Russia - threadbanned users in OP

Jinglejangle69

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763275#Comment_119763275

“Never again”

GM228

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763622#Comment_119763622

"The attempts to isolate Russia are failing, and actually backfiring quite badly on the west"

How are they backfiring quite badly on the west? The Russian rhetoric of the toilet roll shortage in Europe or the fact we are all freezing at the moment because we have no Russian gas? Perhaps we have used up all the toilet roll to wrap up ourselves to keep warm?

The likelihood is that any talks with China or India was going to happen one way or the other and are not simply a direct result of sanctions, or perhaps they are, but the West is more important to China and India than Russia will ever be and they are not going to forget that.

As for "most of the world's population", what a load of rubbish, asides from the no votes (there were only 5 and no real surprises) an abstention is exactly that, an abstention from voting, it is not an abstention from condemning Russia or an indication of support or not for the Resolution.

A nation can abstain for any number of reasons and they are often for political reasons of the regime rather than their populations support or otherwise of what they are voting on.

That asides many of those who abstained aren't exactly utopians of the world order for democracy or human rights.

I do enjoy the regular reporting from Bizarro World Run Forest Run "contributes". At minimum it's great to see how agitated they get by the 'non working' Russian sanctions. 🤣

No matter how shít your day is at least you're not paid to write up complete bollocks and have to try to convince of its legitimacy.

GM228

Some chilling accounts from resident's of Izium released by the Human Rights Watch today:-

https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/10/19/ukraine-russian-forces-tortured-izium-detainees

"Survivors described being subjected to electric shock, waterboarding, severe beatings, threats at gunpoint, and being forced to hold stress positions for extended periods. They identified at least seven locations in the city, including two schools, where they said soldiers had detained and abused them"

Sadly it is just the latest in a series of these types of reports and unfortunately many more to come I would think, the physiological effects of war will long out live the visual effect.

Wibbs

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763622#Comment_119763622

And yet most of the world's population didn't support the recent UN resolution condemning Russia.

Most of the world. Earlier:

Even "friends" like China, South Africa and India sat on the fence. Brazil the first letter in your BRICS alliance voted against. Argentina who are on the list to join BRICS also voted against Mother Russia. The only support came frrom one Russian vassal state, Syria, that bastion of peace and harmony, family run nutball mafia state North Korea and Nicaragua. Fine "friends" you have there. 👌

Trade between Russia and the BRICS nations is soaring since the war began

Yes "soaring" to the point where this small damp island in the Atlantic now has more of an export market than Russia, the largest nation on earth with all those resources and stronk leader. This wasn't the case this time last year. If that's soaring, Icarus would have never risked his wings melting. Then again you reckoned putin chose to pivot to the BRICS, rather than have that choice forced upon him. Remind me again how many pipelines ran to the West vs the East? How many Chinese or Indian factories were operating in Russia? Russians; redefining support, soaring and choice.

particularly with India and China, two major players on the world stage.

Both courted and continue to court Western economies and businesses and those Western imports/exports positively dwarf any trade with Russia. If tomorrow China and India dropped Western trade they'd be utterly screwed economically, if they dropped Russian trade they'd barely miss it. China's trade with Thailand alone is bigger. They'll play the game but they're not stupid. They both see Russia as a faded petrol station where they can get cheap fuel if they throw the owner a bone or two and by doing so hope to get more Western interest and investment as a counter. And always have.

Turkey seems ready to do business with Russia on a new gas hub proposal. And of course, Turkey have been one of the more proactive nations in attempting to broker peace in this conflict. They recognise that the western approach of creating isolated pariah states with heavy sanctions, doesn't really bring about the desired results.

Erdogan is playing both sides, much of it an attempt to keep the home crowd distracted from domestic issues, which are many. They're still important members of the boogyman NATO, even have US bases in Turkey, which you seem to want to ignore.

The "desired result" is Mother Russia pulls her head in, stops acting like pricks in an imperial landgrab and fcuks off out of Ukraine.

The attempts to isolate Russia are failing, and actually backfiring quite badly on the west.

Annnnnd we're back to the same old tune of "sanctions are hurting you more than they're hurting Mother Russia". A tune so often played it's pretty clear who is hurting more.

There is a much bigger game being played here, than just what is happening in Ukraine. A broader tussle for control of key resources, and a greater diversification of power. Food, energy and even the global financial system are at play. On the one hand, it is a very worrying time for the world. On the other hand, it is fascinating to see some big global gears moving and tectonic plates shifting. We could have a dramatically different looking world, after the dust settles on this conflict.

Multipolar, something something, western hegemony, something something... Now what's Ritter or The Duran blogging today?

TAFKA_hometruths_real

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763623#Comment_119763623

I would imagine it was a case it's a meeting that they don't trust being conducted over video link.

Ardent

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763639#Comment_119763639

There's something bleak and depressing about these state TV shows. It never ceases to amaze me how brainwashed or deliberately deceitful these panelists are. Any display of common sense or balance is shot down quickly and brutally. Really sad.

Jinglejangle69

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763767#Comment_119763767

But we must negotiate with Putin and appease him.

bad2thebone

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763575#Comment_119763575

Stranger things have happened, when you mean the rest.

Do you mean the rest of the middle east ?

Furze99

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763622#Comment_119763622

Turkey are trying to ride two horses at the same time and we all know what happens eventually when the horses diverge. Bad cess to them.

GM228

NATO and Romania to hold a joint press conference later today at 1.15PM with Jens Stoltenberg and Romanian Prime minister Nicolae Ciucă.

Probably nothing more than the usual and speaking of the eastern block defences, but also probably an update on Steadfast Noon I would imagine.

ZX7R

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763949#Comment_119763949

Could be in relation to the deployment of addition of nato troops .

Read an article last week were France said they would be deploying troops to Romania, Estonia Lithuania as part of nato reinforcement in the area.

zv2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763108#Comment_119763108

Right, but they target electrical facilities with the aim of crippling Ukraine. They are not much good militarily but against essential infrastructure they are lethal - unless they can be stopped.

zv2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763118#Comment_119763118

The Iranian army/air force should be destroyed - utterly.

zv2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763639#Comment_119763639

Seems like they have rabies.

Brussels Sprout

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763636#Comment_119763636

It's completely misleading too. The world's largest country is China. It's not a democracy. The average person has no say in who their representatives are. The position of China at the UN is the position of the Chinese Communist Party and even more accurately, these days it's the position of a single man - Xi Jinping.

Similar logic applies to other countries who abstained or voted against:

• Algeria
• Belarus
• Burundi
• Cuba
• North Korea
• Eritrea
• Eswatini
• Guinea
• Kazakhstan
• Laos
• Mali
• Nicaragua
• Russia itself
• Sudan
• Syria
• Tajikistan
• Togo
• Uganda
• Uzbekistan
• Vietnam
• Zimbabwe

If the poster wanted to be accurate and truthful (and judging by their posting history there's a big question mark over whether they have any interest in that goal) they could instead say:

The undemocratic regimes, that control the countries where, nearly half* the world's population lives, chose not to support the measure.

*India being democratic probably keeps it under half

Brussels Sprout

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763639#Comment_119763639

Vlad Vexler talked about these shows in one of his Youtube videos before. So the way he described it is that it's more of a performance than an actual political debate show. Each of the people on stage has their own role to fulfill. They're not necessarily reading lines from a script but they'd be assigned a certain ideological lane that they need to keep within. The Kremlin then uses the feedback from social media/radio phone ins as their own form of polling of the greater population.

It also helps to have a dissenting voice on just so they can be shot down by hawks, as in this video. This would maybe assuage the viewer at home, who perhaps had seen this video on Ukrainian Telegram and was troubled by the fact that they had a different origin story for it.

One of the big tells that these shows aren't organic is that it's actually pretty rare for interruptions to happen. Like you'd often see 7 or 8 people on stage and yet one of them has a 4 minute monologue. That would never happen on a Western politics show. People would be pouncing on every point that they made. When I first observed this phenomenon I thought perhaps that this was a cultural thing. Perhaps Russians were just more respectful of whoever the current speaker was. Now though I think it's just discouraged by the producers as it's annoying as a watcher to hear people butting in all of the time.

Russian politics works in a similar manner. Almost all of the "opposition" parties in the Duma are state controlled and the speeches that they give are made to order. You don't have to worry about rigging elections if you just make sure that any real opposition cannot take part in the democratic process.

Hobgoblin11

https://t.me/bbcrussian/36373

2 people wounded as result of shelling in Shebekino of Belgorod region

fly_agaric

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119764159#Comment_119764159

IMO Unless Russia has a bottomless/replinishable supply of the things in reserve and so can launch lots each day for a considerable period + most of these continue to hit the right targets (as Ukraine will presumably adapt to the tactic), they are not going to "cripple" Ukraine (or its ability to generate and distribute electricity) with them. Ukraine is a big country.

yeah they can degrade it maybe even "cripple" it in certain areas they may focus on, and cause misery to civilians, and murder + terrorise (about only thing Russian military has had success with as a strategy in their invasion). That is it.

Given the will Ukraine seems to have to continue fighting them, provided of course Western backers get the finger out some more, accept the reality they are in a vital struggle quite close to a war with Russia (and friends...!) now they have to succeed in for themselves and their people as much as for Ukraine...I don't think it will change the outcome here.

lizzyjane

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119762565#Comment_119762565

Exactly my point, the difference is Iran is not threatening nations with sanctions because who they sell weaponry to, as they do it themselves. What moral standpoint would they have?

zv2

Speaks for itself-

https://twitter.com/u_me_reality/status/1582677526773538816?s=20&t=e_Dcl2YIU9iTEwU-kUJafQ

Run Forest Run

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763636#Comment_119763636

The numbers beg to differ.

The 50 nations that didn't back the resolution, account for more than half of the world's population.

And even many who did back such largely symbolic resolutions - like Turkey who I mentioned - are actually still prepared to work with Russia. So really, they are nowhere near as isolated as the west would like to make them. This has been a failure of western leadership and policy, and nations are rejecting their sanctions based approach.

It's an outdated and unpopular approach to global leadership. It doesn't work, and this is why we're seeing such a strong backlash.

lizzyjane

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763003#Comment_119763003

Lol. I just don't understand the complete arrogance of this post. Do you think if that happens there won't be retaliation on the streets of Europe?

Have you not seen the devastation other wars in the middle east has caused the last few decades.

zv2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119764473#Comment_119764473

I doubt that these government votes represent their people's opinions. The Brits voted for Brexit but many of them didn't.

fly_agaric

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119764473#Comment_119764473

Your new global order approach to "world leadership" developed in your posts is you can do what you like in your own borders to your own people without even flimsy + often ignored criticism of it today provided by structures of post WW2 mostly Western-created order (like the UN you hate + criticise, with its charter and the various international treaties) and you can also like Russia go into a neighbour soveriegn and do same to their own people (who are now "your" people!) if you have the strength and the willingness, just like period pre WW2.

It's not a bright shining global community replacing the Western order, it's a very bleak throwback to the past, particularly if you are from one of world's many low population, weak, small states. Can you fill me in on the positives of the new global community and order for Ireland/Irish people please? Seems more like a prison planet for humanity if likes of China, N. Korea, Syria, Iran, and Russia are the trailblazers showing the way. edit: sps

jmreire

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763063#Comment_119763063

Bog standard or not, it's able to shift, and well able for that road.

Raoul Duke III

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119764518#Comment_119764518

The noises suggest Russia's stay on the north bank of the Dnieper (i.e. Kherson) may be coming to an end shortly.

That would certainly be the biggest victory of the war so far for Ukraine.

Francie Barrett

https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1582665869267984385

Strelkov pictured in Rostov in military garb.

Brussels Sprout

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119764503#Comment_119764503

It's worse than that. As I pointed out in post #66641 above, the vast majority of those countries are authoritarian. The people living in them don't get a free and fair vote to decide their country's leaders and thus their foreign policy. @Run Forest Run is pushing a blatantly misleading view of that UN vote because there is no other way to spin such a resounding condemnation.

jmreire

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119763392#Comment_119763392

You are not going to unite two different factions of Islam that have been in disagreement with each other since the death of Mohammad. In fact, the death of Mohammad triggered the first inter Islamic war. Because it is based on who should succeed him, and it continues to this day, and sometimes with as they say " Extreme Violence", Yemen- Saudi being current examples, but it triggered the Iran - Iraq war too where millions lost their lives.