“Don’t believe what Wikipedia writes about me,” Professor Ian Plimer emails me when I arrange an interview with him. Of course, the first thing to do in this case is to check the Wikipedia article about him. “Ian Rutherford Plimer (born February 12th, 1946) is an Australian geologist and Professor Emeritus at the University of Melbourne. He rejects the scientific consensus on climate change. He has been criticised by climate scientists for misinterpreting data and spreading misinformation,” are the first sentences of the Wikipedia article about him.
Plimer is indeed an Australian geologist and Emeritus Professor of Earth Sciences at the University of Melbourne, where he once was Professor and Head of Earth Sciences. During his long academic career, he has also been a professor at the University of Newcastle, University of Adelaide, Ludwig Maximilians Universität in Munich, Germany, and has work relations with several other universities. He has published more than 130 scientific articles and was one of the editors of the comprehensive five-volume Encyclopedia of Geology. Of course, not all of this information needs to be included in the first paragraph of the Wikipedia article about a renowned scientist, but the editor’s choice to include a clear accusation that Plimer is somehow linked to “spreading misinformation” is not surprising, to say the least.
Wikipedia’s ‘tiny’ error
The humorous thing is, however, that the editors of the Wikipedia article about him have in fact made an embarrassing mistake in the very first sentence. “They’ve got my birth date wrong. And if they can’t get my birth date right, which you can get on common knowledge, then everything else has got to be ignored,” Plimer comments. In fact, he was born in August of the same year.
However, raising the topic of ‘misinformation’ issue at the beginning of a Wikipedia article about a scientist is most probably deliberate – the editors probably think that the first thing the reader should know is that the person in question has a different, even dubious, view of generally accepted positions. This approach is not at all unique to Plimer or even to climate science. The same applies, for example, to the doctors and scientists who, during the Covid crisis, were critical of the panic-mongering, and lockdowns, recommended cheap drugs available to treat the disease like ivermectin, and questioned the efficacy and safety of vaccines (see e.g. here and here). Although Wikipedia still calls many of them spreaders of misinformation, it is clear, especially in retrospect, that their claims had a solid factual basis, while those claims that were continuously propagated did not.
As for Plimer, despite the possible attempt to cast doubt on his credibility, the claims that he rejects the scientific consensus on climate change and that he has been criticised by climate scientists, are factually accurate. Plimer backs this up with his characteristic humorous remark. “I thank Wikipedia for telling me that I’m a true scientist. I’ve never followed this consensus and the scientists have to use evidence. We don’t use what our peers say,” he says.
‘Global boiling is absolute nonsense’
But precisely this ‘scientific consensus’ is always being cited when the world’s most influential people talk to us about anthropogenic global warming and the catastrophe it represents. For example, at the end of July last year, UN Secretary-General António Guterres said that the era of global warming was over and the era of “global boiling” had arrived. “And for scientists, it is unequivocal – humans are to blame,” he said.
“I’ve been told many things in my life,” Plimer comments on this. “I’ve been told there was Father Christmas. I’ve been told, and this was a long long time ago, by young women that they love me. So you learn to be sceptical,” he says, again with his trademark humour, and reiterates that he’s always interested in the evidence. “To use terms like ‘global boiling’ is clearly absolute nonsense. This is a clear hyperbole to try to frighten us because by frightening us you then don’t have to present evidence,” Plimer points out.
Plimer has been criticising climate catastrophe predictions for decades. As a geologist, he says, he has been trained to observe and then analyse whether and how the observations relate to previous observations. Therefore, it is not possible for him to simply believe anything or anyone without evidence. Belief is also the wrong word when talking about science. “Belief is used in politics, it’s used in religion,” Plimer says. You can believe, for example, in the end of the world, which is also predicted for us because of climate change. “We’ve had thousands of years of people telling us the world is going to end. If just one of these predictions was correct, we wouldn’t be here,” Plimer points out.
Science and belief don’t mix. “Science is married to evidence and we come to conclusions based on evidence,” Plimer says, adding that as new evidence comes to light, conclusions have to change. He cites the example of how he has had the pleasure to correct his own scientific conclusions as some of the research he had published years ago has subsequently had to be refuted by new data and a better understanding of the research topic at hand. “I’ve criticised myself and I think that’s what science is about. It’s all about criticism,” he says. However, as soon as someone uses exaggerations about climate change, such as the oceans are boiling or so on, or talks about believing or not believing in climate change, it is not science, but propaganda, he explains.
What drives climate change?
But climate change, and even conditions that could be considered a climate crisis, are facts, Plimer says. He cites the example of the ‘Little Ice Age’, which began around 1300 and lasted until around mid-19th century, depending on the source of the estimate. This was a serious crisis. Long, cold winters meant reduced yields and famines. Malnourished people were in poorer health and, for example, Europeans’ growth also declined physically during this period. Scarcity led to more wars and few would disagree with Plimer who says that our lives today are incomparably better than they were then.
Canals and rivers in Great Britain and the Netherlands were frequently frozen deeply enough to support ice skating and winter festivals during the ‘Little Ice Age’. (Dutch painter Hendrick Avercamp, ‘A Scene on the Ice’ from the first half of the 17th Century.)
But if you look back thousands, hundreds of thousands, and millions of years, climate change has been happening on our planet all along. According to Plimer, the planet’s climate changes cyclically and is influenced by a variety of factors – tectonic changes, astronomical changes, cosmic radiation, orbital cycles, changes in the distance and activity of the sun, changes in ocean currents, etc. According to Plimer, we have known and measured these natural cycles for a long time, but the climate is also influenced by phenomena we do not understand so well. “A massive volcanic eruption can change climate and we’ve seen this a number of times in the past,” he says. At the same time, 70% of the Earth is covered by ocean, in fact, most volcanoes are underwater, and underwater volcanic activity directly affects the oceans by warming them and adding CO2. Plimer says we don’t know exactly how this affects the climate. “Climate is very complicated. It’s not based on a simple gas, carbon dioxide,” Plimer says, adding that the main greenhouse gas in the atmosphere is actually water vapour, and the clouds it creates directly affect our climate.
CO2 does not drive climate change
But as for CO2, which Western countries are working to reduce in an effort to supposedly prevent climate change, Plimer says that although it does have some warming effect as a greenhouse gas, it cannot change the climate. In fact, the more CO2 that is added to the atmosphere, the less each molecule that is added warms the atmosphere because the atmosphere gets saturated with it.
Plimer also points out that ice core studies have shown that every time the climate warms, the temperature rises first, and only then does the CO2 level in the atmosphere rise. The reason why more CO2 is getting released is because the ocean is warming – colder water withholds more CO2, and as the ocean warms more CO2 is released. “We’ve had six great ice ages in the history of our planet and six out of these six great ice ages started when there was more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere than now,” Plimer explains. Three of these ice ages were when we had 20% CO2 in the atmosphere. Today, that level is about 0.04%. It is important to note that 97% of the CO2 cycle is a natural process, and that anthropogenic CO2 emissions account for only 3%, according to Plimer. So to prove that anthropogenic CO2 causes global warming, it would also have to be shown that 97% of CO2 does not. “The whole argument is ridiculous from the start. It has never been shown that human emissions of carbon dioxide drive global warming. And why would we want to get rid of this carbon dioxide? It is plant food,” Plimer says.
“The only thing about renewable energy is that the subsidies are renewable”
But it is precisely this man-made CO2 that is at the heart of climate policies, and for this people will have to give up the reliable energy sources they have, replace them with less reliable ones, and be forced to limit their lives in other ways. “I don’t think it’s got anything to do with the environment. I don’t think it’s got anything to do with looking after your fellow man. I think it’s where unelected elites have seen a mechanism whereby they can make a huge amount of money and where they can control the average person, yet they don’t have to face an election,” he adds.
Part of this, Plimer says, has been the constant talk and scaremongering that fossil fuels are about to run out. “We’ve had that argument going on for 60 years now about peak oil. I don’t know about your country, but we have 3,000 years of coal in Australia, we have about 2,000 years of gas and we have more than 50 million years of uranium. It will take a very, very long time before we run out and by then we may be extinct or we may have different energy systems altogether,” he says. Only recently, oil reserves larger than 50 years’ worth of North Sea production were found off Antarctica, and this has already got the major world powers arguing about who should own them.
So according to Plimer, we won’t run out of fossil fuels just yet. “What we’ve run out of is common sense. And they’re trying to make us run out of money,” he says, referring to the ‘green transition’ and Net Zero, in other words replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy such as wind turbines and solar panels. “The only thing about renewable energy is that the subsidies are renewable. The subsidies just keep coming. If we had no subsidies, we would have no so-called renewable energy. And if we had wind and solar competing on a level playing field with nuclear, with coal, with gas, with hydro, then we probably wouldn’t see a wind turbine or solar facility anywhere in the world,” Plimer says.
The environmental damage of a ‘green turnaround’
Another important factor that cannot be overlooked is the real environmental impact, or real environmental damage, of wind turbines, solar panels, electric vehicles and other ‘green technologies’ that are said to save the climate. Plimer gives some examples. Solar panels are made using metals such as lead and cadmium, which are toxic and are very likely to end up in the soil and groundwater after a relatively short life cycle as a solar panel. Because they do not decay, they create persistent pollution.
He gives another one for wind turbines. A toxic chemical called ‘bisphenol’ is used in the construction of wind turbine blades. The use of bisphenol is banned in almost all Western countries, according to Plimer. For example, continuous exposure to this chemical increases the risk of cancer. Now, when the wind turbines reach the end of their life cycle – which again is not very long, about 15 years – the blades will be removed from the wind turbines and can not be reused or recycled. Instead, it is customary for them to be buried. From there the poison also ends up in the soil and groundwater.
In addition to the direct poisoning of groundwater and soil, wind farms and solar farms also have harmful effects on wildlife and animals. “If you love wind turbines, you are quite happy to slice and dice birds and bats. And if they’re offshore, to kill whales,” Plimer says, noting that protecting the environment has nothing to do with any of this.
Plimer cites the production of electric vehicles (EV) as another example. He points to the fact that it takes six times as much mining to produce an EV as it does to produce an internal combustion engine car. And there is a considerable shortage of the minerals needed, such as rare earths, cobalt, lithium, copper, etc. This means that we have to go deeper and deeper in mining. In the case of copper, for example, we could previously expect to find ore of 10% practically at the surface. Now, however, the ore is being mined deeper and the copper content in the ore has also dropped by a factor of 20 – to 0.5%. Plimer says this means that a lot more material is being excavated from the ground, which is then simply left aside – quite clearly, much more damage is being done to the ground than before. The factories where copper is extracted from the ore also have more material left over. “By increasing the amount of resources we use for the renewables we are actually creating a massive environmental problem,” Plimer says. It has financial impact as well – the price of copper has almost doubled on the world market in the last five years.
Dependence on authoritarian China
In addition, the materials we need for ‘green technologies’ are coming from third-world countries and we are simply turning a blind eye to the damage caused there. “If you are driving an electric vehicle and you are feeling morally superior to those monsters driving around a diesel or a gasoline vehicle, then you should know that for an electric vehicle, you use a lot of cobalt. That cobalt is mined by slave children in the Congo. And China controls the world’s cobalt industry,” Plimer says. He adds that China controls the global market for rare earths, which are needed to make wind turbines, solar panels and EVs as well. And the fact is that China now largely controls the production of all these things. So if you like all these things, you are directly supporting Communist China and the development of their economy, which in some places – for example, with regard to the Uighurs – uses forced labour.
Similarly, it should be borne in mind that China itself is not engaged in the same kind of CO2 emission reduction as the West, for in 2022, for example, the country was commissioning new coal plants at the rate of two per week.
China imports most of its coal from Indonesia and Plimer’s home country Australia. “We have about a dozen power stations and there’s huge pressure to close them down. China has 12,200 coal-fired power stations and is building two power stations a week. India is doing the same sort of growth,” Plimer says. “If coal was so bad, we wouldn’t export coal, which happens to be our biggest export at present. We would go broke trying to save the world,” he adds.
Plimer says that literally, the whole of the West’s economic growth has relied on coal and, later, other fossil fuels. This is linked to the development of industry, transport, medicine and other sectors that are vital to society. In addition, every day we use some 6,000 essential chemicals that we get from processing coal or oil. In addition, abandoning fossil fuels would also mean abandoning cheap and reliable energy production. Indeed, if we do this, we will create major problems for ourselves in terms of energy dependence, while at the same time making ourselves totally dependent on authoritarian China. In Plimer’s view, this is all just very stupid.
Geologist accused of relation to mineral exploration?
While Wikipedia tries hard to show that there are some climate scientists who think he has been spreading misinformation, there are of course others who try ad hominem arguments on him. One of them suggests that his positions on climate change are somehow influenced by his involvement with various mining companies. “Well, what a surprise! Geology involves doing mineral exploration and involves taking those minerals out of the ground. We wouldn’t have energy, we wouldn’t have metals, we wouldn’t have anything in today’s world without geology. This smartphone of mine – there are about 70 elements in the periodic table that are in that phone. If you want to have that criticism, then you should be giving me that criticism from the entrance to your cave. But if you live in the modern world, you are a beneficiary of geology,” he says. Yes, Plimer has connections with companies extracting coal, oil or natural gas, but alongside that, others associated with him mine iron, copper, gold, lead, silver and anything else you can find in the ground. Shouldn’t his association with, say, a copper-mining company make him a great lover of ‘green transition’ technologies and a preacher of the climate crisis?
First published by Freedom Research. Subscribe here.
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
existential means immediate nuclear engagement. Russia is very clear about that.
Russia was also very clear about the SMO and has not budged nor strayed from those tasks
Putin doesn’t bluff.
He has warned Finland to expect a measured response if they join NATO. These will be conventional (Finland imports 60% of their NG from Russia, Russia will switch that off)
As one wag put it on the Saker blog, ” time for the Finnish to get the Grandfather’s axe out of the shed. It’s going to be a long cold winter”
and Russia and its sick regime loses another customer.
yadayadayada
https://thesaker.is/from-the-finlandization-of-ukraine-to-the-ukraine-ization-of-finland/
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-05-12/russia-oil-revenue-up-50-this-year-despite-boycott-iea-says
Russia Oil Revenue Up 50% This Year Despite Boycott, IEA Says
Rouble up 25% against the Euro compared to pre-invasion.
https://www.xe.com/currencyconverter/convert/?Amount=1&From=EUR&To=RUB
Rouble up 17% against the Dollar compared to pre-invasion.
The sanctions are ‘safe and effective’
and Germany and Austria have cried Uncle.
It’s about time our Fat Controller gets his Ukrainian comeuppance.
Along with his ‘cakegate’ comeuppance, his vax scam comeuppance, his mask farce comeuppance, his Lockdown disaster comeuppance ,his fake Brexit comeuppance, his NI protocol sell-out comeuppance , his Carbon Zero insanity comeuppance etc. etc .
I expect a few ‘ladies’ might seek his ‘comeuppance’ for personal resons as well.
If you like your Dollar you can keep your dollar!
/Obama’s QE Dollarcare.
While the those very clever Finns led by a WEF groupie will freeze to death. Now that’s a proper backlash.
Anther one who doesn’t understand that modern luxuries are reliant on oil
Like washing up liquid and plastic for example?
The computer he’s vomiting his bilge from.
Indeed, but there’s no shortage of demand from points Eastwards. Europe needs Russia a lot more than Russia needs Europe.
As any business manager will tell you, some customers are more trouble than they are worth.
And meanwhile Russia has increased oil deliveries to India… that tiny Country not in NATO or US lapdog.
Sick regime. LOL
Biden and Boris.
America and the UK overtly invoking censorship on their citizens. Shovelling money and weapons into the corruption capital of the world, which isn’t even a NATO member.
Biden ignoring the baby formula shortage in the US, and delivering stocks of the stuff to illegal immigrants.
Biden stealing an election, now beyond doubt following the release of 2000Mules.
Both main political parties known to have been partying whilst they imposed lockdowns on the country.
Meanwhile, China, India and Latin America, amongst many other nations refuse to condemn Putin for legally invoking UN Article 51 to resist the ethnic cleansing of Russians from Donbass.
Perhaps Russia doesn’t want to be tarred with the brush of western neglect by ignoring the 5,000 or so artillery strikes on Donbass in the seven days before it finally ‘invaded’ a region persecuted for eight years by western Ukraine.
Meanwhile, the west stood back and did nothing, once again, as genocide of a people, culture, and language was perpetrated over those eight years.
But Putin’s the sick one…….
God help us all.
Great post!
Agreed.
Why didn’t Donbass lives matter?
With honourable exceptions here and there, only the Russians seemed to care about what was happening to people in the Donbass for eight terrible years; as deliberate Ukrainian government policy, aided and abetted by the US and executed by people proud of their identification with Nazis.
.
The USA do not care about lives. Neither do the UK. In Syria and Iraq they used scorched earth tactics where millions of citizens were wiped out. This was never how the British did war before joining the Globalist controlled EU. The UK never, ever invaded a country unless they asked for help or invaded us first. Everything changed when the Americans became a global power.
Casualties have continued on both sides. Russia’s statistics are never, never accurate.
But for Putin, there never would have been breakaway republics and there never would have been a war.
Well said. Best post
More and more EU countries are now signing up to Gazprom and paying in Rubles. The Ruble is now the best performing world currency. It doesn’t matter how patriotic I am, I have to acknowledge the UK never left the Brussels cartel and USA controls the West. Because of a few people in Washington wanting to hide their nefarious investments and money laundering in Ukraine, Europe will now see a generation, maybe two, of poverty and falling living standards. Our leaders are part of a globalist/USA agenda to destroy us in order to control the world. That agenda is failing because the majority of the world is not complying.
The dollar is also rising.
The rouble is not fully convertible right now for locals, so its value is not entirely what it seems.
Currency exchange rates are only part of the economic story. Russian inflation is touching 20% and a 10% fall in GDP is forecast.
The economy won’t stop Putin in the short term, but longer term he has deprived Russia of its biggest customer for by far its biggest product.
Rubbish.
Oh yes, 60% sounds like a big number, doesn’t it? Except that it’s not even 3% of Finland’s energy budget.
They have time to replace that little bit of gas before it cools down again in September.
The Finns are anything but stupid, and will have factored all this in and made provision for the worst.
They know what a Russian invasion is like, the country that stole 10% of its land in the 1940s.
What do you think Finland did to keep warm before they had Russian gas? And now they have lots of nuclear power.
Finland was offered Russian land in exchange for some security with regard to the approaches to Leningrad, its second-largest city.
It decided instead to side with Nazi Germany, and took part in the invasion and attacks which resulted in the loss of hundreds of thousands of lives in that city alone.
Finland might have decided to forget. The Russians are anything but stupid and they have not.
I pray, and I mean this sincerely, that Helsinki and no other city on the face of this earth ever suffers the fate of the people of Leningrad.
The Fins have a Global Leader trained by WEF. That changes everything. A neutral country now puts itself under the control of a nuclear power who has no regard for human life. What a very calculated and dangerous decision for a Government to make.
Stocked up for 3 winters – we have two of these ‘cages’ (about 6 cubic metres of birch logs) and a boathouse filled with another 7 cubic metres. Takes a year for logs like this to dry out.
Wood cage.
Does the Finnish Air Force still use the swastika insignia?
Is Russia’s Nazi Wagner Group still fighting in half a dozen countries?
Why are you asking me? I’m not Russian, I don’t live in Russia, but I do love Wagner, especially the Ring Cycle, so maybe that’s it, who knows?
You ask lots of pointless whataboutist questions, so I thought I’d join in.
It’s quite fun.
As they were flying Gloucester Gladiators gifted by the UK in 1940, perhaps it was just a “good luck” talisman?
And they were pale blue!
I don’t know. You could write and ask them?
So the US factor is not mentioned once. Maybe a bit of investigation into US close ties to and influence in Ukraine Ian. Then compare to Finland.
see my reply to the 77th shill below
Yet another Eisen/Nuland operation then?
There is just too much paper mnehy in the world!
The west stood by and watched the Rwanda genocide.
Thankfully, Putin isn’t spineless enough to ignore the full scale invasion and subsequent genocide of Donbass, planned for immediately prior to his intervention.
In excess of 5,000 artillery strikes by Ukraine on the region in the seven days prior to Putin chasing them off.
Something completely ignored by the western media.
All truth is ignored by Western media. The problem is that the sleepwalking masses still actually believe what the Media (especially the BBC) tell them . They have failed to understand the fundamental transformation of Western media into a single, monotone, voice propaganda-machine just peddling lies and now actively suppressing censoring individuals and forcing the Globalist tyranny forward, crushing truth to advance the agenda of the most evil and corrupt dictatorship the world has ever seen!
Time was when crass ignorance in others was just rather sad and annoying – eliciting a shake of the head and a shrug…but now it is becoming life-threatening for all of us and psychopathic war mongers taking us all to the edge of social and economic breakdown and even nuclear war.
Apart from the mentally deranged now running the west, ‘Stupidity’ is now our biggest threat and enemy.
The first stage of ‘enlightenment’ is so very easy – people should stop believing, watching or reading MSM news coverage whatever.
Lies are now the ‘New World Order” truth!
They should try Mark Steyn before he is censored, cancelled and “gaslighted.” Can’t be long now!
https://ourdecisiontoo.com/Issue/there-s-nothing-left-to-do-but-go-our-separate-ways/320/
But that’s just like, your opinion man…
You have to avoid the 4 min flight time for nukes to Moscow issue to make comparrisons with Ukraine.
Despite the fact Finland has no nukes… unitl they join NATO!
.
Funny, that’s what the civillians in the Donbass have been saying since Russian forces helped the LPR/DPR forces to liberate them and they crawled out of the cellars after 8 years of arty barrages
As lazy as avoiding the US involvement, and the nuclear flight time elephant in the room to make your opinion appear valid?
Nope, sophistry doesn’t work on us Ian, must try harder.
They haven’t joined NATO yet. Apparently all Nordic countries are idealogically opposed to nuclear weapons, and as part of joining NATO they would have to agree to having nuclear weapons on their soil. I am surprised that Norway has agreed already.
The ‘useless eater’ plebs don’y have to ‘agree’ to anything any longer – the CIA just fix the elections to make sure their man/woman ‘wins’!
If it can happen in the US it can happen everywhere.
“We are living in a post-democratic age” ( P. Mandelson)
Just happened in Tower Hamlets.
No surprise.
Or it’s all posturing to put the pressure on Putin so he says sorry and runs away.
In 2008 when he was working at the U.S. embassy in Moscow, William Burns wrote the following memo to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice:
“Ukrainian entry into NATO is the brightest of all redlines for the Russian elite (not just Putin). In more than two and a half years of conversations with key Russian players, from knuckle-draggers in the dark recesses of the Kremlin to Putin’s sharpest liberal critics, I have yet to find anyone who views Ukraine in NATO as anything other than a direct challenge to Russian interests.”
Does Ian regard Burns, who is now CIA director, as a “Putin apologist”?
“Ukraine in NATO [would be] a direct challenge to Russian interests.”
Yes, that is exactly my point – it would be a direct challenge to Russian interests, not Russian security. There’s a vital difference between the two.
and security isn’t “an interest” eh Ian?
Spot on – we’re looking at a very obvious case of sophistry.
Interests include security interests. And regardless of whether one sees those interests as “legitimate”, NATO expansion clearly does matter (see my reply here). In his prize-winning article in the journal International Security, the political scientist Joshua Shifrinson notes that:
“during the diplomacy surrounding German reunification in 1990, the United States repeatedly offered the Soviet Union informal assurances against NATO’s future expansion into Eastern Europe. In addition to explicit discussion of a NATO non-expansion pledge in February 1990, assurances against NATO enlargement were epitomized and encapsulated in later offers to give East Germany special military status in NATO, to construct and integrate the Soviet Union into new European security institutions, and to generally recognize Soviet interests in Eastern Europe.”
He further notes that:
“There are numerous reasons to condemn Russian behavior in Georgia and Ukraine, as well as against states in Eastern Europe, but Russia’s leaders may be telling the truth when they claim that Russian actions are driven by mistrust.”
The key word there, in the phrase “informal assurances” is the word informal. A lot has been said and written about what Russia was supposedly “promised” by the US, following the collapse of the USSR. I think most or all of it is blown out of proportion or taken out of context. The bottom line is that the US Constitution doesn’t grant the executive (i.e., the Presidential branch of government, inc. the Secretary of State and State Dept. ambassadors) the power to enter into international treaties (i.e., to enter into legally binding agreements) – this has been relevant in recent years with respect to the JCPOA and the Paris Climate Accords. Donald Trump promising this, that or the other wouldn’t have bound Joe Biden’s administration, and as Russia knows full well, such agreements need to be approved by Congress or they can’t be (to use the legal term of art) “relied upon”.
This is unlike the Minsk Protocol, which Russia clearly broke.
Surely in recognising the Donetsk Republic, Russia also broke the Budapest Treaty that guarantees Ukrainian territorial integrity?
That too.
The “Budapest Treaty” covers the international recognition of the deposit of microorganisms for the purposes of patent procedure.
You may be thinking about some memorandums of understanding that were penned in Budapest. If so, you either haven’t read them, or didn’t understand them, or are lying about what they say.
Which is it?
Section 2.
UN Article explicitly empowers Russia with the authority to intervene in Donbas.
What a load of old hooey. It explicitly doesn’t empower Russia to do anything, these arguments are of the same pathetic quality as Tony Blair justifying the invasion of Iraq to find the WMDs.
No.It is trumped by the right of self-determination of people and basic Human Rights .
Donbas Russian speakers were not very happy to live under a Government than banned their language, shelled their homes and schools and generally tried to kill them. It actually succeded in killing 14,000 in 8 years.
Idealogical claptrap. Geopolitics operates on trust. There’s not a treaty in the world that can’t be violated, so the word of a political leader is probably worth more that mountains of paper.
Why did this ‘invasion’ (in reality a humanitarian intervention under UN Article 51 to prevent genocide in Donbass following seven days of 5,000 artillery strikes by Ukrainian forces on the region) not take place under Trump? principally it seems, because Trump was more critical of NATO than anyone else and he and Putin trusted each other.
There’s not a war begun without breaking treaties or agreement of one sort or another. UN Article 1441 was violated by America and Britain when they invaded Iraq.
This was drawn up in 2014 and the assault on Donbas continued for eight years, so it wasn’t Putin who violated the protocol, it was Ukraine.
Why should Putin respect an agreement which isn’t respected by his counterparts.
Your article is typical Putin Derangement Syndrome propaganda.
Utterly reprehensible that anyone could simply ignore yet another attempt at genocide western media has watched and ignored for eight years, again.
The majority of the world does not condemn Putin for his intervention. The US, UK and Europe are without a shadow of a doubt the aggressors here and responsible for numerous deaths in Donbass.
The crucial meeting in 1990 was not Gorbachev-Baker in Feb (which everyone quotes) but 6 months later when the deal was actually agreed.
The Russians summarised the Kohl-Gorbachev meeting thus: ‘…(Gorbachev) confirms his agreement to unified Germany’s entry into NATO. Kohl is decisive and assertive. He leads a clean but tough game’.
Gorbachev agreed to NATO expansion because the SU was broke and they sweetened the pill.
The real focus of the 1990 talks was about whether a united Germany could remain in NATO. Absorbing East Germany meant expanding NATO by default.
Most people on this site only ever quote from the first meeting, in Feb. But no deal was struck in Feb. When the deal was struck 6 months later, Gorbachev did indeed concede to NATO expansion. He did so because they sweetened the pill financially, and the SU was broke.
Isn’t a Nation’s Security of interest to it?
Not so – false distinction.
Security is perhaps the principal interest of any State. Without “security” there is no State.
A) Ukraine has not entered into NATO
B) Simply stating that you are not going to allow liberal-democratic countries to enter into defensive alliances (mainly because they are fearful of your own fascist-expansionist agenda) is the exact opposite of an excuse to actually attack them.
To quote myself:
“Petro Poroshenko, the man who replaced Yanukovych, announced that “we’ve decided to return to the course of NATO integration”. NATO troops began military exercises in Ukraine later that year. Then in 2019, the Constitution was amended to include joining NATO as a strategic goal. By June of 2020, Ukraine was recognised by NATO as an “Enhanced Opportunities Partner”. And in November of 2021, the US and Ukraine signed a “Charter on Strategic Partnership”, which declared that the US “supports Ukraine’s right to decide its own future foreign policy course free from outside interference, including with respect to Ukraine’s aspirations to join NATO”.”
All of that is a by-the-by to my main point, which I will repeat:
Simply stating that you are not going to allow other countries to enter into defensive alliances (mainly because they are fearful of your own fascist-expansionist agenda) is the exact opposite of an excuse to actually attack them.
Seen the collage of the multiple images of the Nazis marching in Ukraine, runic banners flying ?
Ever heard of Bandera?
Thought not.
Seen the collage of the multiple images of the Nazis marching in Ukraine, runic banners flying ?
If you are talking about the march held in Kyiv in Spring 2021 commemorating the Second World War Nazi collaborating Ukrainian Galicia / SS Division
A) it was attended by a grand total of 300 out of a population of 44 million, or 0.0007%.
B) The current Jewish President Volodymyr Zelensky stated about it that “We categorically condemn any propaganda in favour of totalitarian regimes, in particular National Socialist ones, and attempts to revise the truth about World War II”.
In general Zelensky has made his vigorously anti-Nazi and anti-fascist positions entirely clear.
Ever heard of Bandera?
You mean Stepan Bandera who died in 1959?
Without going into details of his extremely chequered political career and military activities (with Ukrainian nationalism being the only consistent thread) the Hero of Ukraine award posthumously given by Viktor Yushchenko in 2010 was annulled the next year, and again rejected by the Ukrainian parliament in 2019.
So I have no idea of his relevance to the Russian invasion of February 2022.
No, I am talking about a collage of images and so many videos over the last eight years of the marching Nazis and interviews with them and photo shots of their 2nd SS Panzer Division Das Reich’s “Wolffengel’ runic device on flags, t-shirts, arm bands – and the black sun , and the deaths head – all on show openly since the Maiden Coup staged by Nuland.and the US Deep State.
Have you never heard of the Azov Brigade and its massive expansion since 2014?
Has you seen the video footage of the “Odessa burnings” of Rusian speakers in 2014?
As for Bandera, here is an ‘idea ‘of his relevance – his followers carry his image down the streets and support his policy of ‘ethnic cleansing’ of Russia speakers to create a “racially pure” Ukraine .
Srtike any chords or relevance?
No, I am talking about a collage of images and so many videos over the last eight years of the marching Nazis and interviews with them and photo shots of their 2nd SS Panzer Division Das Reich’s “Wolffengel’ runic device on flags, t-shirts, arm bands – and the black sun , and the deaths head – all on show openly since the Maiden Coup staged by Nuland.and the US Deep State.
You can find Nazi and neo-Nazi imagery in pretty much any country.
The only relevance to the Russia invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 is that the current Zelensky government is unambiguously opposed to neo-nazism and fascism in general.
Have you never heard of the Azov Brigade and its massive expansion since 2014?
The Azov Brigade has now been incorporated into the official Ukrainian army and all extremist political beliefs and propaganda banned.
Has you seen the video footage of the “Odessa burnings” of Rusian speakers in 2014?
Well the exact nature and cause of that horrific event is disputed, but whatever happened in Odessa 8 years ago lends no justification whatsoever to the mass murder and destruction currently being carried out by Russian forces (including in the Donbass)
As for Bandera, here is an ‘idea ‘of his relevance – his followers carry his image down the streets and support his policy of ‘ethnic cleansing’ of Russia speakers to create a “racially pure” Ukraine .
Srtike any chords or relevance?
Again, there are ultra-nationalist, racist and fascistic supporters all over the world – including, and to a very great extent, Russia itself.
Any statements about ethnic cleansing and racial purity are entirely condemned by the anti-fascist Ukrainian government, and none of this justifies the recent brutal invasion by the forces of the largest country in the world.
You don’t find them integrated into the armed forces which is what happened with the Azov battalion. Hiding in plain sight. See attached image.
Would that include the 5,000 artillery rounds fired into Donbas from Ukrainian forces in the seven days prior to Russia’s intervention?
“You can see that by the time Putin invaded Ukraine, the war had already begun. The shelling of ethnic Russians had already intensified by many orders of magnitude. People were being slaughtered in droves, and tens of thousands of refugees were fleeing across the border into Russia. And, all of this had been going on since the 16th of February, a full week before Russia crossed the border. (Moon of Alabama has compiled the data on the bombardment that took place in the Donbas preceding the invasion: “The February 15 report of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine recorded some 41 explosions in the ceasefire areas. This increased to 76 explosions on Feb 16, 316 on Feb 17, 654 on Feb 18, 1413 on Feb 19, a total of 2026 of Feb 20 and 21 and 1484 on Feb 22.”)” (Mike Whitney, The Unz Review, my emphasis)
Russia lost 40 million people to Hitler. There is largely hatred for anything representing Naziism in Russia as almost everyone is touched by it. But as you suggest, Russia is no less susceptible to a minority of fanatics. It’s hardly “to a very great extent”.
In ‘most countries’ it doesn’t form part of the Army, parade in the streets with the Swastika and directly seek to revive the conflicts and “ethnic cleansings”of WW2.
Russia may be the largest country in the world but spends less on its Military than the UK.
Wherever did you find any evidence that the Ukraine Government is “anti-fascist” ? Banning use of the Russian language among Russian speakers is “anti-fascist”?
Wherever did you find any evidence that the Ukraine Government is “anti-fascist” ?
I have mentioned some of it already, in response to a neo-Nazi event in 2021 President Volodymyr Zelensky stated that “We categorically condemn any propaganda in favour of totalitarian regimes, in particular National Socialist ones, and attempts to revise the truth about World War II”.
Also in 2015 the Ukrainian parliament passed a law banning the use of Nazi (as well as Communist) propaganda and symbols.
Banning use of the Russian language among Russian speakers is “anti-fascist”?
The preclusions only apply to the use of non-Ukrainian languages (including Russian) in the public sphere (eg education, state matters, business, theatre and films etc). Printed and online publications can be in non-Ukrainian languages (again including Russian) but are required to have a Ukrainian translation. There is no ban whatsoever on the use of Russian privately.
All countries have both legal and de facto monopolistic language policies in most areas of public life; obviously English in the UK, though the SNP is trying to shoehorn in an old language spoken by a tiny minority (Gaelic) for purely political purposes.
I agree that the 2019 ‘Law on Supporting the Functioning of the Ukrainian Language as the State Language’ is excessively restrictive, but also understandable in the context of the ongoing divide and conquer policy of its Russian neighbour, which has included direct military support for the Russian secessionist movement in the east of the country.
I think it is self-evident that (nearly) all those Russian speakers permanently living in Ukraine will also be able to communicate in that language.
So restrictions on the use of Russian in public life comprise a minor inconvenience or intrusion at worse (like Gaelic speakers having to use English in most circumstances), a very far cry from the brutal oppression implied by the term fascism.
Oh, do stop banging on about the Azov Brigade. They were volunteers and kids in 2014, but since then part of the Ukrainian National Guard, professionalized and a battalion. Yes, I’ve seen those silly pictures from 2014, kids larking around making Nazi salutes.
The idea that Ukraine is infested with neo-Nazis is just silly. You’ve been sucking the teats of too much Russian propaganda.
You can always selectively produce a few images to support your lying narrative. The Azov battalion have shown themselves to be outstanding patriots and heroes since February 24.
Hiding behind civilians? Your ilk used to call that “terrorism” when people you didn’t like did it.
Shooting prisoners in the legs or in the head? I suppose it’s fair to say your “kids larking around” have grown up a bit.
You’d wet yourself if there were some of those “outstanding patriots and heroes” in your neighbourhood and you were a member of one of the races or cultural groups they hate and despise.
So easy to glorify or trivialise thugs when they’re “your thugs”.
But you’d like them defending you Mark if the Russians rolled in, wouldn’t you?
The Russians have no intention of “rolling” into the UK (unless you’re suggesting they’re assembling a fleet of rubber dinghies in Calais), but if they were, no I wouldn’t want a bunch of Ukrainian Nazis defending me.
you can find past articles about neo nazi in Ukraine and their influence in pretty much any western mainstream media, members of US congress themselves expressed concern that US supports and trains them. you’re saying that Putin pays Reuters?
Shouldn’t we be worrying more about the neo-Nazis in the UK?
https://shieldsafety.co.uk/resources/blog/covid-marshals-what-are-they-and-how-to-identify-them/
“Every supermarket in Southend is being visited four times a week by enforcement officers amid mounting Covid compliance complaints, it has been revealed.
Covid marshals are visiting each supermarket in the town to make sure each shop is adhering by the rules, as it emerged Southend Council has been “inundated” with complaints and tip offs surrounding businesses flouting the regulations.”
https://www.harwichandmanningtreestandard.co.uk/news/south_essex_news/19038044.covid-supermarkets-checked-marshals-four-times-week/
Just “Waiting in the wings” for ‘the trumpet call”?
“you can find past articles about neo nazi in Ukraine and their influence in pretty much any western mainstream media”
HaHaHaHaHa. And am I supposed to believe the MSM? If you’re not a woke leftist you are a neo-Nazi according to them.
And yet you believe msm about an existential threat from Russia just because US wants to fight Putin by the hands of Ukrainians? True that MSM can be right and wrong depending on the order of the day and who’s paying. If you don’t trust MSM on the neo nazi stories, read independent western journalists and you’ll learn a lot of interesting things. Like zelensky being elected on the promise of a peace deal in Donbass and then threatened by neo Nazis for that who accordong to MSM are irrelevant and don’t posses any influence.
You lot really must try harder. Azov battalion, patriots and heroes –
Next you’ll be telling us that the Right Sector are Kindergarten Teachers and the SBU are Ukie Community Officers.
Don’t try and put words into my mouth about Right Sector.
But yes, the Azov battalion have proved themselves to be outstanding heroes in the face of aggression from across the border.
Perhaps you need to look up what a hero actually is.
yeah, watched a video of them shooting PoWs in the legs…
“outstanding heros”
You’re a real piece of work SMH
Arse.
What abusive rubbish you write!
A Liberal Democratic country that imprisons the opposition leader and closes down anti government media? You must have gone to a different school to most of us.
If you mean measures which have been carried out since the Russian invasion of Ukraine all liberal democratic countries suspend many civil liberties in times of war, especially when they are actually under invasion and occupation.
On the other hand totalitarian regimes such as Russia have far more draconian measures in place all the time.
Clearly, you have no idea what fascism is.
The west is far more of a fascist entity than Russia.
We have allowed, nay, encouraged the growth and intervention of big industry, in particular Silicone Valley and big pharma to dominate our politics. The very definition of fascism.
Unethical business (that’s not to say all business is unethical) has clearly demeaned and corrupted our Democracy, evidenced by the MSM’s and Social Media’s ability to, without any legal mandate, practice censorship on individual citizens and organisations of the nations it operates in.
By almost any definition we are losing or Democracy.
In complete contrast, Putin has been steadily building the Russian state in order to ensure the Democratic process prevails over technocracy.
Without a state being dominant over commerce there can be no Democracy.
Putin has an 83% approval from Russian citizens for his intervention in Ukraine.
The vast majority of the worlds population, represented by their leaderships, including China, India, Africa and Latin America refuse to condemn Russia’s intervention in Ukraine to prevent the genocide of ethnic Russians in Donbas.
The US, UK and Europe are, without a doubt the rogue entities in this equation.
“Without a state being dominant over commerce there can be no Democracy”
What about the people being dominant over both?
Clearly, you have no idea what fascism is.
Fascism is a form of ultra-nationalist tyrannical government (usually with a supreme leader) where all free speech and dissent is suppressed.
Methods of silencing include intimidation, and where that fails closing down problematic organisations (especially independent media), having individuals fired, political imprisonment (including on trumped up non-political charges such as financial corruption), execution or (especially in the case of Russia where official capital punishment is on a moratorium) extra-judicial assassination.
One clear illustration of the current Russian state’s fascistic nature is the recent law threatening opponents of the Ukrainian invasion with up to 15 years imprisonment
The west is far more of a fascist entity than Russia.
Places like Britain, the US and Ukraine are multi-party liberal democracies with strong protections on freedom of speech, the nearest to the opposite of fascist (see above) that currently exists.
We have allowed, nay, encouraged the growth and intervention of big industry, in particular Silicone Valley and big pharma to dominate our politics. The very definition of fascism.
Private businesses in democracies neither have the legal right to nor in reality do dominate democratic politics (including in the USA as you seem to be specifying).
They do have the same abilities as any other organisations and individuals to lobby, though with strict financial and other restrictions.
The very existence of independent organisations (including companies) outwith state control (other than through universally applied legal regulations) is just one illustration of the fundamental freedoms that exist in multi-party liberal democracies;
Again the exact opposite of the near complete state control of organisations in fascist systems (including the Marxist variety)
Unethical business (that’s not to say all business is unethical) has clearly demeaned and corrupted our Democracy, evidenced by the MSM’s and Social Media’s ability to, without any legal mandate, practice censorship on individual citizens and organisations of the nations it operates in.
I agree that a lot of social media in the West has recently become excessively censoring, including removing posts and banning accounts. Hopefully that will resolve itself soon with eg the recent Elon Musk takeover of Twitter.
But these are private organisations entitled to impose their own voluntary codes of conduct (ones which users choose to sign up to), they obviously have to protect themselves from any possible legal jeopardy, and those who wish to put forward contentious points can always find other platforms to do so – or simply set one up themselves (free blogging sites are readily available for example).
None of this bears any resemblance to the complete silencing of any notable dissenting voices in totalitarian and fascist regimes such as Russia and China.
By almost any definition we are losing or Democracy.
Please see all the above.
In complete contrast, Putin has been steadily building the Russian state in order to ensure the Democratic process prevails over technocracy. Without a state being dominant over commerce there can be no Democracy.
I am afraid that you have this upside down, the dominant state theory is the underpinning of fascism, not liberal democracy.
Putin has an 83% approval from Russian citizens for his intervention in Ukraine. The vast majority of the worlds population, represented by their leaderships, including China, India, Africa and Latin America refuse to condemn Russia’s intervention in Ukraine to prevent the genocide of ethnic Russians in Donbas.
The Nazi’s achieved 89.93% support in their 1934 referendum allowing Adolf Hitler to adopt the position of supreme state leader.
The US, UK and Europe are, without a doubt the rogue entities in this equation.
I don’t look at these issues in that sort of judgemental way, and can only repeat that the current Russian regime clearly follows an ultra-nationalist, tyrannical and expansionist fascist ideology, one which it is putting into practice via its imperialistic aggression against the liberal democratic Ukraine.
That’s not the slam dunk you think it is, in fact it confirms the article’s thesis. Ukraine is not in NATO, is not going to join NATO and not even going to apply to join NATO precisely because it is a red line for Russia. Finland is now joining NATO, because it is not a red line for Russia. The will harumph about it, because that’s what they do.
That’s the point of the article: Russia pretends to be concerned about NATO, but the real reason for aggression is that they regard Ukraine as theirs for ethno-fascist reasons. They will live with Finland in NATO because they don’t want a pretext to attack it.
bollocks.
The SMO is perfectly well articulated by Putin. Which bit of it do you not understand or do you wilfully ignore it?
ethno-fascist gave you away.
Oh Lordy, Putin talks about defending a fictitious Donetsk republic. You cannot possibly be such a moron to swallow that nonsense. The real articulation is his essay “On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians” which is an ethnic justification for his fascism.
But you already knew that.
and it includes ad homs as well. Articulate it ‘aint.
Back under your bridge.
I’m not sure you know what ad hom means.
I’m pretty sure you know what sealioning is.
I don’t actually, I’m not a deviant, but I’m sure you could tell me.
quod erat demonstrandum
For a ‘fictitious’ Republic the Donbas People’s Militia is currently doing very well against much larger Ukraine forces.
Just for the record, the whole of Ukraine became part of Russia in 1792 with the final partition of Poland – the frontiers were very fluid . Lvov was part of Austria Hungary ( Lemberg) until 1919 when it was taken by Poland and held until 1939 when it was handed by Stalin to the Ukraine- the city was largely Polish as was what is now Western.Ukraine and serious violence took place between Poles and Ukrainians in this area in 1946 when Stalin transferred Polish and Ukrainian populations! Donbas is Russian speaking. Ukrainians and Russians have lived along side each other for centuries.
(All documented).
I don’t particularly care about Russia’s security concerns – real or imagined. But I do care about avoiding nuclear war. If you can’t understand why Russia would oppose another country in Eastern Europe joining NATO, especially one to which it has strong historical ties, consider that Australia and the US regard China building a military base in the Solomon Islands as a threat to Australia. And you are mistaken about Ukraine and NATO (see my reply here).
Not only Russia opposes Ukraine joining NATO, but a lot of Ukrainians themselves oppose joining NATO and severing ties with Russia. You wouldn’t be surprised if on a referendum the majority would vote against joining NATO. there is a reason why US/NATO used far right radicals and neo nazis to influence public opinion using violence.
I’ve said this before…I agree, no one is asking what the ordinary Ukrainian wants, because for all their blather, nobody cares…and because Zelenskyy has either arrested or banned all opposition, like a good democratic leader does, naturally…no one is there to make the views of the ordinary person known….which seems to suit everyone in the West….
when ordinary Ukrainians were asked last time – Crimea as well as DPR voted overwhelming against Maidan. Of course Kiev is afraid of asking more questions.
After this crisis fermented by Nuland and Nato I think we can guess the answer!
Whether or not it was a good idea diplomatically to expand NATO, the problem with Russia goes a lot deeper than that. Russia has never accepted that its ex-Soviet republic neighbours should have true independence.
At the mild end, this means Putin won’t allow them to have an independent foreign policy or join institutions like the EU.
At the darker end, it extends to full proxy control, as in Belarus and (up until Maidan) Ukraine.
Very good article, and much needed in the face of the bombardment of invasion-excusing / supporting propaganda on this site.
Of course the Putin regime, one which rules over the largest country in the world with over 6,000 nuclear weapons, was never genuinely in fear of attack by the NATO defensive alliance – the idea is simply preposterous.
What they did fear was that the increasingly liberal-democratic nature of former Soviet Union colonies such as Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, and indeed Ukraine, would influence the brutally oppressed Russian population into seeking the same reforms at home.
As well as being motivated by simple ultra-nationalist / fascistic ambitions to recreate the Soviet or Tsarist empire (all on the record).
LOL transparrent, weapons grade, sophistry.
and weapons grade projection!
Weapons-grade?
I’d have said primary-school level.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned over the last two years, it was that, however sceptical I was of the MSM, it was never enough.
As rockoman points out in a comment below, some ‘liberal’ countries have been the most enthusiastic proponents of illiberal crappery during the Wu-flu plague.
MSM now “over” as far as any truth is concerned!
“increasingly liberal-democratic nature of former Soviet Union colonies such as Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia”
https://www.baltictimes.com/people_without_covid-19_certificates_will_have_access_only_to_essential_stores_as_of_next_week/
I totally agree that many of the coronavirus measures in democratic countries were shockingly illiberal, and vehemently opposed them as such.
On the other hand the totalitarian nature of regimes like those of Russia and China, which includes suppression of all free speech and dissent (eg via imprisonment and execution) is at a completely different level.
You really think we’ve enjoyed ‘free speech’ here in the UK since the Chinese plague measures began?
Relatively, yes.
How many critics of Coronavirus policies in the UK have been interned, poisoned or shot? (as happens to political and journalistic dissenters in Russia).
I have been a staunch critic of lockdowns, mask and vaccine mandates etc and received literally zero state push-backs.
So, how is ‘Soviet or Tsarist empire’ creation going for Puting after 20 years in power? Naturally, former republics which are not in NATO (majority) would have been swallowed by now?
Having an ambition and fulfilling it are not the same thing.
The reintegration of Ukraine into the Russian ‘motherland’ (which Putin stated as a goal in his 2021 essay ‘On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians’) would be a large step in the general empire-recreating direction.
so how about police decides that you have an ambition of going on a shoplifting spree in a year and locks you behind bars today?
“Preventive detention “- all Fascist States use it!
I’ll repeat my reply to greggsy1 in case you miss it:
Russia has never been [metaphorically] locked behind bars.
Furthermore it is not currently being opposed because of future ambitions but rather its ongoing mass killing and destruction in Ukraine.
Sorry, but I “missed” nothing of consequnce.
Russia has never been [metaphorically] locked behind bars.
Furthermore it is not currently being opposed because of future ambitions but rather its ongoing mass killing and destruction in Ukraine.
you don’t even read and watch western MSM, do you? such an overwhelming response (though from a handful of western countries only) and billions in lethal aid and discouragement of Ukraine from peace talks is only possible on the pretense that Russia is an existential threat to the western civilization as the only thing on its mind apparently is swallowing and enslaving other countries. ‘an ambition of swallowing and enslaving other countries’ is what Russia is being locked (metaphorically) behind bars for. As otherwise if its just another local conflict like Palestine (Yemen, <add your own> ) you wouldn’t be able to convince other countries and their peoples to join in in self destructive exercise.
…why then are we not opposing Saudi action in Yemen…or Israel’s actions in Palestine with the same vigour…oh could it be because it’s all about Russia and nothing to do with Ukraine? Bingo!
Yes, and you might ask why we didn’t attack Russia when they slaughtered people in Chechnya.
Liar.
https://moderndiplomacy.eu/2021/08/15/the-historical-unity-of-russians-and-ukrainians/
https://moderndiplomacy.eu/2021/08/15/the-historical-unity-of-russians-and-ukrainians/
This document published in August 2021 (between the two Russian troop build ups on the Ukrainian border of March – April 2021 and October 2021 – February 2022) provides a clear blueprint for the Russian annexation of Ukraine.
Here are some relevant extracts, beginning with the opening sentence:
During the recent Direct Line, when I was asked about Russian-Ukrainian relations, I said that Russians and Ukrainians were one people – a single whole [my bold]
Towards the end:
The Western authors of the anti-Russia project set up the Ukrainian political system in such a way that presidents, members of parliament and ministers would change but the attitude of separation from and enmity with Russia would remain.
Today, the ”right“ patriot of Ukraine is only the one who hates Russia. Moreover, the entire Ukrainian statehood, as we understand it, is proposed to be further built exclusively on this idea. Hate and anger, as world history has repeatedly proved this, are a very shaky foundation for sovereignty, fraught with many serious risks and dire consequences [my bold]
All the subterfuges associated with the anti-Russia project are clear to us. And we will never allow our historical territories and people close to us living there to be used against Russia [my bold]. And to those who will undertake such an attempt, I would like to say that this way they will destroy their own country. [my bold]
Summation: –
A) Russia and Ukraine are essentially a single people or nation divided by an artificial border
B) Russia will not allow Ukraine to continue as a sovereign, independent country if it maintains an anti-Russian agenda.
C) The alleged Western creators of the current Ukrainian state have set it up in such a way that it is permanently and irredeemably anti-Russian.
Conclusion – send in the forces and raise the red white and blue flag of incorporation above Kyiv.
The only statement Putin makes which seems to grant Ukraine any right to continuing independence is the sentence We respect Ukrainians’ desire to see their country free, safe and prosperous.
In the context, however, ‘free’ clearly means from Western, fascist or other malign influences, with Russia riding to the annexing rescue.
Oh, and if there were to be any doubts remaining about Mr Putin’s colonial / incorporative approach to Ukraine he stated immediately prior to the invasion in February 2022 that Ukraine never had a tradition of genuine statehood.
your assertions are not supported by the quoted text.
At best sophistry, at worst lies.
your assertions are not supported by the quoted text.
At best sophistry, at worst lies.
Ones which you are apparently unable to specify.
Yep agree completely. Many of the commenters on here are the right leaning equivalent of the Left’s Oikophobes. Their arguments simply ignore the massively germane non-trivial point that Putin has invaded a sovereign state and they rationalise the notion we (the West) are at fault because we prompted him to do it. When rationalisation is distorted to that extent, there is always a dogma behind it. The dogma in this case is a shadowy untrustworthy Western Elite acting acting as puppet masters. They are continuing their favourite theme regarding alleged shadowy forces behind Coronavirus authoritarianism and of course the conspiratorial notion of a “puppet master“ has been with us throughout history.
Of course there is such thing as a hyper wealthy Western elite, and they do have agenda’s and outsized influence. It’s just that IMO (and the opinion of most people who have a sense of proportion) the means of control is systemic rather than a planned coup to take over government and lurch towards authoritarianism. When, for example, a college board in Canada suspended an academic who disagreed with vaccination and lockdowns and we could hear the tape of the meeting they held to discuss it, it is absolutely clear they were very regional petty authoritarians and are not part of a shadowy organisation with Klaus Schwab at the head. It isn’t Ian Flemming’s Spectre we are talking about here.
Thank you for that. I opposed the draconian CV-19 measures such as lockdowns and vaccine mandates (to me a massively illiberal and ultimately futile over-reaction to a flu-like virus) but never believed that it was all being engineered and enforced by shadowy conspiratorial forces such as the WEF.
All these string-pulling conspiracy theories do is undermine faith in liberal-democracy, which in turn benefits tyrannical agendas such as those of Russia and China.
In fact the vast majority of the populations involved, including in the UK, fully supported the coronavirus regulations, sometimes calling for stricter ones. There was also, of course the rather large material incentives of furlough and work-from-home for those lucky enough to be able to do so.
In terms of the widespread support for the Russian invasion on this site, the frequently stated position that the government and media were wrong about Covid so must be wrong about everything else is clearly ridiculous.
In any case, and I am certainly not directing this at any specific posters, but given the speed and quantity of pro-Russian material and upticks here I think there is every indication of an organised propaganda campaign.
The problem is that if you don’t think the COVID response was being engineered by the WEF then you have to assume a lot of coincidences. Just a coincidence that politicians in many different countries adopted the slogans of this unelected lobby group. Just a coincidence that they ran an exercise just before the pandemic, rehearsing the medically unorthodox measures that were adopted. Just a coincidence that the WEF has been heavily promoting digital ID and a few years ago identified vaccinations as a convenient way to introduce them. Just a coincidence that the Macron government started a digital ID programme two days after winning the recent election. Just a coincidence that the UK government repeatedly lied about not introducing medically useless vaxpasses and has been considering digital ID. Just a coincidence that two heads of state (Haiti, Madagascar) who didn’t go with the programme were attacked by foreign assassins and another (Tanzania) died in hospital to be replaced by a WEF graduate.
The only thing about the WEF that’s “shadowy” is that the media don’t talk about them much. The WEF itself is pretty open about its operations.
Do you really think there’s nothing wrong with an unelected lobby group having “penetrated” (Klaus Schwab’s own word) governments around the world? Not even Wikipedia is particularly kind to the WEF.
I agree that the WEF, WHO and other transnational agencies assisted in the coordination of coronavirus policies across the world. Also that most of these bodies are pursuing a very harmful Green / ultra-health / digital control agenda, at least partially at the behest of the CCP.
The point I am making is that all this is being carried out in the open (so nothing ‘shadowy’ about it) and can only succeed with the full cooperation of relevant individual governments – and, indeed the compliance of affected populations, which are near universally under the sway of the self-destructive and inherently anti-liberty environmentalist religion.
Hardly ‘shadowy ‘ Elite, surely?
Various of them have stated (or admitted) that what’s happening in Ukraine is really a proxy war with Russia, with Ukrainians as handy cannon-fodder.
I don’t agree at all with what Putin has done, by the way. I just don’t accept that the West is blameless, or that they’re not somehow pleased with how things are turning out.
So Putin invaded a sovereign state, now do ALL the sovereign states that have been invaded and explain what’s different this time??
We are supposed to believe that Russia has an army of online trolls and skilled hackers ready to cripple our business and infrastructure at their leisure. Meanwhile in the Empire of Lies, create a story about Ukraine/Russia/Putin and a flock of blatent anti-Russia trolls seem to arrive within minutes.
You mean to say that neutral Finland having second longest border, past (rich) history with Russia haven’t been invaded during all these years on the false pretense of repressed pro-Russian separatists sponsored by Kremlin? How much did Putin pay you, Ian?
The ‘Winter War’ of 1940 over a southern border dispute The UK sent aircraft ( Gloucester Gladiators) to support the Finns (while also being ‘at War’ with Nazi Germany) . It cost Finland a strip of territory around Lake Ladoga . Joining Hitler’s attack on the SU in 1941 cost them a bit more . Peace ever since.
Anything else you need to know?
yes, that’s what’s called a shared history. You can spin it the way you want and attack and swallow neutral and peaceful democratic country if that’s what you normally do. but that hasn’t happened, has it. Because, maybe, contrary to what MSM leads the public to believe to justify the proxy war, Russia/Putin is not an existential enemy to the west?
Why do you quote history in relation to Finland, but think the last eight years (of history) have nothing to do with the Russias invasion of Ukraine?
Which part of the eight years of Russia sending agents provocateurs into Ukraine to foment violence would you like to talk about? Maybe the bit where Russia violated the Budapest Memorandum?
But again the reality is I would be able to find just as much information on Ukrainian/far right atrocities as well…
”Non-governmental organisations, such as Amnesty International also raised concerns about the behaviour of some Ukrainian ’volunteer Battalions’….Amnesty International said that they often acted like “renegade gangs”, and were implicated in torture, abductions, and summary executions.”
so which bit of Ukrainians torturing and killing people do you want to talk about?
All of it. I have no problem at all highlighting the corruption of Ukraine. Get it all out, not just the propaganda. I’m as happy to oppose invading corrupt dumps as I am to oppose invading Switzerland. Invading countries is wrong, I suspect 20,000 Russian parents might agree.
So it was the Russian ‘agents’ who shelled the Russians in Donbas then to blame the peaceful Ukrainians – I see where I got it all so wrong!
They did a good job on the towns and schools as well and even killed 14,000 people!
Strange then how the people of the Donbas begged the Russians to intervene for 8 years and welcomed them with open arms .
where is it that you found me rejecting ‘history’ between Russia and Ukraine? It’s clear this conflict started not in Feb 2022 but 8 years ago contrary to what the west wants you to believe.
My original post about Finland is that the article by Ron implicitly states that Finland, although being neutral and on the Russian border, hasn’t been enslaved or attacked once because it’s what normally happens to all Russian non-NATO neighbors according to the current narrative which excuses the proxy war.
If the UK starts staking in refugees from Finland I think there will be surprised faces when huge families of Somalis turn up!
Having now lived with Serial Liars in Office for three long years, nothing would surprise !
The ‘facts’ of the Finnish-Russian relationship and the Finnish independece movement against the Tsarist Empire, together with the 1940 Winter War and the 1941-45 conflict speak for themselves .
The Finns would perhaps have been wise ( like Sweden) to remain neutral when Hitler attacked the USSR in June 1941 rather than join him.
All this does is increase the risk of an accidental nuclear response on either side.
It certainly doesn’t increase security for anyone.
It boosts terror of dying in a thermonuclear fireball, and government-inflicted terror is and has been the aim of the game for several years now. They want our populations to utterly lose their minds and start frothing at any particular enemy on demand.
Does the US really want a nuclear war? It increasingly seems that way.
The US leadership are the most deranged and dangerous in modern times – and we are standing “shoulder to shoulder”with Biden and doing “stand ups” in Kiev with the not -so -modest, stooge ‘pinist’ clown “President”
God help us with Johnson in charge!
Let’s put it this way, if Russia colluded with Trump to swing his election, did they collude with Biden to swing it his way?
As someone put it at the time, for the hundred thousand or so Trump allegedly paid to have the election swung his way, Hilary had her order in with Putin for the next ten elections the day after Trump was elected.
With two and a half years to go before another Republican POTUS (probably Trump) which is likely to be maintained for the next 20 years after Biden’s fuck up’s, Russia won’t invoke thermonuclear war. Trump is a peacemaker and Putin seemed to respect him.
The best thing that can happen is that America embarks on a Neocon enema with a Christmas tree over that 20 year period, then we may have a peaceful planet.
Finland have been an associate partner of Nato for many years without actually being a full member and Russia has already been treating them as such.
Russia has warned other countries that joining Nato is a threat to Russia which will have consequences.
The US and Nato are the biggest threat to world peace not Russia.
Time for another name change: pieces like this have nothing whatsoever to do with scepticism.
It is sceptical of Russia, it is a perfect piece. Scepticism isn’t just another name for attacking things you dislike.
and likewise of your Empire of Lies. What’s good for your goose etc….
and to be clear, I am, unfortunately, a resident, born and bred, of one of those Empire’s colonies.
You know nothing about me, friend.
and for my retort to this d ick – and DS’ removal of said post >
I ain’t your friend p ri ck
oh please, let’s not let a special proxy operation come between us. Hugs and kisses, sweetie.
can’t even get the SMO name correct. Foreign are we?
Nope, he’s Triplejabbed. And we know what that does to people.
Scepticism isn’t another name for criticising something you dislike. Define the term that broadly and it applies to almost everything.
The Daily Sceptic: Question Everything*, Stay Sane, Live Free
* Unless the conclusions mean that everything you thought you were part of turns out to be a festering lie, and your “team” is actually an axis of evil.
I see, so the scepticism as ‘question everything’ slogan (which to me simply means checking stated facts and coming to your own conclusions, not being inherently suspicious) should apply to liberal-democratic government and media statements and agendas, but not those of inherently much more deceitful and controlling totalitarian-fascist regimes such as those of Russia and China.
I am afraid I can only strongly disagree.
There is nothing factual about geopolitics.
Don’t present your ignorance is such an obvious manner.
There is nothing factual about geopolitics.
I made no mention of the term geopolitics, but in any case the concept certainly can include factual elements.
Don’t present your ignorance is such an obvious manner.
I’ll present my ignorance in any manner I see fit!
Maybe, maybe not. But key point here is that DS has published articles giving varying points of view on the matter in hand, and allows comments from all points of view. That’s a big plus point.
It is a big plus point, until they allow gibberish in articles.
President Ronald Reagan said the American troops were sent into Grenada to protect U.S. citizens there and to prevent the island’s use as a base for Soviet and Cuban aggression in the Western Hemisphere.
So that was ok then?
This invasion was opposed by Her Majesty’s government, and the UN and the Commonwealth. It is possible to be against more than one thing.
You’ve lost me. My point is that if the US wants to be the world’s policeman it has to be Caeser’s wife.
The US married Medusa, of the snake hair, everything it touches or looks at turns to stone!
Is that the ‘new’ Chinese Commonwealth to which you refer?
That’s OK then, as HM government have never been wrong, nor the UN, nor the Commonwealth.
Despite that most of the world, including China, India, Africa and Latin America think they are wrong because they refuse to condemn Russia for its Intervention in genocide.
“The truth is that this war concerns the sovereignty and self-determination of a nation state: a core and immutable Western value, older than the Treaty of Westphalia, that flows from the Christian belief in individual sovereignty.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luDrsd7iPLc
So where is our “Sovereignty” and that of Northern Ireland under the Johnson Globalist Regime, acting under now seemingly permanent “Emergency Powers”?
Finland, creators of a 6G network they are calling ‘Genesis 6‘.
No wonder the media is entering them onto the world stage at this point, when else does Finland get a mention? It’s all scripted.
“So the Lord said, “I will wipe from the face of the earth the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds and the creatures that move along the ground—for I regret that I have made them.” Genesis 6:7
“If there’s one thing I hate worse than prophecy, it’s self fulfilling prophecy”. – Bill Maher
Not long until the end of the world folks, enjoy yourselves.
I seem to remember Finland being home to one of the most innovative mobile phone companies in the world, Nokia.
A flip phone was the symbol of the devil to some back then.
These include population replacement, the erosion of the family, the promotion of behaviours traditionally seen as destructive, and the widespread clampdown on free speech.
Putin has been quite clear on what he views as absolutely destructive policies in western nations, all championed by elites with zero connection to the people they ostensibly govern. There is some truth to his claim that Russians now are more European than western Europe.
Russia is hardly a bastion of freedom or liberal thought, but his views on looking out for the welfare of citizens resonate with many ordinary Russians and increasingly with people in the west who are watching their own culture and society be comprehensively attacked by the very people we expect to protect it.
A simple example is absolutely no one gets away with toppling statues or defacing war memorials and cenotaphs in Putin’s Russia. A small observation but indicative of the deep currents driving Russian culture, however corrupt it may be.
Sound post!
Well said.
My understanding from a friend who lives there is that there isn’t much government to be corrupt. They don’t have legions of local government and parish councils. People are left to sort things out between themselves.
It’s not perfect, and there is corruption, but point me to a council in the UK where corruption isn’t normalised and accepted.
“Russia’s Muted Response to Finland’s Interest in Joining NATO Suggests its Invasion of Ukraine Was Nothing to do With NATO Expansion”
The unbalanced nature of this conclusion reflects the biased nature of the piece overall, which means that it makes many valid points, in a good but systematically limited discussion, but is limited by the need to rationalise the position held by the writer.
A simple glance at the map will tell you why Ukraine as a NATO member is far more significant a threat than Finland. Any honest analysis would reflect that reality, not try to bury it.
That’s without bringing in factors such as the close social, business and familial ties across the Russian-Ukrainian border, the product of centuries of being part of the same country, or the strong influence of viciously Russia-hating extremist groups and attitudes within the Ukraine.
These are complex matters, and there are always multiple motivations for any such actions. The result is that it is always possible to construct cases as this piece does.
But in the end it is based at heart upon nonsense ideas that our side are the good guys and the other side the bad guys, and their motives and intentions are always ultimately bad ones and “ours” ultimately good. Such positions fly in the face of any honest assessment of the history of the past thirty years.
There are better sides and worse sides in most disputes, but to the extent that applies here, clearly the US side are the worse and the Russian side the better, as broadly the US side was better and the Soviet side worse during the cold War. This is partly because the US is the more powerful, and therefore inevitably in practice the aggressor and the one whose victory threatens the world more, and partly because the US side is now the one in the grip of an aggressive, expansionist and universalist ideology that brooks no compromise with dissent and seeks to force the whole world to accept that globalism and all the nonsenses of “political correctness” (nowadays often called wokeness) are the holy writs.
I think it is particularly important that the close ties between the two countries are within most people’s lifetime, and therefore fresh in their memories.
Out of interest, how do you argue that from the map?
Finland has been pro-western for a few decades now, albeit not to the point of joining NATO. Even beforehand, and as a non-western country, it was militarily a force to be reckoned with, and it was taken very seriously as such by the USSR.
Sweden is also more of a player than some people think. Owned by one family, the Wallenbergs (who don’t tend to have as many wives and children as Gulf despots), the Swedish regime has a bit of a “mini-imperialist” racket going on, both in Scandinavia and in the Baltic states. I somehow doubt the Finnish government is about to sign a big contract to buy Swedish weapons and import lots of Swedish advisers to show them how to work them.
Russia won’t invade Finland the day after Finland joins NATO, but this isn’t because they were wicked liars with reference to the Ukraine, only eventually to be exposed as such by compradore western scribblers. It’s because there is no analogue of the Donbas in Finland. War has been going on in the Donbas for eight years, for crying out aloud!
“Out of interest, how do you argue that from the map?”
Because the Ukraine sticks right into the heart of Russia, whereas Finland is on the fringe, and adds little geographically beyond what Norway and Estonia already provide.
I recall Putin noting that NATO recon flights in the Ukraine would have detailed coverage out to the Urals. This is merely one reflection of the impossible task Russia would face in policing a NATO Ukraine.
That’s not to say that your other points aren’t valid as well. One of the things I’ve learned about real world events over the past half century is that almost nothing big ever happens for just one reason. There are always multiple motives and interests pointing in the direction that policy goes.
“Because the Ukraine sticks right into the heart of Russia, whereas Finland is on the fringe, and adds little geographically beyond what Norway and Estonia already provide.”
Oh, yea. Well take another look at the map and see how close St Petersburg is to Finland. Finland used to start at the northern suburbs of Leningrad until the Russians swiped that bit off Finland. And their access to the White sea. And their nickel mines in Karelia.
Finland was so much ‘on the fringe’ that Russia decided to invade her in 1939 and carve off what suited them; not to mention forcing them to lease a naval base to them in Finland at Porkala, close to the capital.
This idea that Finland is ‘on the fringe’ is inept. Don’t make me laugh. Looks like you’ve never spent any serious time in Finland or Russia or you wouldn’t be making such an ignorant comment.
None of that bilge has anything to do with the point under discussion, which was geography and its impact on the security situation.
Reread it and decide if you want to make a substantive contribution or not.
Your usual form of response when you have no substantive contribution yourself.
What would Russia actually want in Finland? Any ideas? have you seen the size of the adjacent Russian territory? Whatever Finland has Russia has in spades.
Russia has offered trade deals and partnership with the West – under US pressure, Europe has refused.
This generation of EU politicians do not work for European interests. UVDL has even told us she is more a “Citizen of the World” than German or European.
Europe is being taken down by its own Globalist Elite in line with “US Exceptionalism” theory that demands the destruction of Russia – that’s the Game plan. The US wants a weak Europe in thrall to its Deep State mafia and their deranged, war mongering, constant ‘regime change’ plots.
“Sanctions” ( Economic Warfare) against Russia which actually destroy European economies – what politician who cared in the least about Europe and its people would ever endorse such nonsense as that?
Yet here we are!
Well, you rather concede the point, for you imply that there is something to want in Ukraine, forgetting that Russia claim not to want anything other than peace. I think it more likely that this is indeed a war of conquest, looking for goodies to give out to Putin’s cronies.
I don’t imply anything of the kind or concede any point.
You persist in painting Russia as an ‘Evil wannabe Empire’ when the real ‘Evil Empire of Lies’ is on the other side of the Atlantic, currently conducting a long planned ‘proxy war’ against Russia using the bodies of Ukrainians as canon fodder .
Eight years of US Deep State rule in Kiev since Maiden show that the US doesn’t care a damn about Ukraine or its people just about all the assets it can exploit and strip and how it can be used to take down Russia..
“What would Russia actually want in Finland? Any ideas? have you seen the size of the adjacent Russian territory? Whatever Finland has Russia has in spades.”
If you drive from Finland into Russia, as I have for business, you will see that as soon as you enter Russia you enter Gangsterland. Drive through Vyborg (once Finnish Viipuri, the Jewel of the Baltic) and see how the Russians have trashed the place. Go out for a smoke and get mugged. Try to fend off the pimps and whores in the hotels and see where that gets you – seriously wounded. Only place in the world where I’ve been held up at gunpoint, and factories have to have guards on duty with automatic weapons.
St Petersburg is the most beautiful city I have ever seen, but here and in Moscow, it’s done up for show, for tourists. Get out into the real Russia and it’s crap. One great big pile of it.
So Vyborg is like Glasgow or East London then? w/o mentioning other shitholes of the UK. I didn’t know russians were here…
Have you ever been there, worked there? I have. I was born and grew up in East London. I can tell you, Vyborg is scarier than anything you’ll find here.
So, let’s get Ukrainians slaughtered and leave their country in rubbles or worse start nuclear holocaust just because you were a bit unlucky with hookers in Vyborg. Gotcha
btw, i know many people who went to 2018 worldcup in russia and said good things about the country and the people. No one was mugged, although it is a possibility, of course, as in other places including UK let alone SA, Brazil, etc
That sounds about right. As soon as you drive across the border into Russia everything is covered in a blanket of grey and depression – look at the railway tracks and they’re all twisted – people sitting by the sides of roads selling what little they have, maybe a few carrots from their allotment.
Russia has nothing to do with ‘communism’, it is run by a mafia, and a good deal of them live happily in the UK and use the English courts, with very expensive judges and lawyers, to fight it out between themselves.
British politicians have been lured into their web and do their bidding.
“One of the biggest donors to Britain’s Conservative Party is suspected of secretly funneling hundreds of thousands of dollars to the party from a Russian account, according to a bank alert filed to Britain’s national law enforcement agency.
The donation, of $630,225, was made in February 2018 in the name of Ehud Sheleg, a wealthy London art dealer who was most recently the Conservative Party’s treasurer. The money was part of a fund-raising blitz that helped propel Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his party to a landslide victory in the 2019 general election.
But documents filed with the authorities last year and reviewed by The New York Times say that the money originated in a Russian account of Mr. Sheleg’s father-in-law, Sergei Kopytov, who was once a senior politician in the previous pro-Kremlin government of Ukraine. He now owns real estate and hotel businesses in Crimea and Russia.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/12/world/europe/russian-money-uk-tories.html
“Russia has nothing to do with ‘communism’, it is run by a mafia”
Absolutely. All these commenters here about Finland and Russia are armchair commentators, never having been to, lived or worked in the place – only perhaps visited as tourists the places that they want you to see. Such it always was in communist times, showcasing Leningrad and Moscow to show how grand communism is.
But get out into the real world and see the real Russia and it’s really crap. It’s a gansterland run by mafia.
A friend of mine lives in Ufa. Been there since the wall came down. A journalist in fact.
He loves the place. 14% income tax rate, free healthcare, little to no government intervention in his life.
Good roads and infrastructure with an international airport on his doorstep.
Never met a Mafia type in 30+ years of living there.
Why don’t you two get a room
You are full of shit. Russia is a demonstrably safer place to live than the USA by international comparison.
As far as I can find out Ian Rons believes in free speech. Apart I can’t find anything that qualifies him to speak authoritatively on this topic.
So I will put it down as opinion and I will go along with his right to say it.
However I think his claim to know Russia’s motivations is a shallow assessment and is plain is wrong.
But hey, that is just my opinion.
He seems to be complaining about the fact that the Russians are capable of politically sophisticated analyses of their situation; rather than acting like hysterical teenagers.
Note that Russia has been involved in diplomacy with regard to Ukraine for years – in which they repeatedly stated their issues of concern.
Your opinion will do just fine! I share it!
Have a biscuit for this utterly one-sided pro-Pentagon propaganda article, Ian.
St Petersburg is about 250 miles from Finland, hardly “very close”. It’s nearer Estonia.
The Russian response to the Israeli-encouraged Georgian effort in 2008 wasn’t principally to do with, or even propagandised with much reference to, the “ethnic Russians” to whom for some reason you repeatedly give inverted commas. Most Abkhazians and South Ossetians don’t want to be under the Georgian government’s thumb. They prefer to be allied with Russia.
Wait, there is a Russian writer in Moscow right now called “Nai” who says that British policy in Northern Ireland was long motivated by “ethnic English” considerations…
Russia is not undergoing a demographic crisis. The government could easily incentivise having more babies if it wanted to.
You don’t even mention the Donbas…
It’s the Kiev regime that’s revanchist.
Anywhere with a fertility rate of 1.82 is experiencing a demographic crisis. Especially when life expectancy is 73.
“St Petersburg is about 250 miles from Finland, hardly “very close”.”
Don’t talk such rot. There speaks one who has never been there.
I can tell you from personal experience of Finland and Russia that it is no further than from London to Birmingham, 100 miles tops.
Oo…should have gone to spec-savers..
according to Wiki’……The distance from central St Petersburg to the border with Finland is 400 km (250 mi) but I do love to see someone put a foot up their own ar*e….
But he used to live there… so he knows better on all things Russian and Finnish!
So he says.
It is around 200km by road to Torfyanovka, which is next to the border with Finland. Star was right in one claim though, that Estonia is nearer. From St Petersburg to Narva is around 170km. Stating these facts does not mean I support Proveritate’s obvious Russophobia though!
St Petersburg (Leningrad) is 390km from Helsinki (about 250 miles) – Vaalimaa (on the border) to St Petersburg is only 206k (about 130 miles).
The title is both illogical and untrue – it was a major factor.
What do you want Russia to do, scream, shout and jump up and down like Von der Leyen, Nuland, Johnson, Rutte, Scholz and the rest of the Wests’ Freak Show leadership? .
Russia will quietly take note, draw conclusions about NATO intentions …and prepare.
Spot on. The author seems amazed by the fact that a nation is capable of conducting its foreign policy with any degree of calmness.
Thought this was a site was supposed to be for ‘sceptics’ and not narrative boot lickers lol.
I think the Fins are in for a cold, cold winter personally. Their WEF chums will be most pleased no doubt.
It’s a site for free discussion and debate, above all.
Granted there’s an argument that there’s no need for pieces that push the Official Truth position that is anyway pushed endlessly in our mainstream media and on social media, but there’s also the argument that debate is healthy, even necessary.
Myself, I think this is a good piece even though I think it is grossly biased and prejudiced, incorrect in lots of key points, and wrong in its conclusion. It’s still a good piece because it is well written and also makes a lot of strong points for the (imo) incorrect side, that need to be accounted for or refuted if we are to be confident in our own positions.
I’m afraid I can’t summon up your generosity of spirit. Winnie The Pooh is well written, but it’s still a lot of nonsense. Nice nonsense, but nonsense nonetheless.
I’m not convinced anyone could be more scathing.
It’s OK – the Prime Minister, Sanna Marin, puts her food shopping for her family on her expenses account. She won’t be cold next winter.
She doesn’t give a fig about spreading Covid around either:
“Finnish PM, Sanna Marin has apologised for dancing in a Helsinki nightclub hours after she was knowingly exposed to coronavirus.”
Maybe if Finland underwent a US lead regime change op and then became hostile towards Russia, and established numerous US bio weapons labs, things might look different?
You nailed it.
“And NATO has no intention of attacking Russia – that would be mad, and not since Bertrand Russell has anyone seriously proposed a first strike. “
Merely because in Rons’ opinion a NATO attack on Russia would be deterred by the MAD doctrine doesn’t mean Russia’s leaders can forget about ever worrying about an attack by NATO. MAD depends intimately upon the balances of forces and technology. The superpowers are constantly seeking ways to undermine the other side’s abilities to resist a first strike, and nobody can ever be certain that the other side won’t succeed in developing such technologies.
In fact one of the main drivers for Russia’s path recently has been their specific concern that the US withdrawal from the ABM treaty and transparently dishonest pretence that missile defences in Europe are “aimed at Iran” reflected an intention to seek ways to enable a first strike on Russia. Putin pointed exactly this out in 2016 when he drew attention to the dangers of ending the ABM treaty and stated that Russia would in response develop exactly the missile technologies we have seen on display recently:
“Russia In Danger
From what I can see, we are in grave danger. We had conversation once with our American partners – where they said they’d like to develop ballistic missiles . but without a nuclear warhead. And we said -“Do you actually understand what that might entail?”
So you’re going to have missiles launching from submarines, or ground territories – this is a ballistic, how do we know whether or not it has a nuclear warhead? Can you can imagine what kind of scenario you can create? But as far as I am award, they did not go through with developing these weapons – they have paused for now. But the other one they continue to implement. I don’t know how this is all going to end.
Russia’s Right to Defend Itself
What I do know is that we will need to defend ourselves. And I even know how they will package this -“Russian aggression” again! But this is simply our response to your actions. Is it not obvious that I must guarantee the safety our people? And not only that, but we must attempt to retain the necessary strategic balance of power, which is the point that I began with. Let me return to it, in order to finish my response.
The Threats to the Balance of Power
It was precisely this balance of power that guarantees the safety of humanity from major global conflict, over the past 70 years. It was a blessing rooted in a “mutual threat” but this mutual threat is what guaranteed mutual peace on a global scale. How they could so easily tear it down, I simply don’t know.
Sure, “the United States are not developing weapons for the purposes of an offensive operation”… At least not that which is in the public eye, although we know for certain that this is occurring. I’m not about to get into asking that right now – we’re perfectly aware that it is happening. “okay you’re not developing it!” But the facts are; there is an anti-missile defense system being developed in the United States. Sure, today it is not in working order and we’re not yet sure if it will ever be implemented.
However, theoretically, it is created in order to be implemented. Again, hypothetically – understand that there will be a moment in time where our nuclear potential will be completely neutralised. Our current capability I mean can be completely neutralised by this anti-missile defense system. It this is the case then that means the balance of power in the world will be completely upset. This means that one of the powers will feel a complete sense of security. Which in turn means it can do what ever it likes not only in regional conflicts – but, now. We are talking about its unmatched might in global conflict.
This is the only food for thought, don’t let me come off like I am accusing you of something. But International Relations is much like mathematics – there is nothing personal about it. Therefore we will respond accordingly – but how?
We can match you in you actions and build an equally great multi-million dollar anti-missile defense system or taking into account our economic and financial capability in the current day – we can respond asymmetrically. So that it is clear to all that “yes there is an anti-missile defense system in Europe – but as it relates to Russia it is entirely pointless. Because we have a weapon that can nullify it. This is the path that we are going to take. It works our cheaper for us. But in now way is this aggression against the United States. I fully mirror your behavior when you say that your anti-missile defense system “is not targeted against us” – then our new weapon is “not targeted against you” either!.”
PUTIN’S WARNING TO THE WEST ON THE DANGERS OF WAR
JUNE 17, 2016
Then we come to Rons’ one-eyed presumption, mostly implicit, that there would never be an intention by NATO to launch an attack because, well, we are the good guys after all.
But the reality is that there is a direct precedent as far as the Russians are concerned, which was the NATO aggression against Serbia. This was shocking to all who were not fully propagandised by the US sphere media into believing that the pretexts used justified the shameless illegality, brutality and outright contempt for sovereignty involved. So much for Rons’ actually moronic assertion that: “this war concerns the sovereignty and self-determination of a nation state: a core and immutable Western value”! That anybody could still try to make this claim after Serbia, Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan and Syria rather beggars belief!
In any case, Russians believe that NATO could and would launch an attack on them, if NATO believed they could get away with it, because they watched NATO do exactly that to an old ally of Russia. As Solzhenitsyn stated:
“I can name many reasons, but the most interesting ones are psychological, i.e. the clash of illusory hopes against reality. This happened both in Russia and in West. When I returned to Russia in 1994, the Western world and its states were practically being worshipped. Admittedly, this was caused not so much by real knowledge or a conscious choice, but by the natural disgust with the Bolshevik regime and its anti-Western propaganda.
This mood started changing with the cruel NATO bombings of Serbia. Its fair to say that all layers of Russian society were deeply and indelibly shocked by those bombings. The situation then became worse when NATO started to spread its influence and draw the ex-Soviet republics into its structure. This was especially painful in the case of Ukraine, a country whose closeness to Russia is defined by literally millions of family ties among our peoples, relatives living on different sides of the national border. At one fell stroke, these families could be torn apart by a new dividing line, the border of a military bloc.
So, the perception of the West as mostly a “knight of democracy” has been replaced with the disappointed belief that pragmatism, often cynical and selfish, lies at the core of Western policies. For many Russians it was a grave disillusion, a crushing of ideals.
At the same time the West was enjoying its victory after the exhausting Cold War, and observing the 15-year-long anarchy under Gorbachev and Yeltsin. In this context it was easy to get accustomed to the idea that Russia had become almost a Third World country and would remain so forever. When Russia started to regain some of its strength as an economy and as a state, the Wests reaction — perhaps a subconscious one, based on erstwhile fears — was panic.”
https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/spiegel-interview-with-alexander-solzhenitsyn-i-am-not-afraid-of-death-a-496211.html
So if a technological opportunity arises for the US globalists to attack Russia, Russia, probably rightly, suspects that a rationalisation for doing so will arise, and it will be done.
They are probably correct in that, given the kind of people who have been driving foreign and military policy in the US sphere for the past three decades.
‘“And NATO has no intention of attacking Russia – that would be mad, and not since Bertrand Russell has anyone seriously proposed a first strike. “
It is not a matter of intention, it is the scope for mistake, misunderstanding, accident, some single soul doing the wrong thing which can trigger a wider conflict. The more parties that get involved, the deeper their involvement, the more strident the rhetoric the more likely fortuitous cataclysm becomes.
Nobody saw WWI or WWII as likely until – suddenly there. The USA despite provoking Japan by cutting them off from oil and other resources which they needed as they industrialised, didn’t see war coming until Japanese planes were overhead sinking the US Pacific Fleet.
What is mad is getting involved in the first place, particularly with genius Biden in the White House and Chief Clown in Downing Street.
Who cares what Putin says any more? He’s become a pathological liar. He spent 20 minutes answering questions from Aeroflot air hostesses, who have relations who could be fighting in Ukraine, and told them a pack of lies from beginning to end. He’s either deluded himself (i.e. really believes that stuff) or thinks others should believe his lies. Maybe he has told so many lies that he comes to believe them himself. Many somewhat autocratic leaders in history have found themselves in that position, and then they immerse themselves in sycophancy, which only makes the condition worse.
Of course, there are plenty of lies being peddled in the West as well: I’ve been complaining about the endless propaganda since the 1980s. I used to have a certain admiration for the Russian perspective, even though I did not always agree with it, as being more realistic in some respects than the standard fare served up in the West (and especially USA). I greatly appreciated Russia’s support in Syria, though of course they were not doing that out of the kindness of their hearts.
But over the last few years Putin and his cronies have lost it and entered a world of make-believe. And this invasion of Ukraine is evidence enough that they have truly lost the plot, and attempt to reify their corroding delusions.
Nice bloviation
Is the Daily Sceptic running low on ‘hits’ or something? I am trying to work out why it should run such an article knowing exactly what the overwhelming response would be. Is it saying that someone running usual MSM views is being sceptical about sceptical points of view?
Overall waste of time reading the article and the responses they have been aired so many times already.
Just one point. Finland and Sweden are very different countries, but neither are aggressors. Very very different to Ukraine. For that one simple point the main thrust of the article falls apart.
It was guaranteed to draw out some enthusiastic pro-Russian invasion comments, directly supported by Russian propaganda on the justification.
Interestingly, quite a small number on the actual issue of Finland.
Finland is well aware of its position and its history.
Whether it is ‘in’ NATO or not will not change that one iota.
And Russia is well aware of that.
Neither country wants to change the border situation, which is reasonably fluid, to the advantage of both.
It’s not an invasion moron, it’s a response to aggression. Russia did not start shooting first, Ukraine did.
And a nice turnout from the 77th from a load of “new” posters
..
. Like you
Must be Russian bots.
The truth lies very much within what Ian Rons is NOT saying, in this article. Where does one start to pick some of his strange arguments apart?
Finland and Sweden have been left in no doubt that if the current insane pressure to push this proxy war to the limits of nuclear conflict continue, they will risk being targets for a nuclear response, whereas this was not previously the case. Russia is in no doubt that this is a proxy war. It is increasingly being said by American politicians and commentators too. The aim is to degrade Russia’s capabilities and to break up its sphere of influence and power, step by step – thus continuing the process seen in Chechnya, Georgia, Kazakstan and the EU / CIA abetted Maidan coup of 2014. It is silly to spend whole paragraphs on ‘how Sweden is not like Ukraine’ in order to twist the reasons for the invasion.
Ignored also – Ukrainian nationalism is or could be an existential threat to Russia, with Ukraine within Nato. Many Ukrainian children are trained by nationalists to hate Russians. Russian prisoners of war have been tortured in gruesome ways – treated as ‘sub-human’ by people who revere Nazism – and it goes all the way to the top, by the way. There are videos – but you would get PTSD from watching them. Ian Rons largely ignores the abhorrent side of Ukrainian nationalism.
I am not aware of 14,000 people being killed by shelling of civilian areas in the Sudetenland. Ian Ross skips lightly over the Donbass. A long story there… Needless to say, a resume mission was becoming overdue, a fact that the Duma impressed upon Putin.
And finally, yes Russia does regard the west as morally corrupt and self-destructive…. Ian Rons is right on that one.
‘Ian Rons is right on that one.’
So is Russia.
Ukrainian nationalism is or could be an existential threat to Russia,
How could this happen? Do you think Ukraine might invade Russia or what?
As a member of NATO it could, simpleton.
But this is not an honestly titled article.
Russia’s response is not muted or sanguine. It has said it will be necessary to take retaliatory steps, “both of military and other nature” in a statement on the possible accession to NATO.
Moreover, the Russian Foreign Ministry says it views such a move as a breach of the 1947 Treaty of Paris, which established a state of peace between the two countries
“Moreover, the Russian Foreign Ministry says it views such a move as a breach of the 1947 Treaty of Paris, which established a state of peace between the two countries”
Oh, yes, that required the stationing of Russian servicemen on Finnish soil, and imposed war reparations on Finland to pay for a war that Russia started as the aggressor.
State of peace, my foot.
Why didn’t the US/UK object in 1947? Same reason they agreed to Austrian neutrality in 1955. The warmongers and the bribed weren’t running the show.
Suggests. Could. Might. Maybe. The weasel word parade meant to imply knowledge where ignorance reigns.
What would the point of Russia saying anything? Who would take any notice?
But it does serve to make Russia’s point about NATO expansionist plans along its borders, and reinforces the importance of Russia making a stand in Ukraine.
it is also extremely dangerous. Britain got dragged into every war in Europe because of ‘bilateral security agreements’, although curiously the ‘bilateral’ bit has never operated in Britain’s direction, it’s always been British citizens dying and suffering, and British treasure spent saving some other party in the local spats among each other that Continentals are so good at.
Take a look at how Britain got dragged into WWI via a convoluted trail of treaties over issues which had nothing do with British interests.
Write out 10 million times: Ukraine is none of our business.
“Ukraine is none of our business.”
Your opinion, but not true.
First class article. At last, a view of Ukraine with a firm handle on reality.
Not enough attention has been given to the financial benefit side of the equation. Putin is possibly the wealthiest man in the world. You need whole countries to fund that kind of lifestyle.
UK to send a FURTHER 1.3 billion pounds to Ukraine….
EU have already sent over 6 billion pounds to Ukraine, and more promised
the USA has sent over 13.6 billion and more promised…..
having read the Pandora Papers I suspect Zelenskyy will be able to add a great deal more to his property portfolio…LOL!
What’s the financial benefit to the British people? Where’s my share?
It’s a big club and you ain’t in it.
It’s as confused as your mental condition Fingers.
of course it is a threat, NATO is hostile to Russia, that is it’s purpose.
Liz Truss’s Mansion House speech at easter was considered by many of the MSM commentators as ‘confrontational’… it included….
We also reject the false choice between Euro-Atlantic security and Indo-Pacific security. In the modern world we need both.
We need a global NATO. By that I don’t mean extending the membership to those from other regions. I mean that NATO must have a global outlook, ready to tackle global threats.…..We are showing that economic access is no longer a given. It has to be earned.
Countries must play by the rules. And that includes China.
sounds like a threat to me…
“Truss” words fail!
Russia seriously considered joining NATO in the 1990s, so how does that NATO ‘purpose’ suit that?
NATO rejecting Russian membership confirmed that it is a threat. Thank you for pointing this out.
NATO is there to defend against Russia.
Obviously your rationale that the defender is to blame drives your opinion.
How many countries has Russia invaded since 1991?
None.
NATO countries on the other hand . . .
Muted response? You mean they havent been immediately invaded? Russia and Ukraine has been brewing for over a decade. This move by Finland and Sweden will similarly start something cooking. Btw https://unherd.com/thepost/putin-spokesman/
This article also mentions history but fails to reference how Finland particularly, since ww2, has purposefully balanced Russian and Western alignment in a very deliberate way. Just look at arms purchases, for one.
“…in Servant of the People…”
…which was made in the Russian language.
“he follows an irredentist policy which is tied to, and in his mind justified by, the concept of ‘ethnic Russian’ identity”: reminiscent of the antics of the Irish Republic, then.
Peskov is right. Finland has never been an existential threat to Russia, whether in or out of NATO.
But Russia has been an existential threat to Finland. Having been forced by the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk to allow Finland to become independent from Russia in 1917-18 they’ve had eyes on taking it back. They invaded and carved off 10% of Finland within living memory.
So, what threat has the USSR and then Russia posed towards Finland since the signing of the Treaty of Paris in 1947?
No more threat than USSR/Russia has posed towards Austria since the signing of the Austrian neutrality treaty in 1955.
Dear god. You drag up a Treaty from over 100 years ago when the biggest threat to the world was the first battlefield Tank.
Go and lie down.
If it’s not blatantly obvious to everyone that the UK, the US and Europe are deliberately provoking a confrontation with Russia by courting Sweden and Finland’s membership of NATO, you should be locked up for your own, and everyone else’s safety.
The Americans have admitted they are conducting a war with Russia by proxy. Are these people insane? Russia and the US are the two most powerful nuclear nations on the planet, yet NATO countries think it clever to provoke Russia when the situation in Ukraine is already sensitive.
Putin’s armed forces have access to some 2,000,000 personnel. He sent 150,000 into Ukraine. Clearly he does not want to occupy the country.
In the same way the west demanded regime change in Iraq, he wants regime change in a rouge nation bordering his. As with Crimea, once that objective is achieved, he’ll leave.
The vast majority of the worlds population, represented by responsible leaders, Including China, India (the largest democracy in the world), Africa and Latin America, amongst others, have refused to condemn Russia’s intervention in a humanitarian catastrophe, the ethnic cleansing of Russian communities in Donbas by Ukraine.
The US, the UK and Europe are without a doubt the rogue elements here, not Russia.
Following eight years of insurgency into the region and the death of thousands of people, Putin finally, and legally, invoked UN Article 51 which allows him to act on behalf of another UN member state to prevent genocide.
A genocide the west has sat back and watched, in the same way they sat back and watched as Rwanda was reduced to a bloodbath.
Putin didn’t ‘invade’ Ukraine, he responded to seven days of artillery strikes targeting Donbas with 5,000 rounds or ordnance.
If you condemn Russia for its intervention, you are condoning genocide.
‘cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war’ it does seem that some in the Western world have some sort of demented madcap desire to provoke and prolong this conflict. Many food experts are saying that it is only the relative stability of the Rice market that is preventing a full world food crisis. But even now the price and supply difficulties with fertiliser look like leading to a 10-15% drop in the World rice harvest. It would only take one of the major rice exporters like Vietnam to stop rice exports or for China to stockpile even more Rice and the world food crisis would get a whole lot worse. Prolonging and aggravating this war could lead to a sequence of events that brings on such a food catastrophe.
Why would they care? The western backed Saudi led attacks on Yemen have caused hundreds and thousands of deaths, …the USA and UK sanctions have led to what the UN has called ‘the largest humanitarian crisis in the world’..a Yemeni child dies every nine minutes….the USA have imposed further sanctions this year….
Every Single ‘food programme’ and charity from the UN, Oxfam, the World Food Programme…every single one has clearly stated that the sanctions imposed by the West will cause the deaths by starvation of hundreds of millions of people on a scale never seen before…
But the goal, as has been explained by the USA is to ‘weaken Russia’, at the expense of Ukraine, and the rest of the world it would seem.
Perhaps your friends the Russians will remove the blockade in the black sea to allow export of grain from Ukraine. Since they are the good guys, this is a must do thing.
Hmmmmmm…..
Let’s think for a moment.
Human lives? – food blockade?
Food blockade? – human lives?
Gee, that’s a toughy.
Don’t give me any bleeding heart BS about global famines and millions dying. The UK had to suffer a World War before there was food rationing. The world has been producing far more food than it needs for generations now. This is a war in a tiny corner of Europe, made a crisis only to demonise Russia.
Had it not been for Biden/NATO’s bombastic posturing none of this would ever have happened.
Read my post, Putin didn’t start this war, Ukraine did by targeting Donbass Russians for genocide.
Feel good about Rwanda do you? I was one calling for intervention while you didn’t even know a million people were being slaughtered.
Asleep then and asleep now.
NGO’s on the happy clappy charity bandwagon.
“There’s an impending famine, we need more money”.
Sick of these shysters.
Think of the salaries of David Milliband and of Stephen Kinnock’s wife at Save the Children.
OMGosh, I completely forgot. I retract it all.
The Americans have admitted they are conducting a war with Russia by proxy.
Since yesterday, I’ve spent some time thinking through this: For some country to act as proxy of some great power in a war, that country must be doing something the great power would want to do as well but prefers to avoid to avoid getting entangled in the war itself.
Assuming the country is in the strategic offensive (ie, the attacker), it can be acting as proxy of some great power if it attacked an enemy of said great power or someone who’s allied to that enemy.
A country in the strategic defensive (the defender) cannot act as proxy of a great power because the great power cannot be in the strategic defensive in lieu of the attacked country. All it could do is invade the attacked country in order to attack the attacker there, which would be place it in the strategic offensive. The defending country also cannot defend itself against the attacker in lieu of the great power because the great power hasn’t been attacked and hence, can’t be defending itself. It might want to defend itself against the same attacker the other country is defending itself in case it would be attacked. But that’s just the normal state of affairs: If attacked, defend yourself.
[I hope this is somewhat comprehensible in English as its basically Clausewitz ad hoc translated into it.]
It follows that it’s impossible for the USA to fight a proxy war against Russia by Ukraine defending itself against a Russian invasion. Russia is the acting party here and Ukraine the reacting one. This reaction would necessarily happen regardless of what the US government thinks about it.
Afterthought: Putin as leader who disregared the UN charta in the interest of the country his leading would command some respect. Putin as leader of a But I didn’t really do anything! weasel wording campaign just comes accross as lowlife.
I’ve warned you about that before. You’ll do yourself a mischief.
You tried all this bullshit with Mark yesterday. I’m not going to bother repeating the kicking you got from him about your bizarre logic.
Ukraine has been waging war on Donbas for the last eight years contrary to the Budapest Accord.
They dropped 5,000 artillery shells on Donbass in the seven days before Russia intervened. Russia had 150,000 troops amassed on the border while that was going on.
It was clearly to provoke Russia to intervene, which they did.
Western media utterly ignored the last eight years and the concentrated shelling, then blamed Putin for legally invoking UN Article 51 which gives him the right to come to the aid of ANY UN member enduring violence.
Donbass is in Ukraine but to ignore the planned genocide would be as bad as the west turning a blind eye to a million people being slaughtered in Rwanda.
Putin’s intentions may not be entirely altruistic, but he stopped a terrible atrocity from occurring.
Condemn him and you are functional in supporting genocide.
Did you count them?
Of course, that’s why Ukraine choose this moment.
Ah-hah! The detective in you comes to the fore at last.
Go back to January of 202 and Elensky issued directives for offensive action, including against the Crimea.
Crimea has never been anything but Russian since before the USA came into existence, save by some bizarre pen stroke of Nikita Kruschev in 1954. Crimea, by the way, was also the victim of a war crime by virtue of its water supply being cut off by the fascists in Kiev. The blowing up of the dam which was blocking the North Crimea Canal was carried out within a few days of the liberation of Country 404 beginning.
Yes, it’s a matter of international record. Read my post’s, one of them lays out the numbers day by day. Satellites don’t miss a shot, but our media does, deliberately and you exist on their lies.
The information is there, but they didn’t tell you. Have you been lied to and hoodwinked?
Why, yes you have.
Russian troops, present on the border between Russia and Ukraine (Donbas), threatening to invade unless hostilities cease in the region, and Ukrainians provoke invasion by lobbing 5,000 rounds of ordnance into Donbas.
That’s not the way geopolitical diplomacy is conducted you tit. That’s called incitement to violence and it’s covered under UN Article 51. Russia, like the rest of the UN, is compelled to respond to protect civilians, only the west didn’t bother, again, did they?
Doubtless, had Putin stepped into Rwanda to stop the butcher of a million lives you would be squealing “Russian man bad” then as well, and wept when the genocide failed.
But that would require you to count all the way up to 5k!
Surely a bridge too far for you, LukeWarm.
I used paper and pencil dummy. Obviously technology beyond you.
And not a single point I made addressed. You really are a sad sack.
It’s pure bigotry from first to last. There isn’t time enough in the world to spend on correcting your ignorance.
I don’t agree much with Noah Carl. But at least he manages to string a sentence together and is capable of a proper conversation about it,
Russia has nothing to fear from NATO, Finland or Sweden, unless it decides to attack.
Your acceptance of Russia’s propaganda without question is puzzling. I thought you were supposed to be sceptical.
The NATO backed Ukraine has waged a war of ethnic cleansing against Donbas for the last eight years. The US has admitted they back Ukraine in a proxy war against Russia.
I don’t understand why this doesn’t compute in your tiny mind.
It’s genocide you clown. Ukraine bombarded Donbass with 5,000 artillery shells in the seven days prior to Russia’s intervention.
Are you happy with that level of aggression even in what might be described as a civil war?
It was clearly an act of provocation as Russia had 150,000 troops on the border at the time.
You must be a special kind of thick not to see this or in any way condone Ukraines genocidal intentions.
Russia has nothing to fear from NATO, Finland or Sweden, unless it decides to attack.
There is very little empirical evidence to support your contention.
NATO and its ancillaries has been on an offensive rampage since the 1990s, beginning with the former Yugoslavia carrying on through Iraq and Libya. It was defeated in Syria and is about to go down big time in Ukraine.
The concept of a nation state, as opposed to a dynastic state, ie a conglomerate of territories inhabited by different people all subject to some ruling dynasty, didn’t even exist prior to the Napoleonic wars and self-determination of the peoples was something Woodrow Wilson invented for his so-called world war one peace plan.
Russia seized Finland from Sweden in 1809 and ruled it until 1917, including trying to russify it. It re-captured 12% of the Finnish territority during a series of Russian-Finnish wars which occurred in the context of the second world war. Finland remained closely aligned with the USSR until its collapse.
As a final remark, sharing some of the values Putin claims to have doesn’t imply a desire to be ruled by him. Enemies of my enemies are only my friends if they join me in fighting them.
And if you go back a bit further, Sweden under Charles XII embarked on a war of conquest against Russia which was only checked by Charles’s bad luck at Poltava in 1709. However, even after that and a period of exile in the Ottoman Empire, he was still keen on war and somebody may have had him assassinated in 1715 (a death which finally brought peace).
“Ukrainian authorities have stopped the flow of Russian natural gas through one key hub that feeds European homes and industries.”
so are they finally ‘biting the hand that feeds them’ or just trying to cause the economic collapse of Europe? Hope Europe appreciates it…..
NATO member Turkey has objected to the Finnish and Swedish applications to join.
NATO expansion has to be agreed by all members.
Whoops!
https://www.ft.com/content/e7d3e505-279c-45d7-8585-1d1354926571
Apparently the Turkish government is especially negative about the idea of an application from Sweden.
Oh dear oh dear. The Wallenberg family that owns Sweden can’t have its cake (sell weapons to the Kurdish opponents of the Turkish government) and eat it (be in a military “alliance” under the United States alongside that same Turkish government).
Hungary is in NATO too. Have they said yet that they would accept Finland and Sweden as members, or will a Hungarian objection be forthcoming?
It’s also hard to see how French president Macron would successfully sell the French population a war against Russia. The left-wing alliance led by Jean-Luc Mélenchon is leading in the polls for the legislative elections scheduled for next month.
Perhaps by next Friday it will be a case of “Finland and Sweden have not said they want to join NATO. They have never said that. They have always said they want to remain neutral. Any assertion to the contrary is made by Russian-paid trolls.“
Good news.
NATO slapped in the face. Not before time.
It’s a negotiating ploy.
Does this argument sound quite ridiculous or am I missing something here?
Control of the Ukrainian economy might enable Putin to buy an even bigger palace and another superyacht, but it would also be a chance to reward his cronies and further cement his position as dictator-for-life.
According to the Guardian, Vladimir Putin “only has himself to blame” for NATO’s supposedly imminent expansion that may well never happen. Funny how the whole British media is singing to the same songbook. It almost makes you think Britain is a “one songbook state”.
Anyway, did Stalin only have himself to blame for NATO’s 1952 expansion (Greece, Turkey)?
How about Khrushchev for the 1955 expansion (Federal Republic of Germany)?
Or Brezhnev for the 1982 expansion (Spain)?
Or Yeltsin for the 1999 expansion (Czechia, Hungary, Poland)?
Has there ever been a country that has become a US satellite without the Kremlin being to blame? Does anyone in the British mainstream media dare answer “yes”?
For those who don’t know already: the Warsaw Treaty Organisation (“Warsaw Pact” in headlinese) was founded six years after NATO, shortly after NATO expanded to include the Federal Republic of Germany as a member in 1955.
Insightful comment.
Pseud nonsense, I’m afraid. Firstly, Finland and Sweden are far too established as democracies to be egged on into conflict by the wider west in the way that a weakly institutioned Ukraine allows itself. Here are two countries with no significant Russian influence that very much do not belong to the Russian sphere of influence. Their joining NATO is symbolic rather that geostrategically significant…unlike Ukraine.
Secondly, characterising Putin is an ethno nationalist is well wide of the mark. Navalny is Russia’s ethno nationalist. Putin has historically shown himself to favour a Russia that co-identifies along broad shared cultural values regardless of ethnicity.
Attack Putin for his many foibles but don’t either deliberately or ignorantly compare him to ethno nationalists with such spurious arguments.
Agreed. Sweden and Finland curiously agreeing to be drawn into a conflict they have no interest in.
To my knowledge, Russia hasn’t been a threat to them in generations, nor does it appear to be now.
I can’t fathom this particular turn of events. What purpose does it serve?
I can’t pretend to know but my assumption would be that it is a risk-free yet highly symbolic initiative designed to facilitate reductive articles such as this one that assert hypocrisy and perhaps even convince the feeble minded.
Agreed … totally illogical…pressure from the Globalists at the WEF …and the CIA?
Hoe many “young leaders ” groomed by Uncle Klaus are involved ?
Funnily enough, you could ask Putin that as he was a Young Global Leader candidate but evidently didn’t ‘graduate”
Funnily enough, nor did Boris.
The opinion of some was that neither conformed to Schwab’s conditioning and were a pain in the arse.
Others contend that Putin pitched up just to see what was going on and, being ex KGB, took away a whole lot of stuff they hadn’t even considered.
Putin is, by many accounts, the smartest guy walking into any room. Having seen many of his translated interviews he comes across as a pretty honest guy.
Probably you would have to live in Finland or Sweden to understand it.
Their sentiments seem strikingly similar to those of the Baltic States.
So, just maybe, they really do know something that should have been obvious to the rest of us.
Why, then, did Putin rattle on about ‘Greater Russia’ prior to invading?
Wow, what an utterly arrogant and blinkered article.
It’s amazing that people like Ian Rons still bang on about “Western values” when we’ve seen the biggest peacetime attack on them over the last two years by our own so called “leaders” who, I can assure you, care less for their citizens than Putin does for Russians.
And to completely omit the fact that the West, obviously the US in particular, continuously gets involved in foreign affairs based on its own interests (as it has been doing in Ukraine for years), must surely be deliberate as the writer can’t be that ignorant?
As Rand Paul said a few days ago – the biggest source of disinformation over the last 50 years? The US Government.
Rons can virtue signal with his West good, Putin/Russia bad rhetoric if it makes him feel better, but it is the likes of him that are actually supporting the destruction of liberty and democracy in this country.
Why are we only allowed one upvote?
The single most accurate sentence on this entire thread.
Well, if we get a “silent but violent” EMP attack that wipes out all of our critical infrastructure, energy and food supply then maybe we can debate whether it was because of Finland’s NATO expansion. “Hmm, maybe Putin did care about Finland joining NATO but he stopped making a fuss about it and just pushed the button? Or hmm, maybe not.”
Seriously, folks we have to take care of the war hawks in our countries. They are on a suicide mission. Our leaders pushed and pushed Putin to the brink and he snapped and now they just keep on ramping it up. They desperately want to depopulate the earth to avoid the inevitable economic collapse and it doesn’t have to involve nukes. They tried the virus and the vaccine and it didn’t work. Now they’re going to try something drastic.
If we don’t do something we’re just living on borrowed time.
And good morning to you too!
Odd, we thought the growing pressure to place nato forces on Russia’s border was part of what drove the “bad guy” actor into action. Meanwhile the comedienne in Ukrainia, dressed in his khaki green clothing was preparing for his part in the proxy war.
anyone read about the shortage of baby formula in the USA? They or someone is burning down food processing plant ta faster than they can be rebuilt creating a man made food shortage. Amazing how the msm has failed to report the destruction of food processing plants. All part of the great reset folks. There are no food shortages in the world. There are distribution problems and now man made shortages.
Never underestimate Russia. Unlike Hitler they know not to fight wars on two fronts. They’ll mop up objectives in Ukraine (100% air superiority) then deal with secondary threats.
That’s what we all thought.
I wonder why it is taking so long?
How come the air superiority isn’t protecting their river crossings, or their Generals, or is it just Putin shooting them?
No one in the world* ever believed the ‘Putin feels threatened by NATO’ narrative anyway, least of all Putin himself. (*Though many claimed to).
It’s just a bonkers post-truth ritual. We know he’s lying, he knows we know he’s lying, we know he knows we know he’s lying and he knows we know he knows we know he’s lying.
Most “sceptics” do believe him.
But that’s only to disagree with the accepted reality. They do this for most subjects.
That Sweden and Finland joining NATO doesn’t pose an existential threat to Russia doesn’t quite fit with what Mr Polyanskiy said in a good interview with Freddie Sayers of Unherd: ‘Speaking to UnHerd’s Freddie Sayers, First Deputy Representative of Russia to the UN Dmitry Polyanskiy has said that Sweden and Finland joining the bloc would turn them overnight from neutral into enemy countries and become a “target” for Russia.’
They’ve been subject to constant Russian pressure and threats for decades anyway.
As part of NATO they become just one of 32 targets.
Putin is aggressive – but he isn’t stupid.
So Russia poses an existential threat to Finland and Sweden?
Wasn’t that why they decided to join NATO?
The fact that Russia may consider them as enemies does not make them a threat.
Putin is a disciple of Ivan Ilyin and his doctrine of Christian fascism and Russian destiny. The resemblance to Hitler is no coincidence, since they share a very similar belief in national spiritual destiny. Anyone supporting Putin is, consciously or otherwise, supporting this doctrine.
Would the USA tolerate China or Russia training a Central American states forces or funding secret bilogical labs in those countries? Isn’t the Monroe docrine in place to prohibit such a presence of a foreign power in their backyard?
Why do you ask?
Brilliant article. Many thanks.
Totalitarian dictator and plutocrat invades neighbouring nascent aspirational capitalist democracy in order to, firstly, enrich himself and, secondly, to remove the political threat it poses to his criminal authoritarianism.
Also hilarious to see the indignation from the burghers of St Petersburg and their running mates.
You accuse Mearsheimer of “lazy thinking”. Seems to me you are guilty of that yourself, Ian. “Sovereignty and self determination of a nation state”? When was Ukraine ever a state? For two years during the War? Ukraine was established as a Soviet Republic, as part of the USSR. This is a fact that Western commentators seem determined to ignore, in their desperation to make the whole situation a simple case of “goodies” (us) versus “baddies” (evil Putin and his henchmen).
You think Ukraine is a plucky Western style democracy? Go and look up what Zelensky has done to his political opponents. I say this not to criticise him, just to challenge the idea that he is a democratic leader in the Western sense.
As for “more modern Western values”, I think we’ve seen over the last two years how shallow are Western claims to be democratic and freedom loving. We are in a fight now to save liberal democracy in the West. Right now democracy in Britain is looking little more solid than democracy in Russia.
‘When was Ukraine ever a state?’
It was Russia that turned Ukraine into a state:
Kievan Rus’, a medieval state, came into existence in the 9th century and was centred around present-day Kiev.
‘A distinct Ukrainian language began to emerge in the dying days of the Kievan Rus’
Following the incorporation of present-day Ukraine into Poland-Lithuania, the Ukrainian language evolved in relative isolation from the Russian language.
At the same time, religious divisions developed within Eastern Orthodoxy. From the mid-15th to the late 17th centuries, the Orthodox Churches in Moscow and in Kiev developed as separate entities
Following the final partitions of Poland in the 1790s, the Russian Empire absorbed the remainder of modern-day Ukraine (apart from its extreme west, which was annexed by Austria).
The territories of Ukraine remained a part of the Russian state for the next 120 years.
Russia’s imperial authorities systematically persecuted expressions of Ukrainian culture and made continuous attempts to suppress the Ukrainian language.
In spite of this, a distinct Ukrainian national consciousness emerged and consolidated in the course of the 19th century
The eastern borders of Ukraine were formally drawn in 1919-1924 as the boundaries of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic (UkrSSR).
….intervention in Ukraine…..has galvanised most Ukrainians in their aversion to Russia.’
LSE Blog 01 07 20
90% of Ukraine’s voters voted for independence. Now they are fighting for it.
Crystal clear.
Ukraine became a state on February 24th, when Russia invaded and the President of Ukraine didn’t run away and the people fought to defend it. Sovereignty comes from the people, and the Ukrainian demos clearly showed that they have given it to Ukraine, not the Russian Federation.
The whole world knows why Russia invaded Ukraine; nothing to do with NATO.
Putin took the trouble to publish his reasons in RIA Novosti
He wants to ‘de-Europeanise’ Ukraine and get rid of ‘Western totalitarianism’
RIA Novosti 04 April 22
Shame on you, Daily Sceptic, to allow such a falsely wrought article on your pages. No effort to mention the true causes of the war, which are by now easy to be found on the internet. Not in the Mainstream Media however. Simply this bastard of a Putin again hé, as if a lot of developments before the 24Feb and since 2014, did not happen. Shame on you, Daily Sceptic.
For those of us who still think that the war has no history, but for that bastard Putin’s lust for power, I recommend reading an excellent article by Mike Whitney in the “UNZ Review” of 10May titled: “Russia started the war” and other fallacies>.
For all those who believe Putin’s invasion of Ukraine was a response to ‘NATO expansionism’ and US imperialism, I recommend reading an excellent article by Putin himself in his own newspaper, RIA Novosti 04 April 22
‘The “Catholic province” (Western Ukraine as part of five regions) is unlikely to become part of the pro-Russian territories. The line of alienation, however, will be found empirically. It will remain hostile to Russia, but forcibly neutral and demilitarized Ukraine with formally banned Na$ism. The haters of Russia will go there. The threat of an immediate continuation of the military operation in case of non-compliance with the listed requirements will be the the guarantee of the preservation of this residual Ukraine in a neutral state. Perhaps this will require a permanent Russian military presence on its territory.’
‘the necessary initial steps of dena$ification can be defined as follows:
— liquidation of armed Na$i formations (which refers to any armed formations of Ukraine, including the Armed Forces of Ukraine), as well as the military, information, and educational infrastructure that ensures their activity’
‘…lustration, publication of the names of accomplices of the Na$i regime, involving them in forced labor to restore the destroyed infrastructure as punishment for Na$i activities (from among those who will not be subject to the death penalty or imprisonment)
‘..the dena$ification of Ukraine is also its inevitable de-Europeanization.’
‘….not just the Bandera version of Na$i Ukraine will be eradicated, but including, and above all, Western totalitarianism..’
Coming to a town near you soon unless Britain, NATO, stands firm.
No wonder ‘Europeanised’ Finland and Sweden want to join NATO if the alternative is to be ‘de-Europeanised’ with all that clearly goes with that intention.
Na$is in Ukraine? Why not let a Ukrainian have the last word:
‘What is the difference between Hitler, Stalin and Putin? There isn’t one because all three of them are evil’
‘Putin does not like Ukrainians and he wants to exterminate us all.’
‘Yes, we have Na$is in Ukraine. I’m one of them (sarc.) and I have a number on my arm from Auschwitz to prove it’
Anastasia Gulej
Someone in the daily sceptic is good friends with Alex Berenson. There is the same split between Covid and Ukraine here as there.
Mearsheimer, Cohen, Ritter, anyone?
Zero evidence Putin is going anywhere beyond Ukraine unless the US hegemony runs the same MO in Georgia or another border nation.
US bioweapons labs (336 in 30 countries) that the UN claims not to know about. Unanswered questions about Slavic-targeted pathogens in these labs. Dilyana Gaytandzhieva exposed biolabs in 2015 in the EU to the US representative and was closed down. See armswatch and her named big. Add all the stuff Russia had submitted direct to UNSC.
Nazis in Ukraine are undeniable. So are Ukrainian war crimes as they literally film themselves doing them. Just scour southfront and telegram. You will find multiple videos of torture and murder of RussianPoWs including one where a tied up Russian PoW is stabbed to death including in the eyes; a Russian soldier may have been crucified; that’s not all of it.
See Patrick Lancaster for first hand testimony from citizens in the DPR of long term Ukrainian attacks against civilians. Ukraine is using Syrian”rebel” human shield tactics, according to citizen testimony and tons of footage released by Russia and Ukrainians that show the Ukrainian forces occupying and setting up in civilian locations including schools and residences while civilians are forced to stay and prevented from evacuating via lanes.
Russia is doing what it said in published documents it would do. It is all out there.
We are fighting a proxy war against Russia using Nazis as our proxies. We would have let Ukraine with those Nazis into the EU and NATO until Russia did, as Mearsheimer predicted 8 years ago, change the cost of entry by “wrecking” Ukraine. Russia will reconstruct the parts it takes. There’s two primary sources of funding for this:
1. The commodities revenues resulting from failed sanctions and the West’s Great Reset agenda that is a deliberate end of empire blow off wealth transfer;
2. The 3 trillion cubic meters of frackable gas in DPR.
Gosh. What a biased article.
Yet another attempt to link Putin with Hitler.
If you listen to his speech that launched the SMO then he lauds the multi national composition of Russia. Note that the Chechens are some of the most enthusiastic soldiers for Russia. They are not ethnic Russians. I do not think that ethno Russian nationalism is a big driver here.
The premise of the article is also wrong: the Russians have warned NATO over Finland. They just do it clearly and western media propaganda does not then amplify it.
I recommend listening to John Mearsheimer for an exposition of why NATO expansion has been seen as an existential threat by Russia and the two decades or so of warnings to that effect.