Brexit Arms - Out with the old and in with the new

[time4chocolate]

It’s time again for another Brexit Arms thread to see us into Christmas and beyond.

Well what a week it’s been!!

Boris has now completed his first week and he’s been busy. New conservatives have been sworn in, the Queens Speech yesterday shows promise (aware that the proof of the (Xmas) pudding is in the eating) and Boris’ Deal is going to be voted on today with the results being around 3pm I believe.

Meanwhile, on the other side all four wheels have definitely fallen off the red bus and were very nearly joined by a garden gate and a car door. Oh dear!!

Anyway, I have added a few more Christmas decs to the pub and popped the fairy back on the tree (it took a nasty tumble)

We are now good to go.
Cheers all 🍷🍷

Ps. If anyone wants to volunteer for outside catering that would be👍🏻

Songs, I think the plans for 9/11 had been brewing for a lot longer than two days... although I appreciate that's unlikely to set your mind to rest. The planning period was a lot longer. Read The Looming Tower, which won a Pulitzer the year of publication.

I have thought that, yes and I know the plans and organisation took months if not years. However, was the assassination the final trigger? Perhaps not and perhaps it would have happened anyway but was it a coincidence?
I just hope we won't see anything like it in the coming weeks, that's all.

I am perhaps overanxious but I think it's a dangerous situation.

I'm pretty worried to be honest.

I've been quietly worrying for the last few days, Songs, ever since Kim Jong Un turned up the volume about testing a nuclear weapon so this latest news in the ME is just adding to the general anxiety. All we can do is hope that cooler heads prevail and that the back channels are being deployed to best effect.

True singing... And if KJU feels emboldened to talk that way, it's probably because China lets him. I'm also worried about that part of the world.

If we have the US on one side, Russia& China on the other + the EU stuck in the middle trying to 'moderate', where does that leave the UK post Brexit?
I think it'll be a tricky strategic balancing act for the government.

where does that leave the UK post Brexit?

Still as a member of NATO and still acting in the UK's best interests and still trying to calm things down, I expect.

So no change there then.

I also worry, but think the UK post-Brexit may be more easily overlooked. Or am I kidding myself? We are hardly strategic (geographically) in a US-China-ME-Russian dust up, except in financial markets.

no worries autumnrose I get what you're saying.

maybe you are right xingming and we are strategically useless - let's hope.

Iran has been ramping up provocation for a while now - it was always going to come to a head at some point

I'm erring on the notion that it was an opportunistic strike rather than pre-planned and was given the go ahead due to the insertion of Quds guards posing as 'protestors' and attacking the Embassy (as well as other attacks over last week)

It's very scary precisely because of who the man was - he's the architect of Iran's proxy agitation & is the go between for many different factions in the different countries
(And he was actually a legally legitimate target from what I can gather)

It's on a knife edge because it can possibly go either way at this point - escalate further into accidental war, or be used as an opportunity for de-escalation on the part of Iran

Trump's an absolute dick.
I've no love for the man whatsoever.
But to simplify this whole thing to 'Trump's an orange bastard who just wants to start a war to distract from impeachment' is both reductive & naive at best.

Raab & other senior officials from UK & other major countries have been clear that they want things to stay calm - this is exactly as expected tbh

Better useless than targets of course but history has never spared anyone- including these shores.
Ok, i'll leave this discussion now, time for some brainless entertainment...

Ugh.

It’s all a bit discombobulating isn’t it?

Not sure which way it will go, but I feel that pandora’s box is now open, maybe not fully, but at the very least, ajar.

I haven’t formed a full opinion yet on the rights or wrongs of the attack itself, I feel I need more information and time before I decide either way. Also, as I do not move in the upper eschelons of International security forces, it’s hard to really know or judge the decisions that lead them to the action. What I do know, or at least expect, is consequences of some sort will surely follow.

As it happens, I was following this breaking story online until after 3am this morning, and I am therefore shattered, so apologies if I am not making much sense! 😬🤦🏻‍♀️

I picked it up on the world service early am, but have only heard the hourly news bulletins since. I am not sure what I think, except that it was a very bad idea.

Just seen this on twitter...

twitter.com/reuters/status/1213236218269487106?s=21

Holy moly... is RT considered pretty reliable? If so... a separate and very disturbing development!

www.rt.com/news/477432-libya-haftar-turkey-plan-shot/

Update on that reuters story...

twitter.com/reuters/status/1213239958091251713?s=21

Ghost I have a conspiracy theory friend who uses it as her primary news source.

Others tell me that’s crazy.

However, I’m thinking at some point, even crazy sites will report correctly? I seem to recall MNers resorting to Breitbart before the UK media finally reported the Cologne assaults.

Thanks Autumn, I will keep checking on the RT one then, for any other verifiable confirmation on the Turkish plane. At least we know Reuters is pretty reliable on the separate breaking Iraq story.

Right.

Iraq story just confirmed by Sky. 6 high rankers killed.

Will keep checking on the Turkish plane.

Twitter rumours of ANOTHER airstrike in Sinjar... that’s in addition to the Taji one reported above. Will post link if there’s a verified source...

Are we ready for it? you mean "I'll cheer from the sidelines, whilst others die?"

As a Forces brat, wife, sister, daughter and aunt, why don't you piss off jasjas? I know the bloody score tyvm. It's my family that will do the dying - do yours? How was I gleeful - or are you just extrapolating as usual because it's me and I seem to have pissed on your chips somehow?

Look at 1939, woefully unprepared; again, 2019, defence budgets in freefall, despite pleas from 3 POTUS's to cough up..recruitment down, procurement in a mess, across the board in the NATO alliance apart from the US. Whilst the military are aware of where the threats are likely to come from (it's common sense after all), the politicians, budget holders and Civil servants, the ones who haven't done the years of service and won't have to do the hard work of fighting, injury or dying either, make cuts, and still expect the Forces to do more with less. That has been the case before I married a serviceman in 1986, and it has not improved over the past three decades.

Those of us with a brain have been watching the Middle East with some trepidation for some time. How long do we allow Iran to carry on with impunity having proxy wars? Do we allow it to make Iraq a client state? Perhaps hitting the target at Baghdad airport was a message in itself - a warning that Iran can be hit, but the US chooses not to hit Iran directly on its own soil.

How long do we continue allowing Iran to have Proxy wars ? As long as we allow Saudi to do the same thing? And Russia? Who do you think funds the other sides?

Btw defence budgets are not in free fall. The target of 2 percent of GDP was set for 2020 but it was a "target" not a requirement.

Germany without a nuclear capability and limited allowance on forces spends 1 percent of gdp but only actually spends 2 billion usd less than the UK.

Morning, all,

I am trying to understand more about what is happening in the Middle East but let's be clear about the general view in the Brexit Arms: not a single one of the regular customers has a cavalier attitude to what's happening. Anyone who thinks so needs to don their spectacles or deploy their common sense, or both.

Like Scary, I've been accused in the past of writing invisible words and it's both insulting and galling at the same time.

All customers welcome in the Arms but only if they abide by the Pub Rule. Let's not forget that there are real live people behind these keyboards, people with real life feelings and real life worries, and some of us are directly affected by this disturbing and developing situation. Anyone who only wants to pick a quarrel should go and start their own thread.

Right, back to some semblance of normality. The customary breakfast tray is a healthy vegetarian option today and the kettle, as always, is on. ☕️☕️☕️

Thanks again, Singing and well said.
Everyone on this thread and others needs to reflect on what they write.
It is all too easy to be a goady fucker on an anonymous thread but IRL this Iran stuff is terrifying.
I hope those in the armed services keep safe.
At least I now hope this government appreciates the work they do and will start to fund them adequately
Daren't imagine what it would be like now if Corbyn had won.

Lovely breakfast by the way. Thanks