has according to Russian spokesman. Yea right....

The list of British traitors and "Agents of Influence" over the decades is depressingly long
Unfortunately, they are usually only exposed decades too late, when a Russian agent defects and brings evidence

Even then, it is usually too embarrassing or difficult to try British traitors in high places, so they just quietly resign and enjoy their pensions

e.g. There is strong evidence that the late Tom Driberg was a Russian agent, at least an Agent of Influence
He was Chairman of the Labour Party

Unfortunately, proving a case beyond reasonable doubt is very difficult when the main witnesses for the prosecution are Russian defectors
and when one of the 2 main parties furiously opposes any prosecution of their man.

afaik, receiving sensitive intelligence material normally requires passing security clearance
much like working with children requires the absence of suspicion, rather than the absence of any criminal convictions

So it might not have been May's decision, but that of the Cabinet Secretary and the Security Services - known to be very worried about Corbyn & friends

Frankiestein - math - re briefing - if there was an agent in place who confirmed a putin order or signint to the same effect then you can't tell anyone or even hint at it - let alone trump's US or the current cabinet - you just state the level of confidence

Russia already knows what happened if they did it.

If you can only state the level of confidence, then you can include Corbyn in your briefing. No details need to be shared. Not including him in the briefing sends the message that he can't be trusted.

Again, if Corbyn is such a threat to national security then he should be charged. Theresa May is playing games over this.

Does anyone think that any attack by Islamic terrorists is really by British Intelligence ?

Or is it only when white people like Putin / Russia are involved that we must stretch the limits of credulity ?

If there are agents in place near Putin and around the establishments producing nerve agents
then of course information they send could be traced back to them

So the agents would be exposed

We have seen this happen before with agents in Russia and with agents in the IRA
Using their information has to be done very carefully so as not to expose them
Specific highly secret information can typically only come from a very small circle of people

Or if GCHQ have some high-tech way of listening in on certain conversations the Russians thought secure,
then this could be traced back and the loophole closed.

The UK’s former ambassador to Russia has criticised senior ministers for “shooting their mouths off”, singling out Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson for displaying a lack of seriousness amid the deepest crisis in relations with Moscow since the end of the Cold War

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/gavin-williamson-salisbury-nerve-agent-attack-russia-spy-uk-ambassador-criticism-sir-rodric-a8259576.html

Tories are talking trump about this. Disingenuous.

Corbyn's real 'crime' is having public supported opposition to Putin.

It distracts too from the impending request to extend the date of leaving?

Gives CCHQ something to do.

Labour should back remain and return women only short lists. Simple.
Otherwise that pesky point drop in the polls will get worse.

But this duplicitous narrative on Russia is being used to frame any moves made by Remain Labour MPs, I bet.

Other stuff which is not being reported is student and lecturer strikes and sit ins in Reading, and the big anti racist march, despite the freezing temps in London. .

The need for a 'delay' in brexit, is a big story really today (being lost in hat gate).
www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-latest-committee-transition-period-hilary-benn-jacob-rees-mogg-a8261081.html

It's obviously a minority on the committee who want to force through crash, so the battle for democratic decision making is becoming more and more stark.

Or is it only when there are Russian trolls pushing alternative narratives on social media that we must stretch the limits of credulity?

Which isn't to say that we abandon all skepticism. This is May we are dealing with, with her love of secrecy and lack of transparency. But I am baffled by the adoption of the same narrative being pushed by Breitbart and the RT and as much as I don't trust Theresa May and has fascism, I still trust Breitbart and the RT less.

EU DisinfoLab 🇪🇺
@DisinfoEU
To complement @DFRLab @benimmo's work, our study on narratives suggesting #Salisbury #Skripal #Novichok attack was carried out by UK /#MI6. Here's what we found:
THREAD 1) by 10pm, out of ~300k tweets, 2236 accounts tweeted 3254 tweets/rts of narrative, No1 was @RussianEmbassy

twitter.com/DisinfoEU/status/973888563585613825

There have been so many odd events over the last 7 years on this island, that I too have been puzzled as to who was really responsible for them. Especially when the pay off is clear.

All we can do is trust our processes, and fight for them to be adhered to.
This is as much a battle for legality and our own constitution as anything.

But this duplicitous narrative on Russia is being used to frame any moves made by Remain Labour MPs

Yes, I've seen lots of this happening on Twitter

pushed by Breitbart and the RT : the most dangerous of poisons are the ones which infect a nation's thinking, and we have them in big offices in Edinburgh and on everyone's phones.

(who has their offices in Edinburgh?)

It is always useful to check if the hard left and the hard right agree on a policy.
If they are, then almost always we need to oppose them

Over the last few years, both the far left & the far right have feverishly supported Russia and idolised Putin.
He and Russia can do no wrong
Everything they do is justified, or they were framed by the evil West - which may no longer include the USA, as long as Trump is POTUS:

A long history of murders of journalist & dissidents in Russia and murders in the West

More recent deliberate genocide of Muslims in the Chechen Wars of 1999 - 2009
Even the historical mass murder of tens of millions in Europe must be whitewashed
much like Holocaust deniers

who has their offices in Edinburgh
Sputnik!
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-37036900

the chatter about corbyn is irrelevant distraction - any damage he could do acting in line with his principles is nothing compared to the damage that has been done and is being done by the party of government and it's backers.

(math - have you tried walking Salisbury to porton? It's up down wiggly/waggly with bits of no pavement - yes it's close - but walking distance implies down the street.)

What scared me most at time of 'Grexit' vote was the geographical vulnerability of a country, on the edge of the EU not being in the EU.

What scared me most at time of 'Brexit' vote etc...............................

All this is known, and no western lab has ever tried to reproduce it? It was so well known that it was identified immediately? No western government has ever been tempted to make its own?

ORNL has.

If Corbyn is in fact a traitor, or Milne, then charge them.

Our courts have already been set up to try people with secret evidence. And there's been an ongoing narrative from both Labour and Conservative governments that if they could "work around" the rule of law, then they could catch these nasty terrorists/paedophiles/bogeyman of the month.

It's a useful tool to be able to demonise entire swathes of people by nudge-nudge innuendo.

I keep in mind the 1% chance that May somehow convinced British Intelligence to carry out a nerve agent attack in the UK
or that they decided themselves for some reason to kill by such complicated means
(Russia has a history of preferring spectacular murders; the Uk doesn't)

However, I concentrate on the 99% probability that it was Russia blatantly murdering in full view of the world.
The big bully spitting in the smaller kid's face and daring them to do something
Showing how powerless & ineffective Britain is
Not something May would want to reveal.

That's Putin's level
Can't do anything about the dreadful Russian economy
but he can show the Russian people that noone dares stand up to him.
So they feel top dogs over the West
Despite their own crappy standard of living.

The McCarthyesque turn of mind is depressing.

Driberg was first protected from the consequences of his actions by Lord Beaverbrook, who would never fit the description of "leftie". The jury is still out on the question of whether he ever spied for Russia. It seems to me that he would not have been a good candidate for espionage.

The biggest factor influencing the treatment of suspected spies and known spies in the UK until about 30, maybe 40 years ago was the fact that homosexuality was criminalised, kept secret, and therefore made many members of the prep school, boarding school and Oxbridge layer of society vulnerable to manipulation.

After that consideration comes political and craft considerations. A trial might expose other agents or expose what information was lost. Politically, exposure and trials of suspected spies are embarrassing.

Thanks woman, had a quick google but couldn't work out who it was!

Truly not a fan of this government but I think it's unwise to underestimate what damage can be done by ignoring Russia as a threat. And this isn't a call for war but that ignoring Putin and his actions will only emboldened him in his attempts to interfere in our democracy, which isn't to dismiss the fact that our main political parties are also undermining the pillars of our democracy as well. Much like in the US, not taking sanctions will only send the message that he is welcome to do more.

And the threat of Russia also encompasses who they have beholden to them to turn blind eyes to all of their different transgressions. Do we really want the situation where decisions are made by government to benefit oligarchs and not citizens? I know this is happening already but surely it's something that should be halted?

Russia already knows what happened if they did it.

reminds me of the joke about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction ...

[to US] How can you be so sure Saddam has weapons of mass destruction ?

US: We have the receipts

The political reality is that any trial of a major Opposition politician would probably have to be fully in public and with overwhelming evidence,
above the usual criteria for prosecution

Otherwise, an opposition party, or elements of it, would likely appeal directly to the public to stop this, to present themselves as victims

So no trials with redacted / secret evidence to protect intelligence sources, as we have for terrorist or "normal" espionage trials.
(As almost every country has)

It is odd, isn't it.

Do we allow the presumption of suitability in political leaders unless there has been a criminal conviction ?

We don't when it comes to working with children or vulnerable adults
Living in a country we are very vulnerable to the actions of the government, so the situation is comparable.