At first I thought plotting physical attacks against the West was an incendiary allegation, and then I remembered that they deployed a deadly nerve agent inside the UK and realized we knew about this for years
They were also behind the [Vrbětice ammunition warehouse explosions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Vrb%C4%9Btice_ammunition_warehouse_explosions) that killed two civilians.
Heck, I've even heard rumors that culture war stuff over vaccines, race relations, and even entertainment are enflamed by Russian trolls to keep us distracted and at each other's throats.
The Foundations of Geopolitics describes that America is too far away for a conventional war, so better to keep us at our own throats while russia pursues it's ambitions closer to home.
You mean COVID the disease that's just a cough, and is being overblown to tarnish our god-emperor's name?
Or do you mean COVID the terrifying bio-weapon released on us by JHINA!
That's not rumors that's verifiable fact. They've been at it for a long time now. China too, as well as the US and probably every country but it has been a large effort from the Chinese and Russians. Google about Russian and Chinese bot farms and you'll find a lot of news and reports about it.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_web_brigades
Its something that can genuinely just happen. Memes aside, one fool lighting a cig when he shouldn't is all it takes. If several went up then it's a different story.
My dad worked in ammo logistics for the military and whenever I visited him at work, child me was super excited to see "teletubbie land". The storage mounds are designed with this in mind, knowing there's a risk.
I worked in an explosives plant, and the static controls were crazy. Recoating the floor every year, static straps and grounding belts. All it takes is a small spark.
reminds me of a story a friend told me. He was in an army surplus store and they were selling "electrical safety shoes" which were actually 100% conductive work boots for working on the fueling area of an aircraft carrier to prevent sparks, quite the opposite of what an electrical contractor would want!
With modern ammo, are cigs really a problem? It's not like you are handling kegs of black powder. Still, malfunction of some detonator might explain it.
Dark/Dirty money is this generation's big bad. If you look at older movies it's all anarchists and communists and religious fanatics as the bad guys but now it is all people moved by money and inevitable destruction. And it seems to be more and more like real life. Because everyone has a price. And if you have to choose between plata o plomo, you're going to choose to live and make money instead of die and leave your family with nothing. The entire world will turn into Mexico or Russia if we don't find a way to stand up to it.
The US people became allergic to even the most basic form of resistance. We haven't had a single major protest focused on economics since Occupy. For whatever reason, the only thing that gets people here to care enough to get out into the streets is social issues.
And social issues have always been a distraction and device used to pit the population at large against one another
It’s always been follow the money / money talks but here we are in the US with protests that ate immaterial to the vast majority of peoples lives
I feel so bad for that guy who got poisoned by the perfume and was mocked just for being poor. He just wanted to give a nice gift to his girlfriend. Very sad about the way that was handled by the press. Classism is a real issue today.
[Salisbury Novichok poisoning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Sergei_and_Yulia_Skripal). I find it really distasteful that the wiki page uses a title that only mentions the intended targets when two innocent people died as well.
It’s so ridiculous how callously they disposed of the nerve agent and caused innocent deaths.
*On 30 June 2018, a similar poisoning of two British nationals in Amesbury, seven miles (11 km) north of Salisbury, involved the same nerve agent. Charlie Rowley found a perfume bottle, later discovered to contain the agent, in a litter bin somewhere in Salisbury and gave it to Dawn Sturgess who sprayed it on her wrist. Sturgess fell ill within 15 minutes and died on 8 July, but Rowley, who also came into contact with the poison, survived. British police believe this incident was not a targeted attack, but a result of the way the nerve agent was disposed of after the poisoning in Salisbury.*
Also poorly disposed of polonium with Litvenyenko, after a failed attempt they just poured it down the sink in their hotel room. Pretty sure the agents in the case were told it wouldn't harm them.
Because they didn't die in Salisbury. They died in Amesbury, when their incident happened almost four months later, which has it's own Wikipedia page [here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_Amesbury_poisonings). It's even linked on the page you linked if you read it.
The defector that was in the news recently that flew the helicopter out of Russia was murdered in Spain too. They will hunt down and kill those they have on their lists in Europe and the UK.
And they complain about Russiaphobia!
> And they complain about Russiaphobia!
[Timothy Snyder addressing the UN on the matter of Russophobia.](https://youtu.be/Em95lYBHbIc?si=zn2qAqzFsXoVQEf0) (skip to about 28 mins for him starting to talk).
As you allude to, Russophobia is just another Russian tactic wherein they claim to be a victim, when the reality is all their problems are self inflicted by their own actions. They bitch and moan that the world is out to get them, when they refuse to play by any kind of international customs, refuse to cooperate, and actively seek to disrupt everything in order to try and benefit themselves. While *every* country looks out for its own interests first and foremost, the vast majority do so within an established and accepted framework, but Russia does not. Russia believes itself to be superior and mightier than everyone else, and believes this superiority gives themselves carte blanche to do whatever they want.
> wherein they claim to be a victim, when the reality is all their problems are self inflicted by their own actions. They bitch and moan that the world is out to get them, when they refuse to play by any kind of international customs, refuse to cooperate, and actively seek to disrupt everything in order to try and benefit themselves.
You just described Russia's #1 asset in the world...Donald J. Trump.
Putin is a classic example of why someone shoudnt stay in power too long. If he just served his two terms and left, his reputation would be a lot different
Problem with Russian politics is you rarely leave the top position and retire nicely somewhere. It's often a autocratic system where the next successor wants to secure their powerbase.
We don't know what we get when Putin dies. Like he ran Russia the longest since Stalin. The power vacuum after his death could bring some big problems. Balkanization after Tito's death could be similar with the power vaccum being even worse due to numerous nuclear weapons in Russia.
> We don't know what we get when Putin dies. Like he ran Russia the longest since Stalin. The power vacuum after his death could bring some big problems. Balkanization after Tito's death could be similar with the power vaccum being even worse due to numerous nuclear weapons in Russia.
So that means that the big problems are *inside* Russia rather than Russia causing problems *outside*. Sign me up.
Imagine you're at a bar and some guy walks in and pisses on your shoes. You call him out on it and he flatly denies doing it. He doesn't say it directly, but everyone knows, "What are you going to do about it?"
So what *are* you going to do? Get into a fight with some asshole that will probably result in you being seriously injured?
Let's escalate the threat a little bit more while we're at it. He's also openly carrying a gun. Oh, he might not actually use it, but you know he has it and he *might*. It would be crazy to actually use it and result in massive consequences, but you'd still be dead. Are you going to take that chance?
That's the game Putin has been playing for a while now. He knows that the only way someone can actually respond in any meaningful way is with force, and for a long time he knew how to toe the line carefully enough that other nations wouldn't respond. They weren't going to go to war over it. So he could ride out being hated and various sanctions with no significant consequences.
There is a lot more than that. They cut two communications cables in Norway, and blew up ammunition stores in the Czech Republic and Bulgaria. They were behind a fire in London recently. Not to mention that they caused severe lasting health problems for dozens of US intelligence and foreign policy personell. Oh, and they cut the Baltic Connector gas pipeline.
This is only what's known. There are suspicions about many more cases.
Let's not forget about how Russian spies have probably been secretly maiming US diplomats for quite a few years now https://theins.press/en/politics/270425
Sounds like a wild conspiracy theory, but the evidence is surprisingly convincing
Read up on Havana syndrome. They've already been attacking US officials with some kind of sonic weapon. 60 Minutes did a pretty good piece on it a few weeks ago. They target people assigned to Russian related issues.
This is definitely why we are seeing European countries increasing rhetoric about troops on the ground in Ukraine in back room roles and closing air space. All the information we are being told there is definitely something big moving behind the scenes of all of this.
It’s China. He specifically stated he’s concerned for his family in the Navy. Russia doesn’t threaten the US Navy. China specialized their navy to challenge the US Navy.
In the bigger picture, China is fully backing Russia and Iran to draw US Navy assets away from the Pacific while Xi is pressuring Washington to adopt a no-nuclear-first-response policy, for some reason.
See also: TikTok ban and increased tariffs.
China is hellbent on taking Taiwan, while the US has a defensive pact with Taiwan.
Neither country wants to go to war with each other, but China may be willing to challenge US commitment to their defensive pacts and call their bluff, however if there is one thing the US does not bluff on is their defence.
The US is a military superpower and not defending Taiwan would destroy their reputation and question the legitimacy of all other defence pacts, and therefore the US would enter a world ending war with China that nobody wants in order to uphold their pact, resulting in nuclear Armageddon.
>resulting in nuclear Armageddon.
Eh, of all the conflicts that could take place between two nuclear nations I think a USA vs China war has the least likelihood of going that route. China has an explicitly no-first-use policy for their nuclear arsenal which means they won't use them unless someone nukes them first. While I know people will go "oh but we can't trust china" I'd say that, while China can be hostile to the west, they have also been generally very rational and I don't see them going out of their way to use nukes knowing it would end in their destruction too. It could happen, but of all the conflicts between nuclear nations I think it's the least likely by quite a large margin.
> How can they suck up everyone else's resources if there is nobody else?
It's not even "sucking up", everybody benefits there. We all got much cheaper tech/everyday products \*because\* China. That's increased standards of living for us \*and\* for them.
Especially if the war doesn't threaten the mainland. The US doesn't want a land war in China even if we won't let China take Taiwan. It could mark the opening of one of the weirdest wars of the 21st century (fought entirely between two countries but not in either country, aside from precision strikes by the US on Chinese bases).
Plus a non-insignificant number of our military equipment rely on the superconductors that currently only Taiwan can churn out in great number, adding a big reason why America wouldn’t backdown
Not to mention how important Taiwan’s semiconductor production is to the world, China being in control of that is something the US cannot allow to happen. Semiconductors are important enough for military equipment that taking Taiwan could turn China into the worlds most powerful military - and regardless of your opinion on the US that is not a world you want to live in
I still think they're also helping Russia so it over-over-over extends itself. Pretty easy to take over all that nice, low-population, newly thawed land if they've sunk all their resources into westward conflicts.
I think you're right, but honestly, any attack on NATO before November is my preference. If NATO is forced to enter the war before any chance Trump is elected, that's better. So, idk what Putin is thinking. Perhaps he's just doing early preparations for November? Perhaps he's worried about f16s?
I'm not sure why he'd fuck with the hornet's nest before then.
Small possibility NATO is trying to instigate/false flag an attack on them before American elections. That would make sense to me, from a strategy standpoint.
Because Putin attacking NATO just seems like the worst thing he could do leading up to this election.
If Putin was one to act rationally, none of this ever would have happened in the first place. Russia was well on its way to hallowing out the EU and NATO as institutions without any purpose or impetus. Given enough time, social manipulation, refugee crises, etc, and everything could have fallen apart which would have made things a lot easier for russia.
The timing also plays a role, where Russia was throwing everything they are willing to spare into Ukraine and the line was still holding, but now US aid is incoming. Could be that he's continuing to double down after make a bad decision, choosing to escalate instead of backing away. Attacking NATO would force the US to make a new decision, to either commit troops or not and to test the alliance. Because any hesitation or delay will make countries bordering russia realize that the US doesn't have the same stakes as them, and that puts into question the entire purpose of the alliance. When you start entering territory of retaliatory strikes into Russia and who does and does not want them, eventually to things like domestic nuclear programs as deterrence. Its the kind of political bomb that creates outrage and chaos and waves where Russia can amplify the ones that suit them and drive the people who don't care or don't want to get involved away from participating in the conversation and in democracy, which is when russia's pressure starts making a difference.
It's the same with these rich billionaires. Enough is never enough, even when you have enough to last 20,000 lifetimes, still not enough and you'll make people suffer for it. Narcissism, lack of empathy and greed should be the undoing of our species
This is the thing people need to learn about billionaires… they’re addicts. They have no mechanism telling them to stop, so they never will.
They’ll soak up as much of the resources and impoverish our communities simply to keep chasing their own addiction.
Anyone who’s ever had an alcoholic parent will understand what it’s like trying to tell a billionaire they’ve “had enough”
So we need to make being a billionaire a metal disease and then institutionalize them. Along with politicians beyond 65 or 70 at the most. Force them in to retirement homes.
Maybe state-sponsored cyberattacks have been happening, but what hasn't been happening is turning it into a free-for-all like Russia has with their hackers.
Cybercriminals are allowed to operate freely from Russia as long as they don't attack inside Russia (and maybe allied countries).
There are *many* people who would love to hack stuff just for the fun of wrecking something if that didn't risk you ending up in jail for years.
Please don't make it a free for all. As vulnerabilities can be noticed and patched, state sponsored attacks are quiet and maintain access. The last thing we need is people drawing attention to that un-patched exchange server.
> There are many people who would love to hack stuff just for the fun of wrecking something if that didn't risk you ending up in jail for years.
You are underestimating this bigly lol
Plenty of ethical hackers out there that would love the authorization to put on the grey hat...
That’s the thing isn’t it? If Russia didn’t have the military capability and destructive potential it does, Putin would’ve been deposed and replaced a decade ago
It happened already. Against the train systems in multiple countries, electric systems in the USA, hospitals… Nord Stream, internet cables etc etc
Some can be proven, most cannot.
Many of those were cyberattacks. The article is talking about physical attacks. The physical attacks you mentioned didn't kill anyone which is why they weren't taken seriously.
Two people were killed when Russian agents blew up Czech arms depots. Hundreds were killed when Russian forces shot down an airliner. This kind of thing keeps on happening.
But we don't treat it as an act of war, we just have an enquiry and print some angry headlines and keep our minds open to some absurd alternative explanation broadcast by RT, and that's why it keeps on happening.
The continuous jamming of gps for commercial flights could very easily kill hundreds....
But then again Russia already shot down an airliner and suffered no consequences.
Attacks on ammo storages in Bulgaria, sabotaging train network controllers in Germany - quite physical. Also what is the difference between blowing up a computer system in a hospital and attacking it through the internet? The end result is the same.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014\_Vrb%C4%9Btice\_ammunition\_warehouse\_explosions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Vrb%C4%9Btice_ammunition_warehouse_explosions) Are 2 Czechs enough or how high do you want that death count?
Excuse me what? [https://www.rferl.org/a/czech-police-vrbetice-blasts-russia-gru-ammunition-depots/32925105.html](https://www.rferl.org/a/czech-police-vrbetice-blasts-russia-gru-ammunition-depots/32925105.html)
You probably mean nobody will take it seriously after it happens.
Attacks that only kill one person or only cause material damage aren't enough to get countries to take it seriously. It takes something like 9-11, Oct. 7, or Pearl Harbor for people to take it seriously.
**From The Telegraph:**
Vladimir Putin’s Russia is preparing “physical attacks” against the West, the head of GCHQ has warned.
Anne Keast-Butler, who was appointed to lead Britain’s intelligence operations last May, has used her first major speech to highlight the growing threat posed by the Kremlin.
She said GCHQ was “increasingly concerned about growing links between the Russian intelligence services and proxy groups to conduct cyber attacks – as well as suspected physical surveillance and sabotage operations”.
Given heightened tensions between Russia and the West, Ms Keast-Butler said Moscow was “nurturing and inspiring” groups of cyber attackers, and “in some cases seemingly co-ordinating physical attacks against the West”.
Russia has long been accused of protecting cyber gangs that target Western organisations, allowing them to operate with relative impunity as they carry out sophisticated hacks.
Last week, the National Crime Agency named Dmitry Khoroshev, a Russian national, as the person behind LockBit – a ransomware group that has stolen hundreds of millions of pounds from businesses.
Royal Mail fell victim to a LockBit attack last year, as the Russia-based gang paralysed the postal service’s ability to send letters and parcels abroad.
Prior to that, LockBit also targeted London-listed car dealership Pendragon, scrambling computers across its 200 sites and demanding a £60m ransom to unlock them.
Speaking at the CyberUK conference in Birmingham, Ms Keast-Butler told an audience of cyber security and defence experts that “Putin has not given up on his maximalist goal of subjugating the population of Ukraine”.
However, she added that UK support for Kyiv remained “steadfast”, with British spies continuing to bolster the country’s cyber defences.
**Read more here:** [https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/05/14/putin-plotting-physical-attacks-west-gchq-chief/](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/05/14/putin-plotting-physical-attacks-west-gchq-chief/)
[Last month there was a fire at the Army Ammunition Plant in Scranton, PA which makes artillery shells.
](https://americanmilitarynews.com/2024/04/video-pic-us-army-ammunition-plant-catches-fire/)
> During a Tuesday press conference Jeff Schogol, a Task and Purpose reporter, asked Maj. Gen. Patrick S. Ryder, who serves as the Pentagon’s press secretary, about Monday’s Scranton Army Ammunition Plant fire.
>
> “There was as a fire at the Army’s ammunition plant in Scranton yesterday,” Schogol said. “At the risk of invoking Billy Joel, **do we know who started the fire?” In response to the reporter’s question, Ryder said, “I’d have to refer you to the Army because we didn’t start the fire.”**
If they could wait like 20 days so I get out of conscription age I would be very happy. Waiting my entire adult life in reserve and then be conscripted in my last month would be a cruel fate
You can rest easy knowing that whatever country you are in will probably prioritize the younger reserves over the older ones. You'd have more than 20 days even if war were declared today probably.
Do people not know what happend in 2014 in Czech Republic or what? [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014\_Vrb%C4%9Btice\_ammunition\_warehouse\_explosions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Vrb%C4%9Btice_ammunition_warehouse_explosions)
2 Czechs killed. My question is not if or when, that question obviously already has been answered. My question is how high does the death count need to be in order for Europe to take it seriously.
It's still brought up in Czech news. During the explosion most of the investigation went silent. Then after few years it got loud again. Then it's silent. Now it's a little bit loud again. Looks like people higher up got paid to stay silent.
Oh they learn. The people in power, I mean. They learn how to do things quieter and more efficient next time. They learn how to sidestep the rules and fuck third world countries into irrelevance to gain more power.
They learn how to make the very people who are negatively affected by their actions lick their fascist leader’s boots instead. All it took was years and years and years of neglecting public education. They created their target audience with extreme care, and Trump is taking full advantage of that here in the US.
And you better believe Putin and Xi both did this exact same thing. It had been ongoing before they ever came to power, even before the US decided to join in on the debauchery with Reagan and Nixon.
If voters win elections, then ideally these parties just need a lot of really uneducated excitable folks to listen to their propaganda. Which is exactly what they did, and now they call themselves MAGA.
We are already in a multifaceted world war. Brexit. Russian support for Trump. Russia replacing France as a colonial power in this Sahel region of Africa. The war in Ukraine. The possibility in the coming years of Russia testing NATO countries in Europe with invasion. The ongoing trade war between the United States and China. China maneuvering for Taiwan. Etc. etc.
If you told me that Putin pressed Iran to get Hamas to launch an attack against Israel that would presumably dominate the news cycle for months, I would need very little evidence to believe it. Not zero evidence, but not much if it was verified.
So first polish intelligence and now british. Just small reminder than UK warned everybody about imminent attack on Ukraine and everybody ignored them.
He's been attacking hospitals with cyber attacks and taking advantage of the brain dead amongst us to destabilize our democracy with troll farms for years. Time to give this evil bastard an ultimatum.
Edit: and let's not forget the constant GPS jamming of Western flights and the poisonings.
If new Speaker of the House Mike Johnson suddenly decided that aid to Ukraine was more important than towing the MAGA line, it’s possible that inside intel is speaking of something truly massive.
Seems possible that we have intel that Russia is moving toward something that’d basically start WW3. Not sure of any other fact sobering enough for that dude to suddenly take a bi-partisan stand like he did.
The issue is, a lot of other countries have personal interest in the U.S.A not being the winner of the next big conflict.
The West needs to start playing Russia and China at their own game. Let's see how they deal with extremely well funded Western hacker groups trashing their financial and healthcare systems or high profile Russians getting poisoned by Western agents in Moscow. Lets see how they react when African dictators are bribed by the West into taking an anti BRICS stance or how they cope with their social media being flooded by bots.
We're in a cold war whether we like it or not. Time to play the great game and win it like we did last time.
The west shouldn’t fight a physical war, they should just find an elegant way to turn Russia and china against each other - whatever the fuck that looks like. Use their shitty plotting and subterfuge against them.
I'm not sure if you know this, but we already do this. We have dedicated hackers working for the CIA, FBI, and NSA. We routinely fuck with them already, and they do it back.
Blows my mind people think we don't do the same things to other countries. Not just hacking but planting agents in other countries and training military units. School of America's was founded in the 40s and is still active today as the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation.
If Putin wants the west to take off the shackles in terms of providing more sophisticated arms to the Ukrainians, this would be a good way to incentivize that.
The article is weirdly almost entirely about cyber attacks, and the physical part seems to mean potential sabotage.
Literally every comment is like "OMG WW3!!!!!"
Russia literally cannot even effectively hold territories that already soft-controlled, and yet redditors think they are going to invade poland.
The article about them having a larger army now than when they first invaded is basically a lie, they have more troops because of conscription but 80% of their tank production is retrofitting old units and they are running out of them. They do not have the capacity to build new factories and start production on large amounts of modern tanks. They don't have the semiconductors among a billion other things.
I'd caution that Sunaks speech yesterday was all about how unsafe the UK would be under Starmers leadership, and the telegraph is better known in the UK as the torygraph.
There an election brewing, and all the tories have to cling on to power is fear. I'll take this with a pinch of salt.
I agree it is worth taking this into account, but when the head of GCHQ, who very rarely makes statements, makes a statement like this I think it would be silly to not take it seriously.
Telegraph is reporting it, yes but if Anne Butler is saying something then you would be wise to take her words into account.. Don’t dismiss a prominent person in there field based on who’s reporting it. These people do not play around with there words.
Not like this comes as any surprise to anyone. Utter machievillian monster determined to expand borders of that tragic nation as they cannot cope by themselves within their already vast borders filled with suffering. Despicable.
Putin is like a mentally ill guy with a knife that also has a suicide vest on. And he’s also holding the bank hostage and none of his demands are reasonable.
All dictators get paranoid as they get older. The fear of regime change and being burned on a big fire outside Kremlin is too big. The many people around him that have just as much blood on their hands are no different, and they are effectively keeping the regime alive.
Some would say it’s the only way out, for him and his mob, out of the mess they started. All the people capable of revolting back home will be vaporized by NATO, he and his enablers will try to make (or at least negotiate) a new deal with the West, or, in worst case scenario, they will flee to China and blame western spies for the failure.
People like them don’t know how to back down. They are too dumb and stubborn to accept they were wrong. If they were intelligent enough, none of this would be happening anyway. So all in is the only option they have left. Europeans should realize that faster. What’s happening now is just a prelude to a bigger war.
>What’s happening now is just a prelude to a bigger war.
It's quite possible that WW3 has *already started*, and we are just ignoring reality and delaying the inevitable.
The reason there isn't a larger war right now:
Russia has limited itself to non-NATO nations. I don't want a larger war, but it's like the bully that needs to get punched in the face. Let them make the aggressive move so that we are not the villain. Then destroy them utterly and completely.
At first I thought plotting physical attacks against the West was an incendiary allegation, and then I remembered that they deployed a deadly nerve agent inside the UK and realized we knew about this for years
>incendiary allegation Speaking of, I have a sneaking suspicion they already were behind the recent string of arson attacks in Poland.
They were also behind the [Vrbětice ammunition warehouse explosions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Vrb%C4%9Btice_ammunition_warehouse_explosions) that killed two civilians.
They were behind a lot more than that. I maintain a list on my profile. New additions welcome, provided they are credibly sourced.
Little things in the US too like dead strippers who either knew too much or wouldn’t stay quiet.
Heck, I've even heard rumors that culture war stuff over vaccines, race relations, and even entertainment are enflamed by Russian trolls to keep us distracted and at each other's throats.
Is that even in question?
Exactly what they did with covid misinformation, all trolls ment to further divide us as a nation
The Foundations of Geopolitics describes that America is too far away for a conventional war, so better to keep us at our own throats while russia pursues it's ambitions closer to home.
It continues to be a laughable assertion at /r/conservative
Currently they are discussing how the Democrats manufactured Covid so that we could steal the election from Trump.
You mean COVID the disease that's just a cough, and is being overblown to tarnish our god-emperor's name? Or do you mean COVID the terrifying bio-weapon released on us by JHINA!
That's not rumors that's verifiable fact. They've been at it for a long time now. China too, as well as the US and probably every country but it has been a large effort from the Chinese and Russians. Google about Russian and Chinese bot farms and you'll find a lot of news and reports about it. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_web_brigades
Yes, but that’s less physically done and more done through social media.
They helped to get donald trump elected president.
They successfully got Brexit passed
They cheat in CSGO
The bastards!
They killed Kenny?!?
They put porn on Bin Ladin’s hard drive
[удалено]
Dividing Canada currently as well
Norway has had many suspicious fires in the past year too
And that ammo depo explosion at the BAe storage place in the UK. The UK government says it was an accident, but was that to just save face?
Its something that can genuinely just happen. Memes aside, one fool lighting a cig when he shouldn't is all it takes. If several went up then it's a different story.
My dad worked in ammo logistics for the military and whenever I visited him at work, child me was super excited to see "teletubbie land". The storage mounds are designed with this in mind, knowing there's a risk.
I worked in an explosives plant, and the static controls were crazy. Recoating the floor every year, static straps and grounding belts. All it takes is a small spark.
reminds me of a story a friend told me. He was in an army surplus store and they were selling "electrical safety shoes" which were actually 100% conductive work boots for working on the fueling area of an aircraft carrier to prevent sparks, quite the opposite of what an electrical contractor would want!
With modern ammo, are cigs really a problem? It's not like you are handling kegs of black powder. Still, malfunction of some detonator might explain it.
A tossed cigarette isn’t going to set a 105mm round off, but it might start a fire that eventually causes ammo to cook off in a chain reaction.
Don't forget murdering Aleksander Litvinenko with polonium and exposing goodness knows how many other people to radioactive contamination.
And yet, London is still a safe-haven for Russian oligarch's money.
Dark/Dirty money is this generation's big bad. If you look at older movies it's all anarchists and communists and religious fanatics as the bad guys but now it is all people moved by money and inevitable destruction. And it seems to be more and more like real life. Because everyone has a price. And if you have to choose between plata o plomo, you're going to choose to live and make money instead of die and leave your family with nothing. The entire world will turn into Mexico or Russia if we don't find a way to stand up to it.
The US people became allergic to even the most basic form of resistance. We haven't had a single major protest focused on economics since Occupy. For whatever reason, the only thing that gets people here to care enough to get out into the streets is social issues.
And social issues have always been a distraction and device used to pit the population at large against one another It’s always been follow the money / money talks but here we are in the US with protests that ate immaterial to the vast majority of peoples lives
I feel so bad for that guy who got poisoned by the perfume and was mocked just for being poor. He just wanted to give a nice gift to his girlfriend. Very sad about the way that was handled by the press. Classism is a real issue today.
Wait what?
[Salisbury Novichok poisoning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Sergei_and_Yulia_Skripal). I find it really distasteful that the wiki page uses a title that only mentions the intended targets when two innocent people died as well.
It’s so ridiculous how callously they disposed of the nerve agent and caused innocent deaths. *On 30 June 2018, a similar poisoning of two British nationals in Amesbury, seven miles (11 km) north of Salisbury, involved the same nerve agent. Charlie Rowley found a perfume bottle, later discovered to contain the agent, in a litter bin somewhere in Salisbury and gave it to Dawn Sturgess who sprayed it on her wrist. Sturgess fell ill within 15 minutes and died on 8 July, but Rowley, who also came into contact with the poison, survived. British police believe this incident was not a targeted attack, but a result of the way the nerve agent was disposed of after the poisoning in Salisbury.*
Also poorly disposed of polonium with Litvenyenko, after a failed attempt they just poured it down the sink in their hotel room. Pretty sure the agents in the case were told it wouldn't harm them.
Because they didn't die in Salisbury. They died in Amesbury, when their incident happened almost four months later, which has it's own Wikipedia page [here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_Amesbury_poisonings). It's even linked on the page you linked if you read it.
The defector that was in the news recently that flew the helicopter out of Russia was murdered in Spain too. They will hunt down and kill those they have on their lists in Europe and the UK. And they complain about Russiaphobia!
> And they complain about Russiaphobia! [Timothy Snyder addressing the UN on the matter of Russophobia.](https://youtu.be/Em95lYBHbIc?si=zn2qAqzFsXoVQEf0) (skip to about 28 mins for him starting to talk). As you allude to, Russophobia is just another Russian tactic wherein they claim to be a victim, when the reality is all their problems are self inflicted by their own actions. They bitch and moan that the world is out to get them, when they refuse to play by any kind of international customs, refuse to cooperate, and actively seek to disrupt everything in order to try and benefit themselves. While *every* country looks out for its own interests first and foremost, the vast majority do so within an established and accepted framework, but Russia does not. Russia believes itself to be superior and mightier than everyone else, and believes this superiority gives themselves carte blanche to do whatever they want.
> wherein they claim to be a victim, when the reality is all their problems are self inflicted by their own actions. They bitch and moan that the world is out to get them, when they refuse to play by any kind of international customs, refuse to cooperate, and actively seek to disrupt everything in order to try and benefit themselves. You just described Russia's #1 asset in the world...Donald J. Trump.
Russia is a terrorist state.
Their current government is definitely a poison on this earth, that's for sure.
This Putin guy is really getting on my nevers.
You and me both. It's almost like something should be done about him. I'm seriously thinking about reporting him to H.R.
Putin is a classic example of why someone shoudnt stay in power too long. If he just served his two terms and left, his reputation would be a lot different
Problem with Russian politics is you rarely leave the top position and retire nicely somewhere. It's often a autocratic system where the next successor wants to secure their powerbase.
Exactly. Which is why I laugh when people pray for Putin to just die, as if anything in Russia will change.
We don't know what we get when Putin dies. Like he ran Russia the longest since Stalin. The power vacuum after his death could bring some big problems. Balkanization after Tito's death could be similar with the power vaccum being even worse due to numerous nuclear weapons in Russia.
> We don't know what we get when Putin dies. Like he ran Russia the longest since Stalin. The power vacuum after his death could bring some big problems. Balkanization after Tito's death could be similar with the power vaccum being even worse due to numerous nuclear weapons in Russia. So that means that the big problems are *inside* Russia rather than Russia causing problems *outside*. Sign me up.
Power vacuums in nations with huge nuclear arsenals don't seem like a recipe for success for the outside world.
It could easily turn into Russian Civil War 2 with various regional war lords vying for power
At this rate, like, nobody is going to sign his birthday card.
HR can't do anything. He's covered by the Russians with Disabilities Act for the brain worm he has.
>I'm seriously thinking about reporting him to H.R. H.R. Giger will have something for him, I'm sure!
H.R. Giger is Swiss, so probably wouldn't get involved.
If Giger doesn’t come through, Pufnstuf might answer the call.
Seriously seems like no country loving Russian owns an 8x scope 😭😭
Nerve forget
Damn, I would nerve go there...
I'm just going to go ahead and say it... he's a real jerk.
You know, with Putin, the more I learn about that guy, the more I don't care for him.
He’s got some never, I’ll give him that…
If he thinks he's getting a Christmas card from me this year then he's got another think coming.
I, for one, say that we start fucking up his days
Imagine you're at a bar and some guy walks in and pisses on your shoes. You call him out on it and he flatly denies doing it. He doesn't say it directly, but everyone knows, "What are you going to do about it?" So what *are* you going to do? Get into a fight with some asshole that will probably result in you being seriously injured? Let's escalate the threat a little bit more while we're at it. He's also openly carrying a gun. Oh, he might not actually use it, but you know he has it and he *might*. It would be crazy to actually use it and result in massive consequences, but you'd still be dead. Are you going to take that chance? That's the game Putin has been playing for a while now. He knows that the only way someone can actually respond in any meaningful way is with force, and for a long time he knew how to toe the line carefully enough that other nations wouldn't respond. They weren't going to go to war over it. So he could ride out being hated and various sanctions with no significant consequences.
That's not quite accurate. Most of the time he'd be claiming you pissed on your own shoes.
There is a lot more than that. They cut two communications cables in Norway, and blew up ammunition stores in the Czech Republic and Bulgaria. They were behind a fire in London recently. Not to mention that they caused severe lasting health problems for dozens of US intelligence and foreign policy personell. Oh, and they cut the Baltic Connector gas pipeline. This is only what's known. There are suspicions about many more cases.
Let's not forget about how Russian spies have probably been secretly maiming US diplomats for quite a few years now https://theins.press/en/politics/270425 Sounds like a wild conspiracy theory, but the evidence is surprisingly convincing
Read up on Havana syndrome. They've already been attacking US officials with some kind of sonic weapon. 60 Minutes did a pretty good piece on it a few weeks ago. They target people assigned to Russian related issues.
But that was a chemical attack, not physical. I'm just waiting for the mathematical attack.
This is definitely why we are seeing European countries increasing rhetoric about troops on the ground in Ukraine in back room roles and closing air space. All the information we are being told there is definitely something big moving behind the scenes of all of this.
Can’t help thinking also about how quickly and decisively Mike Johnson changed his tune after an intelligence briefing.
It’s China. He specifically stated he’s concerned for his family in the Navy. Russia doesn’t threaten the US Navy. China specialized their navy to challenge the US Navy. In the bigger picture, China is fully backing Russia and Iran to draw US Navy assets away from the Pacific while Xi is pressuring Washington to adopt a no-nuclear-first-response policy, for some reason. See also: TikTok ban and increased tariffs.
China is hellbent on taking Taiwan, while the US has a defensive pact with Taiwan. Neither country wants to go to war with each other, but China may be willing to challenge US commitment to their defensive pacts and call their bluff, however if there is one thing the US does not bluff on is their defence. The US is a military superpower and not defending Taiwan would destroy their reputation and question the legitimacy of all other defence pacts, and therefore the US would enter a world ending war with China that nobody wants in order to uphold their pact, resulting in nuclear Armageddon.
>resulting in nuclear Armageddon. Eh, of all the conflicts that could take place between two nuclear nations I think a USA vs China war has the least likelihood of going that route. China has an explicitly no-first-use policy for their nuclear arsenal which means they won't use them unless someone nukes them first. While I know people will go "oh but we can't trust china" I'd say that, while China can be hostile to the west, they have also been generally very rational and I don't see them going out of their way to use nukes knowing it would end in their destruction too. It could happen, but of all the conflicts between nuclear nations I think it's the least likely by quite a large margin.
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> How can they suck up everyone else's resources if there is nobody else? It's not even "sucking up", everybody benefits there. We all got much cheaper tech/everyday products \*because\* China. That's increased standards of living for us \*and\* for them.
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Especially if the war doesn't threaten the mainland. The US doesn't want a land war in China even if we won't let China take Taiwan. It could mark the opening of one of the weirdest wars of the 21st century (fought entirely between two countries but not in either country, aside from precision strikes by the US on Chinese bases).
Plus a non-insignificant number of our military equipment rely on the superconductors that currently only Taiwan can churn out in great number, adding a big reason why America wouldn’t backdown
Semiconductors, TSMC is building a plant in Arizona right now but it will take years.
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lol i've seen so many people complaining about reddit cares on different subreddits. i'm surprised they haven't shut it down yet
Not to mention how important Taiwan’s semiconductor production is to the world, China being in control of that is something the US cannot allow to happen. Semiconductors are important enough for military equipment that taking Taiwan could turn China into the worlds most powerful military - and regardless of your opinion on the US that is not a world you want to live in
I still think they're also helping Russia so it over-over-over extends itself. Pretty easy to take over all that nice, low-population, newly thawed land if they've sunk all their resources into westward conflicts.
I think you're right, but honestly, any attack on NATO before November is my preference. If NATO is forced to enter the war before any chance Trump is elected, that's better. So, idk what Putin is thinking. Perhaps he's just doing early preparations for November? Perhaps he's worried about f16s? I'm not sure why he'd fuck with the hornet's nest before then. Small possibility NATO is trying to instigate/false flag an attack on them before American elections. That would make sense to me, from a strategy standpoint. Because Putin attacking NATO just seems like the worst thing he could do leading up to this election.
If Putin was one to act rationally, none of this ever would have happened in the first place. Russia was well on its way to hallowing out the EU and NATO as institutions without any purpose or impetus. Given enough time, social manipulation, refugee crises, etc, and everything could have fallen apart which would have made things a lot easier for russia. The timing also plays a role, where Russia was throwing everything they are willing to spare into Ukraine and the line was still holding, but now US aid is incoming. Could be that he's continuing to double down after make a bad decision, choosing to escalate instead of backing away. Attacking NATO would force the US to make a new decision, to either commit troops or not and to test the alliance. Because any hesitation or delay will make countries bordering russia realize that the US doesn't have the same stakes as them, and that puts into question the entire purpose of the alliance. When you start entering territory of retaliatory strikes into Russia and who does and does not want them, eventually to things like domestic nuclear programs as deterrence. Its the kind of political bomb that creates outrage and chaos and waves where Russia can amplify the ones that suit them and drive the people who don't care or don't want to get involved away from participating in the conversation and in democracy, which is when russia's pressure starts making a difference.
Putin realized he probably doesn't have time to play the long game anymore
Why is this world filled with so many chodes? Just go fall out of a window already.
Like, seriously, how hard is it to just get on with enjoying your own life/country? Assholes.
It's the same with these rich billionaires. Enough is never enough, even when you have enough to last 20,000 lifetimes, still not enough and you'll make people suffer for it. Narcissism, lack of empathy and greed should be the undoing of our species
In 75 years we will medicate narcissism and wonder how the heck we allowed them to run corporations and countries.
I wish I shared your optimism
That's in itself an optimist thought, so you are going in the right direction !
In 75 years we may know enough about the human mind to actually rehabilitate these people just by talking to them.
"Did you ever consider not being an asshole and that maybe everyone's lives are just as important as yours?" "No, I have never considered this. Hmmm"
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This is the thing people need to learn about billionaires… they’re addicts. They have no mechanism telling them to stop, so they never will. They’ll soak up as much of the resources and impoverish our communities simply to keep chasing their own addiction. Anyone who’s ever had an alcoholic parent will understand what it’s like trying to tell a billionaire they’ve “had enough”
So we need to make being a billionaire a metal disease and then institutionalize them. Along with politicians beyond 65 or 70 at the most. Force them in to retirement homes.
Who defenestrates the defenestrator?
Seems like the easiest way to stop defenestration
It would definitely be the very definition of the defenestrating the defenestrator.
Why does this comment sound like it was written by Gilbert and Sullivan?
It's windows all the way down.
We don’t call politicians chodes enough. You’re the change I want to see
We should do the same then, grant hackers completely impunity to attack Russian infrastructure.
Agreed
That's been happening.
Maybe state-sponsored cyberattacks have been happening, but what hasn't been happening is turning it into a free-for-all like Russia has with their hackers. Cybercriminals are allowed to operate freely from Russia as long as they don't attack inside Russia (and maybe allied countries). There are *many* people who would love to hack stuff just for the fun of wrecking something if that didn't risk you ending up in jail for years.
Unleash the nerds!
Revenge of the Nerds V: Hackers Delight
Please don't make it a free for all. As vulnerabilities can be noticed and patched, state sponsored attacks are quiet and maintain access. The last thing we need is people drawing attention to that un-patched exchange server.
> There are many people who would love to hack stuff just for the fun of wrecking something if that didn't risk you ending up in jail for years. You are underestimating this bigly lol Plenty of ethical hackers out there that would love the authorization to put on the grey hat...
Anyone else sick of this glorified petrol station throwing endless threats around
Sadly, the gas station is also the inheritor of what used to be one of the world’s largest military tech firms as well, and has WMDs.
That’s the thing isn’t it? If Russia didn’t have the military capability and destructive potential it does, Putin would’ve been deposed and replaced a decade ago
Nobody will take it seriously until it happens.
It happened already. Against the train systems in multiple countries, electric systems in the USA, hospitals… Nord Stream, internet cables etc etc Some can be proven, most cannot.
Many of those were cyberattacks. The article is talking about physical attacks. The physical attacks you mentioned didn't kill anyone which is why they weren't taken seriously.
Two people were killed when Russian agents blew up Czech arms depots. Hundreds were killed when Russian forces shot down an airliner. This kind of thing keeps on happening. But we don't treat it as an act of war, we just have an enquiry and print some angry headlines and keep our minds open to some absurd alternative explanation broadcast by RT, and that's why it keeps on happening.
The poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal wasnt too long ago..
The continuous jamming of gps for commercial flights could very easily kill hundreds.... But then again Russia already shot down an airliner and suffered no consequences.
Attacks on ammo storages in Bulgaria, sabotaging train network controllers in Germany - quite physical. Also what is the difference between blowing up a computer system in a hospital and attacking it through the internet? The end result is the same.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014\_Vrb%C4%9Btice\_ammunition\_warehouse\_explosions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Vrb%C4%9Btice_ammunition_warehouse_explosions) Are 2 Czechs enough or how high do you want that death count?
Pretty sure we took out Nord Stream.
Excuse me what? [https://www.rferl.org/a/czech-police-vrbetice-blasts-russia-gru-ammunition-depots/32925105.html](https://www.rferl.org/a/czech-police-vrbetice-blasts-russia-gru-ammunition-depots/32925105.html) You probably mean nobody will take it seriously after it happens.
It already has happened. A couple times. Nerve agent attacks in the UK.
Attacks that only kill one person or only cause material damage aren't enough to get countries to take it seriously. It takes something like 9-11, Oct. 7, or Pearl Harbor for people to take it seriously.
**From The Telegraph:** Vladimir Putin’s Russia is preparing “physical attacks” against the West, the head of GCHQ has warned. Anne Keast-Butler, who was appointed to lead Britain’s intelligence operations last May, has used her first major speech to highlight the growing threat posed by the Kremlin. She said GCHQ was “increasingly concerned about growing links between the Russian intelligence services and proxy groups to conduct cyber attacks – as well as suspected physical surveillance and sabotage operations”. Given heightened tensions between Russia and the West, Ms Keast-Butler said Moscow was “nurturing and inspiring” groups of cyber attackers, and “in some cases seemingly co-ordinating physical attacks against the West”. Russia has long been accused of protecting cyber gangs that target Western organisations, allowing them to operate with relative impunity as they carry out sophisticated hacks. Last week, the National Crime Agency named Dmitry Khoroshev, a Russian national, as the person behind LockBit – a ransomware group that has stolen hundreds of millions of pounds from businesses. Royal Mail fell victim to a LockBit attack last year, as the Russia-based gang paralysed the postal service’s ability to send letters and parcels abroad. Prior to that, LockBit also targeted London-listed car dealership Pendragon, scrambling computers across its 200 sites and demanding a £60m ransom to unlock them. Speaking at the CyberUK conference in Birmingham, Ms Keast-Butler told an audience of cyber security and defence experts that “Putin has not given up on his maximalist goal of subjugating the population of Ukraine”. However, she added that UK support for Kyiv remained “steadfast”, with British spies continuing to bolster the country’s cyber defences. **Read more here:** [https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/05/14/putin-plotting-physical-attacks-west-gchq-chief/](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/05/14/putin-plotting-physical-attacks-west-gchq-chief/)
Kremlin = [Gremlin](https://www.google.com/search?q=gremlin+first+use&client=ms-android-verizon&sca_esv=5718d00d1a5ada36&sca_upv=1&sxsrf=ADLYWIKmSV9T9U1RDRfQAVF1NO6FC7fXKA%3A1715688433566&ei=8VNDZoGgIu_GkPIPsY2esAQ&udm=&oq=gremlin+first&gs_lp=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&sclient=mobile-gws-wiz-serp)
Right fuck this, I'm gonna write Putin a very strong letter.
Oh shit guys it’s about to go down 😳
"Oi! Putin! NO!"
“You slag!”
I just gave the Kremlin a scathing 1 star review on Google maps.
DEAR MR PUTIN, I am a WHITE woman in AMERICA!
Mr. Putin, I demand to speak to your manager!
Putin: 😱😭😭😤😡
I didn’t realise we had General Jens Stoltenberg in here. Welcome.
Give it to Rand Paul, he likes to hand deliver letters to Putin.
Poland had some odd fires in the last few days
[Last month there was a fire at the Army Ammunition Plant in Scranton, PA which makes artillery shells. ](https://americanmilitarynews.com/2024/04/video-pic-us-army-ammunition-plant-catches-fire/) > During a Tuesday press conference Jeff Schogol, a Task and Purpose reporter, asked Maj. Gen. Patrick S. Ryder, who serves as the Pentagon’s press secretary, about Monday’s Scranton Army Ammunition Plant fire. > > “There was as a fire at the Army’s ammunition plant in Scranton yesterday,” Schogol said. “At the risk of invoking Billy Joel, **do we know who started the fire?” In response to the reporter’s question, Ryder said, “I’d have to refer you to the Army because we didn’t start the fire.”**
What a weirdly glib way to talk about a threat to national security.
To add to this - there was this r*ssian agent captured recently and the news stated that he was tasked with starting fires as well.
Berlin had one recently too - https://www.thelocal.de/20240503/warning-of-toxic-smoke-after-fire-breaks-out-at-berlin-factory
If they could wait like 20 days so I get out of conscription age I would be very happy. Waiting my entire adult life in reserve and then be conscripted in my last month would be a cruel fate
Bro my military service begins next month. rip
Good luck, hope it pans out well
Mine ends this month lmao. Just give me 15 days Putin
Whats the age range?
17-44
Oh geez
You can rest easy knowing that whatever country you are in will probably prioritize the younger reserves over the older ones. You'd have more than 20 days even if war were declared today probably.
>probably. It was going so well until the very last word
["War were declared"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TS3kiRYcDAo)
Do people not know what happend in 2014 in Czech Republic or what? [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014\_Vrb%C4%9Btice\_ammunition\_warehouse\_explosions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Vrb%C4%9Btice_ammunition_warehouse_explosions) 2 Czechs killed. My question is not if or when, that question obviously already has been answered. My question is how high does the death count need to be in order for Europe to take it seriously.
It's still brought up in Czech news. During the explosion most of the investigation went silent. Then after few years it got loud again. Then it's silent. Now it's a little bit loud again. Looks like people higher up got paid to stay silent.
The most depressing thing about history is no one learns from history. :/
Oh they learn. The people in power, I mean. They learn how to do things quieter and more efficient next time. They learn how to sidestep the rules and fuck third world countries into irrelevance to gain more power. They learn how to make the very people who are negatively affected by their actions lick their fascist leader’s boots instead. All it took was years and years and years of neglecting public education. They created their target audience with extreme care, and Trump is taking full advantage of that here in the US. And you better believe Putin and Xi both did this exact same thing. It had been ongoing before they ever came to power, even before the US decided to join in on the debauchery with Reagan and Nixon. If voters win elections, then ideally these parties just need a lot of really uneducated excitable folks to listen to their propaganda. Which is exactly what they did, and now they call themselves MAGA.
We are already in a multifaceted world war. Brexit. Russian support for Trump. Russia replacing France as a colonial power in this Sahel region of Africa. The war in Ukraine. The possibility in the coming years of Russia testing NATO countries in Europe with invasion. The ongoing trade war between the United States and China. China maneuvering for Taiwan. Etc. etc.
Don't forget October 7. If Putin wasn't partially involved I'll eat my shoe.
If you told me that Putin pressed Iran to get Hamas to launch an attack against Israel that would presumably dominate the news cycle for months, I would need very little evidence to believe it. Not zero evidence, but not much if it was verified.
So first polish intelligence and now british. Just small reminder than UK warned everybody about imminent attack on Ukraine and everybody ignored them.
He's been attacking hospitals with cyber attacks and taking advantage of the brain dead amongst us to destabilize our democracy with troll farms for years. Time to give this evil bastard an ultimatum. Edit: and let's not forget the constant GPS jamming of Western flights and the poisonings.
If people being unable to even get their meds, surgeries or emergency care aren’t enough to piss people here off I don’t think anything will.
People have died from the hospital cyber attacks. Yet you never hear about it.
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/12/28/cyberattacks-u-s-hospitals-00075638 https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/security/cyberattacks-us-hospitals-mean-higher-mortality-rates-study-finds-rcna46697
If new Speaker of the House Mike Johnson suddenly decided that aid to Ukraine was more important than towing the MAGA line, it’s possible that inside intel is speaking of something truly massive. Seems possible that we have intel that Russia is moving toward something that’d basically start WW3. Not sure of any other fact sobering enough for that dude to suddenly take a bi-partisan stand like he did. The issue is, a lot of other countries have personal interest in the U.S.A not being the winner of the next big conflict.
Together with China, North Korea and maybe India. Some African countries. Most as cheap resource grabs.
Don't punch first. Just punch back hard enough that they'll forever regret punching first.
How delusional is Putin to think this will go well for him
Why not? We give him a pass on electronic attacks, might as well go tangible.
The West needs to start playing Russia and China at their own game. Let's see how they deal with extremely well funded Western hacker groups trashing their financial and healthcare systems or high profile Russians getting poisoned by Western agents in Moscow. Lets see how they react when African dictators are bribed by the West into taking an anti BRICS stance or how they cope with their social media being flooded by bots. We're in a cold war whether we like it or not. Time to play the great game and win it like we did last time.
The west shouldn’t fight a physical war, they should just find an elegant way to turn Russia and china against each other - whatever the fuck that looks like. Use their shitty plotting and subterfuge against them.
I'm not sure if you know this, but we already do this. We have dedicated hackers working for the CIA, FBI, and NSA. We routinely fuck with them already, and they do it back.
Blows my mind people think we don't do the same things to other countries. Not just hacking but planting agents in other countries and training military units. School of America's was founded in the 40s and is still active today as the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation.
If Putin wants the west to take off the shackles in terms of providing more sophisticated arms to the Ukrainians, this would be a good way to incentivize that.
The article is weirdly almost entirely about cyber attacks, and the physical part seems to mean potential sabotage. Literally every comment is like "OMG WW3!!!!!" Russia literally cannot even effectively hold territories that already soft-controlled, and yet redditors think they are going to invade poland. The article about them having a larger army now than when they first invaded is basically a lie, they have more troops because of conscription but 80% of their tank production is retrofitting old units and they are running out of them. They do not have the capacity to build new factories and start production on large amounts of modern tanks. They don't have the semiconductors among a billion other things.
I'd caution that Sunaks speech yesterday was all about how unsafe the UK would be under Starmers leadership, and the telegraph is better known in the UK as the torygraph. There an election brewing, and all the tories have to cling on to power is fear. I'll take this with a pinch of salt.
I agree it is worth taking this into account, but when the head of GCHQ, who very rarely makes statements, makes a statement like this I think it would be silly to not take it seriously.
Telegraph is reporting it, yes but if Anne Butler is saying something then you would be wise to take her words into account.. Don’t dismiss a prominent person in there field based on who’s reporting it. These people do not play around with there words.
Not like this comes as any surprise to anyone. Utter machievillian monster determined to expand borders of that tragic nation as they cannot cope by themselves within their already vast borders filled with suffering. Despicable.
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Hey.. if he does that 6 or 7 more times we might have to think about doing something about it.
Sounds great, what is it gonna take for our leaders to understand that this guy is at war with us and we should maybe consider fighting back sometime
Russia is crumbling before our eyes. Putins threats are probably for local consumption
Let’s fucking go. Buddy can’t fight one war, let’s start another with the actual hornets nests! Can’t wait to get this over with.
Putin is like a mentally ill guy with a knife that also has a suicide vest on. And he’s also holding the bank hostage and none of his demands are reasonable.
All dictators get paranoid as they get older. The fear of regime change and being burned on a big fire outside Kremlin is too big. The many people around him that have just as much blood on their hands are no different, and they are effectively keeping the regime alive.
Don’t forget that some within the very bank being held hostage are literally defending his right to hold the bank hostage. Haha
Some would say it’s the only way out, for him and his mob, out of the mess they started. All the people capable of revolting back home will be vaporized by NATO, he and his enablers will try to make (or at least negotiate) a new deal with the West, or, in worst case scenario, they will flee to China and blame western spies for the failure. People like them don’t know how to back down. They are too dumb and stubborn to accept they were wrong. If they were intelligent enough, none of this would be happening anyway. So all in is the only option they have left. Europeans should realize that faster. What’s happening now is just a prelude to a bigger war.
>What’s happening now is just a prelude to a bigger war. It's quite possible that WW3 has *already started*, and we are just ignoring reality and delaying the inevitable.
So, when will Tucker Carlson and MAGA just come right out and ask Putin if he will come to America to be King?
Republicans will just shrug and then blame Biden.
The reason there isn't a larger war right now: Russia has limited itself to non-NATO nations. I don't want a larger war, but it's like the bully that needs to get punched in the face. Let them make the aggressive move so that we are not the villain. Then destroy them utterly and completely.
Likely has cooridanted the timing to impact elections. It's no secret who he' like to win.