Russia - threadbanned users in OP

Putin is not playing "4D chess" or doing anything smart. Some people look for some deeper meaning, because "oh, he is a great leader, he must know what we don't, he is so smart". I have seen and talked to politicians. Some of them are very charming and charismatic. But being smart is not a requirement for a politician, it's the ability to sell your friends and lick correct arses that is needed.

Some people say that Putin is waging war because he wants to re-unite Ukraine with Russia into some kind of pseudo-USSR. That is all fluff, in my opinion. Ukraine is a country that can be plundered and it resources divided between oligarchs close to Putin, and this is a more plausible explanation for the war. That is what "denazification" Putin is talking about -- take all the resources from Ukrainians (="nazis") and give it to Russian capitalists. This is just an imperialist war of conquest.

Will Russians get to hear about it though? I would imagine that if it appears on the news at all it will be presented either as a tragic accident or as a successful attack against Ukrainian forces. To what extent is the Kremlin able to keep a lid on this?

EDIT: never mind, I just read that Moscow has accused Ukraine of carrying out the attack.

This. They don't give a flying **** if they flatten the entire country as long as they hold control of the gas and oil, they'd probably be happy enough with an ongoing occupation/insurgency but I don't think it's played out that way. If they had done this in 2014 when the Ukrainian army was in disarray then it might have worked. They're now having to compete with a steady supply of modern weapons.

Yes, it has been reported by the Russian media in fact. Lots of faux outrage about how it might stop the supposed "peace talks" from going ahead. I'd say there must be a fair few raised eyebrows in Russia though after people being told that the special operation was a big success.

Everybody's opinions will be based on their own experiences I guess. My own experience is mixed, but I have encountered some extremely clever and capable Indian contractors.

Actually not quite true.

Granted there are a lot of Indian IT workers out there and in particular it looks like the Middle East is full of them.

Coincidentally a lot of them want to get to Ireland.

But the West reliant on them ?

More worringly the West is far more reliant on getting shyte built in China because it is cheap.

It is time the West wakes up and starts reversing all the production in a probable enemy state.

The more the world goes on the more it stays the same.

A lot of major US & British industrialists were up to their necks in Germany and some rather liked old Adolf.

Hell it looked like they even wanted to keep doing business with him despite his warring ways.

They were involved with Germany because it made them money and they couldn't care less if he slaughtered Jews, homosexuals, political opponents, etc.

Likewise with all the Western multinationals to their necks in China. They couldn't care less.

The amount of "off-shoring" disasters you'd hear about in industry would probably surprise most people. Management paying peanuts and then over the next year or two find out they are getting plenty of monkeys but not much work done.

CNN op-ed on the influence of Western intelligence in presenting the Russian invasion as a disaster.

Oh man the stories I could tell out certain large Indian outsourcers. There is no way that companies save money by using them. The ones who do tend to suffer significant reputational damage from their customers if they have the outsourcers in customer facing roles.

Any client I've dealt with who have gone down the route of using Indian outsourcers for their IT have by in large had major buyers regret.

Ukrainian govt not confirming or denying that the helicopter attack on the oil depot was them while Russia saying it was them. Putin is on record a few weeks ago saying he would use nuclear weapons if Russia was threatened, things could really escalate now as he has his reason for using them.

It seems to draw an equivalence between NATO and Russia which isn't very accurate or fair. Only Russia invaded Ukraine.

What else could the Russian invasion of Ukraine be defined as at this point than a disaster? Not only did the Russian military not make it to Kyiv in a few days, as some here were predicting, they never even got to the capital proper. They're even being pushed back, it seems. Have never been able to get air superiority. Have had several high-ranking officers killed (confirmed by both sides). Tanks getting milled out of it. Thousands of troops killed. Can't even take Mariupol fully after a month despite it literally being surrounded on 3 sides. Whatever way one talks it up or breaks it down, the invasion has decidedly not gone to plan. Yes, it is in Western interests to present the invasion as a disaster, but the point is that there's no shortage of material to this end.

Unfortunately no one is willing to Stand up and guarantee their security ,nato membership is the only other option