Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
That doesn't even begin to make sense. People do not 'want' an outcome even if they are prepared to 'risk it' as it were.
I'm thinking of adding Portugal to my nuclear escape list. Wasn't previously on there because it's a NATO member, but aside from one minor facility near Lisbon and bases on the Azores it doesn't look a hugely target rich environment. Why would Russia bother?
Has all the other advantages: visa-free travel, cheap, agriculturally self-sufficient, clean Westerlies, easy and quick to get to. Would probably fly to Porto, far enough South from the somewhat target richer environment of Spanish Galicia.
Non NATO Austria and Switzerland are likely your best bets in Europe, both relatively neutral in their comments on the conflict unlike say non NATO Ireland with the Irish government making pro Zelensky comments.
Otherwise Latin America or Africa or India or the Caribbean
Switzerland and Austria are very small, landlocked, surrounded by major military states like France, Germany and Italy and likely to suffer significant fallout, not agriculturally self-sufficient and almost impossible to get out of once there is there's a nuclear conflagration.
Either one would be a prison. Switzerland might even close its borders to foreigners. Neither would have much space for refugees, millions of whom would be fleeing from surrounding countries. Far better to be on the edge of a continent in an agricultural country with a maritime escape route.
Portugal is in NATO, therefore Lisbon and Porto would likely be nuked by Putin, you would need to be in very rural Portugal to have a chance
Putin really doesn't have that many nukes, and many (perhaps most) of them won't work. So, I think Portugal is a good call.
(Plus, the global cooling effect of a nuclear winter means you'd probably want to be somewhere reasonably warm, all other things being equal.)
If he doesn’t have many nukes how many would he spare for the UK? I mean he does seem to hate us so I’m not holding out any hope!
yes Johnson acting like a wannabe Churchill probably has pointed a few more at us. Truss did not help with her stupid call for UK citizens to fight for Ukraine back in March
Boris made some speeches and has provided material support like most other western leaders have. I think criticising him for an irrational russian response is a bit unfair - whatever his motivations someone with less churchillian pretensions would have done the same.
We know that as the stance taken is supported across both main parties
its not so much the stance its the unecessary promotion of it by him for personal means when he should have considered all eventualities of what he was signalling when doing it
I'm thinking of adding Portugal to my nuclear escape list. Wasn't previously on there because it's a NATO member, but aside from one minor facility near Lisbon and bases on the Azores it doesn't look a hugely target rich environment. Why would Russia bother?
Has all the other advantages: visa-free travel, cheap, agriculturally self-sufficient, clean Westerlies, easy and quick to get to. Would probably fly to Porto, far enough South from the somewhat target richer environment of Spanish Galicia.
Non NATO Austria and Switzerland are likely your best bets in Europe, both relatively neutral in their comments on the conflict unlike say non NATO Ireland with the Irish government making pro Zelensky comments.
Otherwise Latin America or Africa or India or the Caribbean
Switzerland and Austria are very small, landlocked, surrounded by major military states like France, Germany and Italy and likely to suffer significant fallout, not agriculturally self-sufficient and almost impossible to get out of once there is there's a nuclear conflagration.
Either one would be a prison. Switzerland might even close its borders to foreigners. Neither would have much space for refugees, millions of whom would be fleeing from surrounding countries. Far better to be on the edge of a continent in an agricultural country with a maritime escape route.
Portugal is in NATO, therefore Lisbon and Porto would likely be nuked by Putin, you would need to be in very rural Portugal to have a chance
Putin really doesn't have that many nukes, and many (perhaps most) of them won't work. So, I think Portugal is a good call.
(Plus, the global cooling effect of a nuclear winter means you'd probably want to be somewhere reasonably warm, all other things being equal.)
If he doesn’t have many nukes how many would he spare for the UK? I mean he does seem to hate us so I’m not holding out any hope!
Top targets:
Strategic - London Naval - Barrow; Portsmouth; Plymouth; Glasgow. Intelligence - Cheltenham; Menwith Hill There's loads of army and airforce bases so I think those would be lower prio, Putin would surely be targetting many other european and US infrastructure past those lot.
Thanks, that squares with something I read recently (pre-Ukraine) which I’m sure said targets in an all out nuclear war were likely to be strategic and military rather than all out blanketing of everywhere with more than 20 houses - on the basis of a reduction in stockpiles. Of course that’s enough nuking to cause enough damage to make us all suffer.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
You are of course at liberty to believe what you want. I want Bart to write those words because sometimes everything is very simple on the internet and if he writes out the words it might focus his mind on what he is advocating.
I don't remember this outcry over the annexation of the Crimea. Perhaps you were on PB effing and jeffing about what we would do to Russia if they did this that or the other. Perhaps not. Now we have another part of Ukraine and you have arbitrarily decided that the use of a very big bomb is beyond the pale.
I am interested in your (or your) motives as to why this is getting you all so het up.
I believe it might be insecurity and fear. Like a dog who barks because it is scared.
I'm thinking of adding Portugal to my nuclear escape list. Wasn't previously on there because it's a NATO member, but aside from one minor facility near Lisbon and bases on the Azores it doesn't look a hugely target rich environment. Why would Russia bother?
Has all the other advantages: visa-free travel, cheap, agriculturally self-sufficient, clean Westerlies, easy and quick to get to. Would probably fly to Porto, far enough South from the somewhat target richer environment of Spanish Galicia.
Non NATO Austria and Switzerland are likely your best bets in Europe, both relatively neutral in their comments on the conflict unlike say non NATO Ireland with the Irish government making pro Zelensky comments.
Otherwise Latin America or Africa or India or the Caribbean
Switzerland and Austria are very small, landlocked, surrounded by major military states like France, Germany and Italy and likely to suffer significant fallout, not agriculturally self-sufficient and almost impossible to get out of once there is there's a nuclear conflagration.
Either one would be a prison. Switzerland might even close its borders to foreigners. Neither would have much space for refugees, millions of whom would be fleeing from surrounding countries. Far better to be on the edge of a continent in an agricultural country with a maritime escape route.
Portugal is in NATO, therefore Lisbon and Porto would likely be nuked by Putin, you would need to be in very rural Portugal to have a chance
Putin really doesn't have that many nukes, and many (perhaps most) of them won't work. So, I think Portugal is a good call.
(Plus, the global cooling effect of a nuclear winter means you'd probably want to be somewhere reasonably warm, all other things being equal.)
If he doesn’t have many nukes how many would he spare for the UK? I mean he does seem to hate us so I’m not holding out any hope!
yes Johnson acting like a wannabe Churchill probably has pointed a few more at us. Truss did not help with her stupid call for UK citizens to fight for Ukraine back in March
Boris made some speeches and has provided material support like most other western leaders have. I think criticising him for an irrational russian response is a bit unfair - whatever his motivations someone with less churchillian pretensions would have done the same.
We know that as the stance taken is supported across both main parties
its not so much the stance its the unecessary promotion of it by him per personal means when he should have considered all eventualities of what he was signalling when doing it
I don't believe for an instant that even the Russians are making major tactical and strategic decisions on nuke allocation on the basis that Boris Johnson was a bit too fulsome in his pro Ukrainian stance.
I'm thinking of adding Portugal to my nuclear escape list. Wasn't previously on there because it's a NATO member, but aside from one minor facility near Lisbon and bases on the Azores it doesn't look a hugely target rich environment. Why would Russia bother?
Has all the other advantages: visa-free travel, cheap, agriculturally self-sufficient, clean Westerlies, easy and quick to get to. Would probably fly to Porto, far enough South from the somewhat target richer environment of Spanish Galicia.
trouble is you have to time it right(the move ) - escalation in nuclear war is very quick . Which is why we dont want to get anywhere near that stage !
Exactly, which is why only a severe MAD deterrence is the appropriate threat for any possible nuclear action from Russia.
Lulling Russia into a sense of security that they can get away with using nukes will make it much more likely that they'll use them, which makes escalation then fairly inevitable and greatly increases the risk of escalation to global nuclear war.
"Sanctions" are not the response to nuclear weapons, MAD is, which prevents their use.
Putin has made clear he is ready to go to MAD if Russia is attacked and he now includes the 4 disputed regions in Russia as per the ceremony last week
He has not said that at all. Listen carefully to the words - he will use weapons systems available to him - but he has said nothing about attacking NATO.
He has made clear he will defend Russian territory whether it is Ukraine or NATO that attacks it
I don't believe the Russian leadership really, truly believes that the annexed territories are part of Russia. They know that's not the case yet even if it's an aspiration in a few years after some school propaganda and a bit of ethnic cleansing. I very much doubt they are feeling the visceral fear that comes from a true attack on the motherland either. After all they've been bombing the shit out of those so called new territories over the last 6 months.
Take UK experience in the Falklands. Now that was land to which we had a long standing legal claim, settled by loyal British subjects. It was invaded by Argentina, and recovered after a conventional battle which many didn't believe we could win. There was never any hint or prospect of Britain using nuclear weapons on Argentina. Even if the expeditionary force had been humiliatingly routed by the Argentinians in the South Atlantic the nukes would have stayed firmly in the drawer. Russia is fighting a colonial war of conquest in someone else's land and deep down it knows it.
They believe what the leader tells them. Should he change his mind, declare the SMO a waste of brave Russian lives, and defenestrate the dozen generals who were to blame for making an arse of it, they would go on to believe that, too. That's how it works.
If he can hold power after a defeat.
Defeat isn't existential for him, necessarily; it represents a risk to his position, as does trying to launch a nuke. That's probably just as likely to see him deposed.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
I hope your family accept that is a good trade . Their life for a concept . Great .i woudl suggest taking a walk this afternoon and looking at the normality and innocence of life and all its varieties . It may make you think different
Think my favourite quote from conference was someone at a lunch I was at - during which I think there were four separate breaking controversies involving things said by the cabinet or Liz Truss - saying at least we’ll be able to warm ourselves on the giant binfire this winter https://twitter.com/JenWilliamsMEN/status/1577317020051308544
I'm thinking of adding Portugal to my nuclear escape list. Wasn't previously on there because it's a NATO member, but aside from one minor facility near Lisbon and bases on the Azores it doesn't look a hugely target rich environment. Why would Russia bother?
Has all the other advantages: visa-free travel, cheap, agriculturally self-sufficient, clean Westerlies, easy and quick to get to. Would probably fly to Porto, far enough South from the somewhat target richer environment of Spanish Galicia.
Non NATO Austria and Switzerland are likely your best bets in Europe, both relatively neutral in their comments on the conflict unlike say non NATO Ireland with the Irish government making pro Zelensky comments.
Otherwise Latin America or Africa or India or the Caribbean
Switzerland and Austria are very small, landlocked, surrounded by major military states like France, Germany and Italy and likely to suffer significant fallout, not agriculturally self-sufficient and almost impossible to get out of once there is there's a nuclear conflagration.
Either one would be a prison. Switzerland might even close its borders to foreigners. Neither would have much space for refugees, millions of whom would be fleeing from surrounding countries. Far better to be on the edge of a continent in an agricultural country with a maritime escape route.
Portugal is in NATO, therefore Lisbon and Porto would likely be nuked by Putin, you would need to be in very rural Portugal to have a chance
Putin really doesn't have that many nukes, and many (perhaps most) of them won't work. So, I think Portugal is a good call.
(Plus, the global cooling effect of a nuclear winter means you'd probably want to be somewhere reasonably warm, all other things being equal.)
If he doesn’t have many nukes how many would he spare for the UK? I mean he does seem to hate us so I’m not holding out any hope!
yes Johnson acting like a wannabe Churchill probably has pointed a few more at us. Truss did not help with her stupid call for UK citizens to fight for Ukraine back in March
Boris made some speeches and has provided material support like most other western leaders have. I think criticising him for an irrational russian response is a bit unfair - whatever his motivations someone with less churchillian pretensions would have done the same.
We know that as the stance taken is supported across both main parties
its not so much the stance its the unecessary promotion of it by him for personal means when he should have considered all eventualities of what he was signalling when doing it
There is no downside to it. If Russia is shown to be a paper tiger, then we can all rest easier in our beds.
Teatime. I was doing a roast chicken. Knock at the door. Two coppers. There’s been an allegation of harassment and malicious comms and we’ve come to arrest you."
I find it very strange the selective outrage about police procedure. Yes, this must have been pretty difficult for her, but by all accounts she seems to have been treated civilly by the cops. If she was harassing someone online, that should be investigated, and gathering the information for that would require searching items connected to the internet.
This wasn't a "put in the van and accidentally broke their neck" or "fell down the stairs" or literal beating. This was a "we need to question you at the police station, and also look for evidence of alleged crime, if you don't mind".
As for whether she harassed people online or not, that's down to a court, I guess?
IANAL but since when can the Police enter a home and seize people's private property without a warrant?
That absolutely sounds like harassment to me. If there's evidence of a crime, then investigate it yes, but seizing materials or forcing entry should only happen with a warrant surely?
I mean, that I agree with, but cops are given broad license for stuff. I know they often argue they don't need a warrant if they are looking for a person and know where that person is / have suspicion that person is in a place, but I too am not a lawyer. Like, I don't trust cops, but on the spectrum of "bad cop experience" this sounds like what we would want most interactions with the police to me?
Well, IF you believe her then that is an absolutely outrageous interaction. To do whatever they did, march her off to the cells, and all on the word apparently of someone else. But they were polite. Jesus H Christ.
And even if she had done whatever someone said she had done (still wholly unclear to me) then is that worth a spell in the cells rather than interview at their mutual convenience? Where was the imminent threat to the person or public order?
As someone who has also been frogmarched to a cell before questioning and thinking these exact same things - yes, it sounds like she was treated well.
And if someone is accused of online harassment, how do you investigate the validity of that without questioning someone, or looking into their devices that go online? Like, she may deny saying things, but you would still need to corroborate that.
You (as the police), first look at what’s been written online, and ask a magistrate for a warrant to discover the identity of the person posting the messages if they also consider them to be harrasment.
Then approach the platform on which the alleged harrasment took place, and ask for their logs.
What you don’t do, is arrest someone without due process, for a non-violent crime where there is no immediate danger to anyone.
Yeah, that kind of thing will work on Google, or Facebook, or any firm located in the UK (or the EU). It won’t work on KiwiFarms.
It’s entirely plausible to me that the only way to connect this woman with her KF accounts (if they exist) is to grab her devices & go through them to look for digital forensic evidence.
This /is/ the appropriate due process.
That sort of thing should need to be signed off by a judge, based on the available evidence from the complainant that the person in question is actually responsible for the messages in question, and that the messages themselves exceed the standard of illegality.
Otherwise it’s simply middle-class swatting, using the police to harass someone who’s upset you. Police should *always* need warrants, where there is no immediate risk of physical harm.
They had a warrant: The arrest warrant is sufficient, as previously explained. Someone has authorised that arrest warrant.
It may be that the police have over stepped the mark & there’s no evidence that actually connects this woman with the KF accounts in question. If someone has falsely claimed to the police that these accounts are the same person then that would carry consequences itself I would hope.
I'm thinking of adding Portugal to my nuclear escape list. Wasn't previously on there because it's a NATO member, but aside from one minor facility near Lisbon and bases on the Azores it doesn't look a hugely target rich environment. Why would Russia bother?
Has all the other advantages: visa-free travel, cheap, agriculturally self-sufficient, clean Westerlies, easy and quick to get to. Would probably fly to Porto, far enough South from the somewhat target richer environment of Spanish Galicia.
Non NATO Austria and Switzerland are likely your best bets in Europe, both relatively neutral in their comments on the conflict unlike say non NATO Ireland with the Irish government making pro Zelensky comments.
Otherwise Latin America or Africa or India or the Caribbean
Switzerland and Austria are very small, landlocked, surrounded by major military states like France, Germany and Italy and likely to suffer significant fallout, not agriculturally self-sufficient and almost impossible to get out of once there is there's a nuclear conflagration.
Either one would be a prison. Switzerland might even close its borders to foreigners. Neither would have much space for refugees, millions of whom would be fleeing from surrounding countries. Far better to be on the edge of a continent in an agricultural country with a maritime escape route.
Portugal is in NATO, therefore Lisbon and Porto would likely be nuked by Putin, you would need to be in very rural Portugal to have a chance
Putin really doesn't have that many nukes, and many (perhaps most) of them won't work. So, I think Portugal is a good call.
(Plus, the global cooling effect of a nuclear winter means you'd probably want to be somewhere reasonably warm, all other things being equal.)
If he doesn’t have many nukes how many would he spare for the UK? I mean he does seem to hate us so I’m not holding out any hope!
yes Johnson acting like a wannabe Churchill probably has pointed a few more at us. Truss did not help with her stupid call for UK citizens to fight for Ukraine back in March
Boris made some speeches and has provided material support like most other western leaders have. I think criticising him for an irrational russian response is a bit unfair - whatever his motivations someone with less churchillian pretensions would have done the same.
We know that as the stance taken is supported across both main parties
its not so much the stance its the unecessary promotion of it by him per personal means when he should have considered all eventualities of what he was signalling when doing it
I don't believe for an instant that even the Russians are making major tactical and strategic decisions on nuke allocation on the basis that Boris Johnson was a bit too fulsome in his pro Ukrainian stance.
oh and why not - Hitler targeted certain UK non-strategic cities purely because of revenge - The allies did with say Dresden -Putin is not above that either I woudl think (or not like to bet)
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
RCS is spot on.
If you want peace, prepare for war
Blessed then are the North Koreans!
I can't think of a substantial military build-up where that force wasn't eventually used.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
You are of course at liberty to believe what you want. I want Bart to write those words because sometimes everything is very simple on the internet and if he writes out the words it might focus his mind on what he is advocating.
I don't remember this outcry over the annexation of the Crimea. Perhaps you were on PB effing and jeffing about what we would do to Russia if they did this that or the other. Perhaps not. Now we have another part of Ukraine and you have arbitrarily decided that the use of a very big bomb is beyond the pale.
I am interested in your (or your) motives as to why this is getting you all so het up.
I believe it might be insecurity and fear. Like a dog who barks because it is scared.
I'm more than capable of writing what I want myself, using my own words.
I want to prevent nuclear Armageddon, by preventing nuclear escalation in the first place.
If there is nuclear escalation, then I want us to wield our full force of weaponry in response, but I hope the threat of that is sufficient to prevent that escalation happening in the first place, and thus makes us safer.
I accept that if it does become Armageddon, and if Russia's weapons work and aren't intercepted, then I expect my family would be killed in a Russian strike. I expect where we live is within the radius of a target.
But that is all the more reason to want to prevent nuclear escalation, not less of a reason to do so.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
You are of course at liberty to believe what you want. I want Bart to write those words because sometimes everything is very simple on the internet and if he writes out the words it might focus his mind on what he is advocating.
I don't remember this outcry over the annexation of the Crimea. Perhaps you were on PB effing and jeffing about what we would do to Russia if they did this that or the other. Perhaps not. Now we have another part of Ukraine and you have arbitrarily decided that the use of a very big bomb is beyond the pale.
I am interested in your (or your) motives as to why this is getting you all so het up.
I believe it might be insecurity and fear. Like a dog who barks because it is scared.
Does it matter, if the West is making a fuss now, when it did not in 2014?
Putin pushed his luck too far, as expansionist leaders often do. People will put up with a bully for a while, before saying "enough."
All this arguing about nuclear threats and what would happen to one's family takes me back to my youth. A time in the 50s when those of us who supported nuclear disarmament used to ask the same questions!
'Documents obtained by the BBC show the govt signed a £32.8m contract for an asylum centre in North Yorkshire which was then cancelled. It’s expected taxpayers will have to pick up a substantial compensation bill.'
All this arguing about nuclear threats and what would happen to one's family takes me back to my youth. A time in the 50s when those of us who supported nuclear disarmament used to ask the same questions!
I'm getting a terrible feeling of déjà vu!
Me too, from my student days in the late 1970s/early 1980s!
A PM needs to inspire respect (and maybe a little fear). Truss doesn’t.
No MP, not a single one, is currently feeling they need to butter up Truss to develop their career.
Unless something happens soon , she is toast.
I agree with your sentiment entirely but can't help thinking your metaphors are a little tangled. If Truss is toast then surely some buttering up would be in order?
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
You are of course at liberty to believe what you want. I want Bart to write those words because sometimes everything is very simple on the internet and if he writes out the words it might focus his mind on what he is advocating.
I don't remember this outcry over the annexation of the Crimea. Perhaps you were on PB effing and jeffing about what we would do to Russia if they did this that or the other. Perhaps not. Now we have another part of Ukraine and you have arbitrarily decided that the use of a very big bomb is beyond the pale.
I am interested in your (or your) motives as to why this is getting you all so het up.
I believe it might be insecurity and fear. Like a dog who barks because it is scared.
I'm more than capable of writing what I want myself, using my own words.
I want to prevent nuclear Armageddon, by preventing nuclear escalation in the first place.
If there is nuclear escalation, then I want us to wield our full force of weaponry in response, but I hope the threat of that is sufficient to prevent that escalation happening in the first place, and thus makes us safer.
I accept that if it does become Armageddon, and if Russia's weapons work and aren't intercepted, then I expect my family would be killed in a Russian strike. I expect where we live is within the radius of a target.
But that is all the more reason to want to prevent nuclear escalation, not less of a reason to do so.
All very laudable. But you want your family to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuke in Ukraine.
That is what I find curious. Or maybe not at all curious. I believe you and the others are scared, but it's only my pet theory.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
You are of course at liberty to believe what you want. I want Bart to write those words because sometimes everything is very simple on the internet and if he writes out the words it might focus his mind on what he is advocating.
I don't remember this outcry over the annexation of the Crimea. Perhaps you were on PB effing and jeffing about what we would do to Russia if they did this that or the other. Perhaps not. Now we have another part of Ukraine and you have arbitrarily decided that the use of a very big bomb is beyond the pale.
I am interested in your (or your) motives as to why this is getting you all so het up.
I believe it might be insecurity and fear. Like a dog who barks because it is scared.
Does it matter, if the West is making a fuss now, when it did not in 2014?
Putin pushed his luck too far, as expansionist leaders often do. People will put up with a bully for a while, before saying "enough."
Plus in 2014 Putin didn't lose a war in conventional terms, and didn't use nuclear weapons, so its a very weird comparison.
Putin chose this war, and he's lost it. That happens, don't start wars as you might lose them. He needs to retreat his army back to his own borers, which of course means leaving Crimea etc too - to the victor goes the spoils and Ukraine are the victors and get to reclaim their lost land.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
You are of course at liberty to believe what you want. I want Bart to write those words because sometimes everything is very simple on the internet and if he writes out the words it might focus his mind on what he is advocating.
I don't remember this outcry over the annexation of the Crimea. Perhaps you were on PB effing and jeffing about what we would do to Russia if they did this that or the other. Perhaps not. Now we have another part of Ukraine and you have arbitrarily decided that the use of a very big bomb is beyond the pale.
I am interested in your (or your) motives as to why this is getting you all so het up.
I believe it might be insecurity and fear. Like a dog who barks because it is scared.
Does it matter, if the West is making a fuss now, when it did not in 2014?
Putin pushed his luck too far, as expansionist leaders often do. People will put up with a bully for a while, before saying "enough."
Yes absolutely right. And you guys on PB have decided that he has gone too far. But the internet and PB in particular has robbed you of perspective and context.
There is something bigger than you can control and you are lashing out.
A PM needs to inspire respect (and maybe a little fear). Truss doesn’t.
No MP, not a single one, is currently feeling they need to butter up Truss to develop their career.
Unless something happens soon , she is toast.
I agree with your sentiment entirely but can't help thinking your metaphors are a little tangled. If Truss is toast then surely some buttering up would be in order?
I am hungry. Truss is unbuttered toast. There is little sadder in life.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
You are of course at liberty to believe what you want. I want Bart to write those words because sometimes everything is very simple on the internet and if he writes out the words it might focus his mind on what he is advocating.
I don't remember this outcry over the annexation of the Crimea. Perhaps you were on PB effing and jeffing about what we would do to Russia if they did this that or the other. Perhaps not. Now we have another part of Ukraine and you have arbitrarily decided that the use of a very big bomb is beyond the pale.
I am interested in your (or your) motives as to why this is getting you all so het up.
I believe it might be insecurity and fear. Like a dog who barks because it is scared.
I'm more than capable of writing what I want myself, using my own words.
I want to prevent nuclear Armageddon, by preventing nuclear escalation in the first place.
If there is nuclear escalation, then I want us to wield our full force of weaponry in response, but I hope the threat of that is sufficient to prevent that escalation happening in the first place, and thus makes us safer.
I accept that if it does become Armageddon, and if Russia's weapons work and aren't intercepted, then I expect my family would be killed in a Russian strike. I expect where we live is within the radius of a target.
But that is all the more reason to want to prevent nuclear escalation, not less of a reason to do so.
All very laudable. But you want your family to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuke in Ukraine.
That is what I find curious. Or maybe not at all curious. I believe you and the others are scared, but it's only my pet theory.
I think everyone is a bit.
I'm more scared of a world were nuclear aggression is tolerated and normalised, than the risks associated with preventing that world. A world were nuclear aggression is tolerated is much more likely to see a nuclear holocaust than one where it isn't.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
You are of course at liberty to believe what you want. I want Bart to write those words because sometimes everything is very simple on the internet and if he writes out the words it might focus his mind on what he is advocating.
I don't remember this outcry over the annexation of the Crimea. Perhaps you were on PB effing and jeffing about what we would do to Russia if they did this that or the other. Perhaps not. Now we have another part of Ukraine and you have arbitrarily decided that the use of a very big bomb is beyond the pale.
I am interested in your (or your) motives as to why this is getting you all so het up.
I believe it might be insecurity and fear. Like a dog who barks because it is scared.
Does it matter, if the West is making a fuss now, when it did not in 2014?
Putin pushed his luck too far, as expansionist leaders often do. People will put up with a bully for a while, before saying "enough."
Plus in 2014 Putin didn't lose a war in conventional terms, and didn't use nuclear weapons, so its a very weird comparison.
Putin chose this war, and he's lost it. That happens, don't start wars as you might lose them. He needs to retreat his army back to his own borers, which of course means leaving Crimea etc too - to the victor goes the spoils and Ukraine are the victors and get to reclaim their lost land.
None of it is rocket science. Quite why anyone is still afraid of Russia, now, is a bit of a mystery.
I'm thinking of adding Portugal to my nuclear escape list. Wasn't previously on there because it's a NATO member, but aside from one minor facility near Lisbon and bases on the Azores it doesn't look a hugely target rich environment. Why would Russia bother?
Has all the other advantages: visa-free travel, cheap, agriculturally self-sufficient, clean Westerlies, easy and quick to get to. Would probably fly to Porto, far enough South from the somewhat target richer environment of Spanish Galicia.
Non NATO Austria and Switzerland are likely your best bets in Europe, both relatively neutral in their comments on the conflict unlike say non NATO Ireland with the Irish government making pro Zelensky comments.
Otherwise Latin America or Africa or India or the Caribbean
Switzerland and Austria are very small, landlocked, surrounded by major military states like France, Germany and Italy and likely to suffer significant fallout, not agriculturally self-sufficient and almost impossible to get out of once there is there's a nuclear conflagration.
Either one would be a prison. Switzerland might even close its borders to foreigners. Neither would have much space for refugees, millions of whom would be fleeing from surrounding countries. Far better to be on the edge of a continent in an agricultural country with a maritime escape route.
Portugal is in NATO, therefore Lisbon and Porto would likely be nuked by Putin, you would need to be in very rural Portugal to have a chance
Putin really doesn't have that many nukes, and many (perhaps most) of them won't work. So, I think Portugal is a good call.
(Plus, the global cooling effect of a nuclear winter means you'd probably want to be somewhere reasonably warm, all other things being equal.)
If he doesn’t have many nukes how many would he spare for the UK? I mean he does seem to hate us so I’m not holding out any hope!
yes Johnson acting like a wannabe Churchill probably has pointed a few more at us. Truss did not help with her stupid call for UK citizens to fight for Ukraine back in March
Boris made some speeches and has provided material support like most other western leaders have. I think criticising him for an irrational russian response is a bit unfair - whatever his motivations someone with less churchillian pretensions would have done the same.
We know that as the stance taken is supported across both main parties
its not so much the stance its the unecessary promotion of it by him per personal means when he should have considered all eventualities of what he was signalling when doing it
I don't believe for an instant that even the Russians are making major tactical and strategic decisions on nuke allocation on the basis that Boris Johnson was a bit too fulsome in his pro Ukrainian stance.
I assume the order would be military installations and major civilian infrastructure like airports and ports in the USA first, because that is the greatest military threat, closely followed by those in UK and France, then major NATO bases in Germany and E Europe, Scandinavia, Cyprus, Turkey, Gibraltar, Diego Garcia, Samoa, other major US military concentrations like Iraq. Perhaps South Korea. Aircraft carriers and other naval assets at sea. A few others. Then on to the cities.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
RCS is spot on.
If you want peace, prepare for war
Blessed then are the North Koreans!
I can't think of a substantial military build-up where that force wasn't eventually used.
Yet back in January and February, many people (including some on here) were saying that the Russian build-up was all for show, and would not get used...
If you want an example of a substantial military build-up that was not used, then the BAOR and the equivalent US forces might be a good example.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
You are of course at liberty to believe what you want. I want Bart to write those words because sometimes everything is very simple on the internet and if he writes out the words it might focus his mind on what he is advocating.
I don't remember this outcry over the annexation of the Crimea. Perhaps you were on PB effing and jeffing about what we would do to Russia if they did this that or the other. Perhaps not. Now we have another part of Ukraine and you have arbitrarily decided that the use of a very big bomb is beyond the pale.
I am interested in your (or your) motives as to why this is getting you all so het up.
I believe it might be insecurity and fear. Like a dog who barks because it is scared.
Does it matter, if the West is making a fuss now, when it did not in 2014?
Putin pushed his luck too far, as expansionist leaders often do. People will put up with a bully for a while, before saying "enough."
Yes absolutely right. And you guys on PB have decided that he has gone too far. But the internet and PB in particular has robbed you of perspective and context.
There is something bigger than you can control and you are lashing out.
We're not the ones lashing out. We are keeping calm and carrying on.
Its you that, @HYUFD and @state_go_away etc that are lashing out and running around like headless chickens saying we must not allow Putin to be defeated as he might nuke us if he is.
No, Putin is defeated and that must be followed through to its conclusion in full. Russia out of Ukraine, peace restored.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
You are of course at liberty to believe what you want. I want Bart to write those words because sometimes everything is very simple on the internet and if he writes out the words it might focus his mind on what he is advocating.
I don't remember this outcry over the annexation of the Crimea. Perhaps you were on PB effing and jeffing about what we would do to Russia if they did this that or the other. Perhaps not. Now we have another part of Ukraine and you have arbitrarily decided that the use of a very big bomb is beyond the pale.
I am interested in your (or your) motives as to why this is getting you all so het up.
I believe it might be insecurity and fear. Like a dog who barks because it is scared.
I'm more than capable of writing what I want myself, using my own words.
I want to prevent nuclear Armageddon, by preventing nuclear escalation in the first place.
If there is nuclear escalation, then I want us to wield our full force of weaponry in response, but I hope the threat of that is sufficient to prevent that escalation happening in the first place, and thus makes us safer.
I accept that if it does become Armageddon, and if Russia's weapons work and aren't intercepted, then I expect my family would be killed in a Russian strike. I expect where we live is within the radius of a target.
But that is all the more reason to want to prevent nuclear escalation, not less of a reason to do so.
All very laudable. But you want your family to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuke in Ukraine.
That is what I find curious. Or maybe not at all curious. I believe you and the others are scared, but it's only my pet theory.
I think everyone is a bit.
I'm more scared of a world were nuclear aggression is tolerated and normalised, than the risks associated with preventing that world. A world were nuclear aggression is tolerated is much more likely to see a nuclear holocaust than one where it isn't.
"Speak softly and carry a big stick" - is there much more to it than that?
I'm thinking of adding Portugal to my nuclear escape list. Wasn't previously on there because it's a NATO member, but aside from one minor facility near Lisbon and bases on the Azores it doesn't look a hugely target rich environment. Why would Russia bother?
Has all the other advantages: visa-free travel, cheap, agriculturally self-sufficient, clean Westerlies, easy and quick to get to. Would probably fly to Porto, far enough South from the somewhat target richer environment of Spanish Galicia.
Non NATO Austria and Switzerland are likely your best bets in Europe, both relatively neutral in their comments on the conflict unlike say non NATO Ireland with the Irish government making pro Zelensky comments.
Otherwise Latin America or Africa or India or the Caribbean
Switzerland and Austria are very small, landlocked, surrounded by major military states like France, Germany and Italy and likely to suffer significant fallout, not agriculturally self-sufficient and almost impossible to get out of once there is there's a nuclear conflagration.
Either one would be a prison. Switzerland might even close its borders to foreigners. Neither would have much space for refugees, millions of whom would be fleeing from surrounding countries. Far better to be on the edge of a continent in an agricultural country with a maritime escape route.
Portugal is in NATO, therefore Lisbon and Porto would likely be nuked by Putin, you would need to be in very rural Portugal to have a chance
Putin really doesn't have that many nukes, and many (perhaps most) of them won't work. So, I think Portugal is a good call.
(Plus, the global cooling effect of a nuclear winter means you'd probably want to be somewhere reasonably warm, all other things being equal.)
If he doesn’t have many nukes how many would he spare for the UK? I mean he does seem to hate us so I’m not holding out any hope!
yes Johnson acting like a wannabe Churchill probably has pointed a few more at us. Truss did not help with her stupid call for UK citizens to fight for Ukraine back in March
Boris made some speeches and has provided material support like most other western leaders have. I think criticising him for an irrational russian response is a bit unfair - whatever his motivations someone with less churchillian pretensions would have done the same.
We know that as the stance taken is supported across both main parties
its not so much the stance its the unecessary promotion of it by him per personal means when he should have considered all eventualities of what he was signalling when doing it
I don't believe for an instant that even the Russians are making major tactical and strategic decisions on nuke allocation on the basis that Boris Johnson was a bit too fulsome in his pro Ukrainian stance.
oh and why not - Hitler targeted certain UK non-strategic cities purely because of revenge - The allies did with say Dresden -Putin is not above that either I woudl think (or not like to bet)
Exeter was a prime example. Rates on tourist centres were known as Baedecker raids.
Incidentally, I'm using Mac's dictation facility at the moment; you would be amazed at the options that came up in the previous sentence!
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
You are of course at liberty to believe what you want. I want Bart to write those words because sometimes everything is very simple on the internet and if he writes out the words it might focus his mind on what he is advocating.
I don't remember this outcry over the annexation of the Crimea. Perhaps you were on PB effing and jeffing about what we would do to Russia if they did this that or the other. Perhaps not. Now we have another part of Ukraine and you have arbitrarily decided that the use of a very big bomb is beyond the pale.
I am interested in your (or your) motives as to why this is getting you all so het up.
I believe it might be insecurity and fear. Like a dog who barks because it is scared.
Does it matter, if the West is making a fuss now, when it did not in 2014?
Putin pushed his luck too far, as expansionist leaders often do. People will put up with a bully for a while, before saying "enough."
Yes absolutely right. And you guys on PB have decided that he has gone too far. But the internet and PB in particular has robbed you of perspective and context.
There is something bigger than you can control and you are lashing out.
It's our leaders who decided he went too far. And, our leaders were correct. They weren't pushed into standing up against Russia by anything that was posted here.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
'Documents obtained by the BBC show the govt signed a £32.8m contract for an asylum centre in North Yorkshire which was then cancelled. It’s expected taxpayers will have to pick up a substantial compensation bill.'
Levelling up in action - money to the North and nothing expected in return?
Teatime. I was doing a roast chicken. Knock at the door. Two coppers. There’s been an allegation of harassment and malicious comms and we’ve come to arrest you."
I find it very strange the selective outrage about police procedure. Yes, this must have been pretty difficult for her, but by all accounts she seems to have been treated civilly by the cops. If she was harassing someone online, that should be investigated, and gathering the information for that would require searching items connected to the internet.
This wasn't a "put in the van and accidentally broke their neck" or "fell down the stairs" or literal beating. This was a "we need to question you at the police station, and also look for evidence of alleged crime, if you don't mind".
As for whether she harassed people online or not, that's down to a court, I guess?
IANAL but since when can the Police enter a home and seize people's private property without a warrant?
That absolutely sounds like harassment to me. If there's evidence of a crime, then investigate it yes, but seizing materials or forcing entry should only happen with a warrant surely?
I mean, that I agree with, but cops are given broad license for stuff. I know they often argue they don't need a warrant if they are looking for a person and know where that person is / have suspicion that person is in a place, but I too am not a lawyer. Like, I don't trust cops, but on the spectrum of "bad cop experience" this sounds like what we would want most interactions with the police to me?
Well, IF you believe her then that is an absolutely outrageous interaction. To do whatever they did, march her off to the cells, and all on the word apparently of someone else. But they were polite. Jesus H Christ.
And even if she had done whatever someone said she had done (still wholly unclear to me) then is that worth a spell in the cells rather than interview at their mutual convenience? Where was the imminent threat to the person or public order?
As someone who has also been frogmarched to a cell before questioning and thinking these exact same things - yes, it sounds like she was treated well.
And if someone is accused of online harassment, how do you investigate the validity of that without questioning someone, or looking into their devices that go online? Like, she may deny saying things, but you would still need to corroborate that.
You (as the police), first look at what’s been written online, and ask a magistrate for a warrant to discover the identity of the person posting the messages if they also consider them to be harrasment.
Then approach the platform on which the alleged harrasment took place, and ask for their logs.
What you don’t do, is arrest someone without due process, for a non-violent crime where there is no immediate danger to anyone.
Yeah, that kind of thing will work on Google, or Facebook, or any firm located in the UK (or the EU). It won’t work on KiwiFarms.
It’s entirely plausible to me that the only way to connect this woman with her KF accounts (if they exist) is to grab her devices & go through them to look for digital forensic evidence.
This /is/ the appropriate due process.
That sort of thing should need to be signed off by a judge, based on the available evidence from the complainant that the person in question is actually responsible for the messages in question, and that the messages themselves exceed the standard of illegality.
Otherwise it’s simply middle-class swatting, using the police to harass someone who’s upset you. Police should *always* need warrants, where there is no immediate risk of physical harm.
They had a warrant: The arrest warrant is sufficient, as previously explained. Someone has authorised that arrest warrant.
It may be that the police have over stepped the mark & there’s no evidence that actually connects this woman with the KF accounts in question. If someone has falsely claimed to the police that these accounts are the same person then that would carry consequences itself I would hope.
In the story as told, the police explicitly didn’t have a warrant. They knocked on her door and took her, and her possessions, away without a warrant. All police decisions, no magistrates nor judges involved anywhere in the process - which is the problem.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
RCS is spot on.
If you want peace, prepare for war
Blessed then are the North Koreans!
I can't think of a substantial military build-up where that force wasn't eventually used.
Yet back in January and February, many people (including some on here) were saying that the Russian build-up was all for show, and would not get used...
If you want an example of a substantial military build-up that was not used, then the BAOR and the equivalent US forces might be a good example.
The bigger picture with those was a substantial rundown from WW2 levels. I guess the Swiss may be a good example, perhaps the British expenditure (although modest) in the Northern Indian frontier, and no doubt the big baggy Empires of Egypt, Austria-Hungary and the Ottomans had some ups and downs. Perhaps too some mid Victorian expenditure.
Teatime. I was doing a roast chicken. Knock at the door. Two coppers. There’s been an allegation of harassment and malicious comms and we’ve come to arrest you."
I find it very strange the selective outrage about police procedure. Yes, this must have been pretty difficult for her, but by all accounts she seems to have been treated civilly by the cops. If she was harassing someone online, that should be investigated, and gathering the information for that would require searching items connected to the internet.
This wasn't a "put in the van and accidentally broke their neck" or "fell down the stairs" or literal beating. This was a "we need to question you at the police station, and also look for evidence of alleged crime, if you don't mind".
As for whether she harassed people online or not, that's down to a court, I guess?
IANAL but since when can the Police enter a home and seize people's private property without a warrant?
That absolutely sounds like harassment to me. If there's evidence of a crime, then investigate it yes, but seizing materials or forcing entry should only happen with a warrant surely?
I mean, that I agree with, but cops are given broad license for stuff. I know they often argue they don't need a warrant if they are looking for a person and know where that person is / have suspicion that person is in a place, but I too am not a lawyer. Like, I don't trust cops, but on the spectrum of "bad cop experience" this sounds like what we would want most interactions with the police to me?
Well, IF you believe her then that is an absolutely outrageous interaction. To do whatever they did, march her off to the cells, and all on the word apparently of someone else. But they were polite. Jesus H Christ.
And even if she had done whatever someone said she had done (still wholly unclear to me) then is that worth a spell in the cells rather than interview at their mutual convenience? Where was the imminent threat to the person or public order?
As someone who has also been frogmarched to a cell before questioning and thinking these exact same things - yes, it sounds like she was treated well.
And if someone is accused of online harassment, how do you investigate the validity of that without questioning someone, or looking into their devices that go online? Like, she may deny saying things, but you would still need to corroborate that.
You (as the police), first look at what’s been written online, and ask a magistrate for a warrant to discover the identity of the person posting the messages if they also consider them to be harrasment.
Then approach the platform on which the alleged harrasment took place, and ask for their logs.
What you don’t do, is arrest someone without due process, for a non-violent crime where there is no immediate danger to anyone.
Yeah, that kind of thing will work on Google, or Facebook, or any firm located in the UK (or the EU). It won’t work on KiwiFarms.
It’s entirely plausible to me that the only way to connect this woman with her KF accounts (if they exist) is to grab her devices & go through them to look for digital forensic evidence.
This /is/ the appropriate due process.
That sort of thing should need to be signed off by a judge, based on the available evidence from the complainant that the person in question is actually responsible for the messages in question, and that the messages themselves exceed the standard of illegality.
Otherwise it’s simply middle-class swatting, using the police to harass someone who’s upset you. Police should *always* need warrants, where there is no immediate risk of physical harm.
They had a warrant: The arrest warrant is sufficient, as previously explained. Someone has authorised that arrest warrant.
It may be that the police have over stepped the mark & there’s no evidence that actually connects this woman with the KF accounts in question. If someone has falsely claimed to the police that these accounts are the same person then that would carry consequences itself I would hope.
Hi Phil
One point about this - according to that thread, they *didn't* have a warrant. Either a search warrant or an arrest warrant. They said when challenged that they did not need one. They do not need a warrant to question somebody, of course, but they would to take away property unless the owner gave consent knowing they did not have to.
Which means prima facie in arresting somebody and seizing computer equipment claiming they could do so without a warrant the officers in question have exceeded their powers.
Another good night for Ukraine. Several more towns taken in Kharkiv and Kherson Oblasts, including the key town of Borova in the East.
Ukraine claiming 44 tanks and 27 APCs lost by Russia yesterday. Massive losses.
The tank losses are getting silly now. I think that every tank in Russia, bar a few parade prototypes, is in Ukraine or heading there at the moment. The fall of Kherson will be fun, as there’s going to be a few hundred tanks there with no way out. The Russians appear to have no idea how to wage tank warfare, especially against a modern enemy. Even the recent-model tanks, appear to be seen as expendable.
Came across this article from July, which in part suggests that tanks are being withdrawn from storage and sent to the front without basic checks being made on their readiness. The tank equivalent of sending new conscripts to the front in shorts and flip-flops.
The fact that the Russian army can still fight at all must reflect herculean efforts by some of the front line soldiers. It makes you wonder how much longer they can keep things going.
Good piece. Give it a couple of weeks, and we’ll likely see the new conscripts turn up in shorts and flip flops, just as the snow starts falling.
Do you think Ukraine will be able to keep up their offensive in the winter months or will that freeze the conflict until the spring?
At the moment the Russians rather look like a team that should in theory be doing well like Man Utd getting thrashed in the first half and desperately awaiting the half time whistle so they can go back inside for a break.
Yet also a team which has nuclear missiles ie effectively their star striker is on the bench if they face complete defeat by Ukraine
Nuclear missiles are not a star striker and don't score goals in wars of aggression. They are equivalent to walking off the pitch, not scoring a goal, since the 'game' would be over and Russia would be annihilated by MAD if they were stupid enough to use nukes.
Preventing nuclear escalation means ensuring we respond with our full force if Russia were to attempt it.
Russia could also annihilate NATO with nuclear missiles too however if NATO responded militarily and got involved in a direct war with Russia over Russian actions in Ukraine
They probable couldn't actually.
But that's why NATO haven't got directly involved, but if Russia were to escalate it into a nuclear conflict, which would involve radiation hitting NATO nations, then we would be involved and it would need to be a direct war. Which is why the line has to be drawn for Russia, escalate to nukes and we are involved and you know what that means.
It means we are annihilated in nuclear holocaust as well as most of Russia despite the fact Ukraine is not even in NATO!
Poland is in NATO and a nuclear attack on Ukraine would hit Poland too. 🤦♂️
If Russia choose to start a nuclear holocaust then that's their choice, but they need to be in no doubt that we will take a nuclear strike that hits Poland/Ukraine the same as a nuclear strike that hits London.
Not directly and not worth starting WW3 over unless Russia directly nuked or invaded Poland which is a NATO member state unlike Ukraine
If Russia escalate to nuclear conflict we won't be the ones starting WW3 though, they will.
If we make clear to Russia that we can't stand idly by while nuclear weapons are used in Europe, and they choose to use them anyway, then they've started WW3 and we need to fight it and win it.
Being weak in the face of nuclear aggression just increases the risk of a nuclear escalation, it doesn't reduce it.
Exactly.
You’ve got those saying that yes, we have to give in if Putin ever detonates a nuke, unless it’s literally to preserve the UK. And confident he’ll never push it to the UK, because we’ve got nukes, too.
Okay. Then what happens?
If we make the call that we must give in to at least some of what he wants if he ever detonates a nuke, he’ll probably notice that. And so will all the other countries in the world. Together with the codicil that “at least he won’t attack us, because we’ve got nukes too.”
If we’d surrender to Putin’s aggression in Ukraine – would we really risk death for Estonia? What would Tallinn think? Or Moscow?
How about Poland? Putin would have shown he’ll detonate a nuke and has got away with it. What would Warsaw think?
If you’re in any of those countries, you’re getting nukes and getting them NOW. Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Finland. Japan, South Korea, Taiwan. And with them having nukes, and there being no taboo on nukes, which country WON’T get nukes? In a world of “safe” and “victim,” not having nukes puts you in the category of “victim.”
What about Ukraine? A few years down the line, what happens there? Russia decides Kharkiv, Mykolaiv, and Odesa look like they should be Russian, and, after regenerating as much as they can, make a stab for them. And this time, when fully extended, rather than letting the conventional fight go against them, it’s bucket-of-instant-sunshine time and “Stop there! We win!”
Ukraine knows this. So they HAVE to build nukes themselves. At which point, they’ll want their occupied territories back. Tac-nuke versus tac-nuke. Rumours of someone smuggling a nuke into Moscow or Kyiv. Basically – if Putin benefits AT ALL from use of a nuke, non-proliferation is gone. Use of nukes is no longer taboo. Massive rush for nuclear weapons. Even without flashpoints like Ukraine (or Taiwan, or North Korea), we’d see nukes used again within five years somewhere. And we’d see nukes used again in Ukraine in a few years as well – and possibly by both sides.
What’s the odds of London dying in nuclear fire in that world?
We stop it here, or we never stop it.
If Ukraine wants to develop its own nukes again that is its affair.
However it is not in NATO and we only go to WW3 for NATO states defence
We don't have to go to WW3. We have to ensure that Putin is materially worse off from detonating a nuke.
How do you do that without starting WW3? Which can be assumed as undesirable for the purposes of this Beispiel.
So, your alternative is what? That whenever someone even mentions the word 'nuke', we all say 'sorry sir, my apologies sir'?
And if we do that, don't you think there's just the tiniest chance that this increases the chance that the word 'nuke' is mentioned more in future?
This is all fairly simple game theory stuff. And is exactly the reason why British troops would have had to have gone to Estonia in the event that Russia had invaded. (Something you were incredibly reticent to do, IIRC.)
If you want to minimise the possibility of Armageddon, you need to be willing to accept Armageddon as an outcome.
For the sake of Ukraine. That is what this is about right now.
How many wars are there in the world. Plenty. Nukes is just a big bomb. Plenty of ways not limited to machetes, small arms, and bows and arrows to kill people. Lots of people.
I am none too sure about asssured destruction of the UK for the sake of Ukraine. We didn't care eight years ago at all. I think I barely noticed the annexation of the Crimea, shameful current affairs hound as I am.
The latest theory in Russia is that the whole thing was an elaborate trap set by the West. Let them take a small bite without too much fuss knowing that it would eventually draw them in to a situation where they are doomed whatever they do.
Teatime. I was doing a roast chicken. Knock at the door. Two coppers. There’s been an allegation of harassment and malicious comms and we’ve come to arrest you."
I find it very strange the selective outrage about police procedure. Yes, this must have been pretty difficult for her, but by all accounts she seems to have been treated civilly by the cops. If she was harassing someone online, that should be investigated, and gathering the information for that would require searching items connected to the internet.
This wasn't a "put in the van and accidentally broke their neck" or "fell down the stairs" or literal beating. This was a "we need to question you at the police station, and also look for evidence of alleged crime, if you don't mind".
As for whether she harassed people online or not, that's down to a court, I guess?
IANAL but since when can the Police enter a home and seize people's private property without a warrant?
That absolutely sounds like harassment to me. If there's evidence of a crime, then investigate it yes, but seizing materials or forcing entry should only happen with a warrant surely?
I mean, that I agree with, but cops are given broad license for stuff. I know they often argue they don't need a warrant if they are looking for a person and know where that person is / have suspicion that person is in a place, but I too am not a lawyer. Like, I don't trust cops, but on the spectrum of "bad cop experience" this sounds like what we would want most interactions with the police to me?
Well, IF you believe her then that is an absolutely outrageous interaction. To do whatever they did, march her off to the cells, and all on the word apparently of someone else. But they were polite. Jesus H Christ.
And even if she had done whatever someone said she had done (still wholly unclear to me) then is that worth a spell in the cells rather than interview at their mutual convenience? Where was the imminent threat to the person or public order?
As someone who has also been frogmarched to a cell before questioning and thinking these exact same things - yes, it sounds like she was treated well.
And if someone is accused of online harassment, how do you investigate the validity of that without questioning someone, or looking into their devices that go online? Like, she may deny saying things, but you would still need to corroborate that.
You (as the police), first look at what’s been written online, and ask a magistrate for a warrant to discover the identity of the person posting the messages if they also consider them to be harrasment.
Then approach the platform on which the alleged harrasment took place, and ask for their logs.
What you don’t do, is arrest someone without due process, for a non-violent crime where there is no immediate danger to anyone.
Yeah, that kind of thing will work on Google, or Facebook, or any firm located in the UK (or the EU). It won’t work on KiwiFarms.
It’s entirely plausible to me that the only way to connect this woman with her KF accounts (if they exist) is to grab her devices & go through them to look for digital forensic evidence.
This /is/ the appropriate due process.
That sort of thing should need to be signed off by a judge, based on the available evidence from the complainant that the person in question is actually responsible for the messages in question, and that the messages themselves exceed the standard of illegality.
Otherwise it’s simply middle-class swatting, using the police to harass someone who’s upset you. Police should *always* need warrants, where there is no immediate risk of physical harm.
They had a warrant: The arrest warrant is sufficient, as previously explained. Someone has authorised that arrest warrant.
It may be that the police have over stepped the mark & there’s no evidence that actually connects this woman with the KF accounts in question. If someone has falsely claimed to the police that these accounts are the same person then that would carry consequences itself I would hope.
Hi Phil
One point about this - according to that thread, they *didn't* have a warrant. Either a search warrant or an arrest warrant. They said when challenged that they did not need one. They do not need a warrant to question somebody, of course, but they would to take away property unless the owner gave consent knowing they did not have to.
Which means prima facie in arresting somebody and seizing computer equipment claiming they could do so without a warrant the officers in question have exceeded their powers.
Is there any polling on how the British voter feels about dying to prove a point about something or other over Ukraine? I'm not sure that there is a clear majority in favour of the Bartydammerung option.
Not content with his idea to cull the elderly to save fiscal creep, Dr Strangebart now wants to blow up the entire country.
I don't want to, I want us to convince Russia not to engage in a first strike.
But if they do engage in a first strike, then we absolutely should have Trident and the full range of our weaponry for retaliation in response.
Bart it would cement your credibility if you wrote the words "I want my wife and daughter to die if Russia uses a battlefield nuclear weapon in Ukraine".
Then your position would be entirely consistent. As it usually is.
So tia.
No I don't want them to die. If it comes to that I'd want Russia's weaponry to fail, or to be intercepted. But I would want to take and accept the risk that my family and I would die if it comes to that. The risk of that is better than nuclear aggression being the norm in the world.
So write the words.
However, both Bart and I believe that it is your stance which would imperil or even doom our families and ourselves.
That trying to hide under the bed does not actually protect us but makes that fate far more likely. So it seems we are at an impasse - but one that is not assisted by you trying to make him or anyone else write down what you have concluded to be the effect. Anymore than it would be assisted by us insisting that you write down "I want to hide under the bedsheets and ensure my loved ones live in a world where they are far more likely to die in nuclear fire if Russia uses a nuclear weapon in Ukraine."
You are of course at liberty to believe what you want. I want Bart to write those words because sometimes everything is very simple on the internet and if he writes out the words it might focus his mind on what he is advocating.
I don't remember this outcry over the annexation of the Crimea. Perhaps you were on PB effing and jeffing about what we would do to Russia if they did this that or the other. Perhaps not. Now we have another part of Ukraine and you have arbitrarily decided that the use of a very big bomb is beyond the pale.
I am interested in your (or your) motives as to why this is getting you all so het up.
I believe it might be insecurity and fear. Like a dog who barks because it is scared.
I'm more than capable of writing what I want myself, using my own words.
I want to prevent nuclear Armageddon, by preventing nuclear escalation in the first place.
If there is nuclear escalation, then I want us to wield our full force of weaponry in response, but I hope the threat of that is sufficient to prevent that escalation happening in the first place, and thus makes us safer.
I accept that if it does become Armageddon, and if Russia's weapons work and aren't intercepted, then I expect my family would be killed in a Russian strike. I expect where we live is within the radius of a target.
But that is all the more reason to want to prevent nuclear escalation, not less of a reason to do so.
In practice, you are derogating the right to begin Nuclear Armageddon to local military commanders within the theatre. They may have the ability to authorise the use of low-yield tactical nuclear weapons under Russian doctrine.
Mistakes happen on the battlefield all the time. Sometimes quite large numbers of personnel are lost by mistake. You may want to ask yourself whether your enthusiasm for a hair trigger response is appropriate.
I don't really want to get into a long discussion about nuclear deterrence or the Ukraine war with you. It's not a computer game, ultimately.
Teatime. I was doing a roast chicken. Knock at the door. Two coppers. There’s been an allegation of harassment and malicious comms and we’ve come to arrest you."
I find it very strange the selective outrage about police procedure. Yes, this must have been pretty difficult for her, but by all accounts she seems to have been treated civilly by the cops. If she was harassing someone online, that should be investigated, and gathering the information for that would require searching items connected to the internet.
This wasn't a "put in the van and accidentally broke their neck" or "fell down the stairs" or literal beating. This was a "we need to question you at the police station, and also look for evidence of alleged crime, if you don't mind".
As for whether she harassed people online or not, that's down to a court, I guess?
IANAL but since when can the Police enter a home and seize people's private property without a warrant?
That absolutely sounds like harassment to me. If there's evidence of a crime, then investigate it yes, but seizing materials or forcing entry should only happen with a warrant surely?
I mean, that I agree with, but cops are given broad license for stuff. I know they often argue they don't need a warrant if they are looking for a person and know where that person is / have suspicion that person is in a place, but I too am not a lawyer. Like, I don't trust cops, but on the spectrum of "bad cop experience" this sounds like what we would want most interactions with the police to me?
Well, IF you believe her then that is an absolutely outrageous interaction. To do whatever they did, march her off to the cells, and all on the word apparently of someone else. But they were polite. Jesus H Christ.
And even if she had done whatever someone said she had done (still wholly unclear to me) then is that worth a spell in the cells rather than interview at their mutual convenience? Where was the imminent threat to the person or public order?
As someone who has also been frogmarched to a cell before questioning and thinking these exact same things - yes, it sounds like she was treated well.
And if someone is accused of online harassment, how do you investigate the validity of that without questioning someone, or looking into their devices that go online? Like, she may deny saying things, but you would still need to corroborate that.
You (as the police), first look at what’s been written online, and ask a magistrate for a warrant to discover the identity of the person posting the messages if they also consider them to be harrasment.
Then approach the platform on which the alleged harrasment took place, and ask for their logs.
What you don’t do, is arrest someone without due process, for a non-violent crime where there is no immediate danger to anyone.
Yeah, that kind of thing will work on Google, or Facebook, or any firm located in the UK (or the EU). It won’t work on KiwiFarms.
It’s entirely plausible to me that the only way to connect this woman with her KF accounts (if they exist) is to grab her devices & go through them to look for digital forensic evidence.
This /is/ the appropriate due process.
That sort of thing should need to be signed off by a judge, based on the available evidence from the complainant that the person in question is actually responsible for the messages in question, and that the messages themselves exceed the standard of illegality.
Otherwise it’s simply middle-class swatting, using the police to harass someone who’s upset you. Police should *always* need warrants, where there is no immediate risk of physical harm.
They had a warrant: The arrest warrant is sufficient, as previously explained. Someone has authorised that arrest warrant.
It may be that the police have over stepped the mark & there’s no evidence that actually connects this woman with the KF accounts in question. If someone has falsely claimed to the police that these accounts are the same person then that would carry consequences itself I would hope.
Hi Phil
One point about this - according to that thread, they *didn't* have a warrant. Either a search warrant or an arrest warrant. They said when challenged that they did not need one. They do not need a warrant to question somebody, of course, but they would to take away property unless the owner gave consent knowing they did not have to.
Which means prima facie in arresting somebody and seizing computer equipment claiming they could do so without a warrant the officers in question have exceeded their powers.
What they didn’t have was a search warrant but, as previously explained, they didn’t need one.
The police do not need a warrant to arrest people. They need 'reasonable grounds to believe somebody has committed an offence.'
If they arrested her with or without a warrant that is also separate from seizing property unless it is an indictable offence which it seems unlikely this would be.
Comments
I don't remember this outcry over the annexation of the Crimea. Perhaps you were on PB effing and jeffing about what we would do to Russia if they did this that or the other. Perhaps not. Now we have another part of Ukraine and you have arbitrarily decided that the use of a very big bomb is beyond the pale.
I am interested in your (or your) motives as to why this is getting you all so het up.
I believe it might be insecurity and fear. Like a dog who barks because it is scared.
Should he change his mind, declare the SMO a waste of brave Russian lives, and defenestrate the dozen generals who were to blame for making an arse of it, they would go on to believe that, too. That's how it works.
If he can hold power after a defeat.
Defeat isn't existential for him, necessarily; it represents a risk to his position, as does trying to launch a nuke. That's probably just as likely to see him deposed.
https://twitter.com/JenWilliamsMEN/status/1577317020051308544
It may be that the police have over stepped the mark & there’s no evidence that actually connects this woman with the KF accounts in question. If someone has falsely claimed to the police that these accounts are the same person then that would carry consequences itself I would hope.
I can't think of a substantial military build-up where that force wasn't eventually used.
I want to prevent nuclear Armageddon, by preventing nuclear escalation in the first place.
If there is nuclear escalation, then I want us to wield our full force of weaponry in response, but I hope the threat of that is sufficient to prevent that escalation happening in the first place, and thus makes us safer.
I accept that if it does become Armageddon, and if Russia's weapons work and aren't intercepted, then I expect my family would be killed in a Russian strike. I expect where we live is within the radius of a target.
But that is all the more reason to want to prevent nuclear escalation, not less of a reason to do so.
Putin pushed his luck too far, as expansionist leaders often do. People will put up with a bully for a while, before saying "enough."
I'm getting a terrible feeling of déjà vu!
https://twitter.com/davidrhodesBBC/status/1576484934440845312?cxt=HHwWgIDQ8b-s5uArAAAA
'Documents obtained by the BBC show the govt signed a £32.8m contract for an asylum centre in North Yorkshire which was then cancelled. It’s expected taxpayers will have to pick up a substantial compensation bill.'
That is what I find curious. Or maybe not at all curious. I believe you and the others are scared, but it's only my pet theory.
Putin chose this war, and he's lost it. That happens, don't start wars as you might lose them. He needs to retreat his army back to his own borers, which of course means leaving Crimea etc too - to the victor goes the spoils and Ukraine are the victors and get to reclaim their lost land.
There is something bigger than you can control and you are lashing out.
I'm more scared of a world were nuclear aggression is tolerated and normalised, than the risks associated with preventing that world. A world were nuclear aggression is tolerated is much more likely to see a nuclear holocaust than one where it isn't.
If you want an example of a substantial military build-up that was not used, then the BAOR and the equivalent US forces might be a good example.
Its you that, @HYUFD and @state_go_away etc that are lashing out and running around like headless chickens saying we must not allow Putin to be defeated as he might nuke us if he is.
No, Putin is defeated and that must be followed through to its conclusion in full. Russia out of Ukraine, peace restored.
Incidentally, I'm using Mac's dictation facility at the moment; you would be amazed at the options that came up in the previous sentence!
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/3760408#Comment_3760408
"My argument is that the west and especially the UK can do F all about it and should stop pretending we can"
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/3760513/#Comment_3760513
Turns out we can do something.
Loretta Lynn "Coal Miner's Daughter" on The Ed Sullivan Show
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpqqgCnF_Kc
One point about this - according to that thread, they *didn't* have a warrant. Either a search warrant or an arrest warrant. They said when challenged that they did not need one. They do not need a warrant to question somebody, of course, but they would to take away property unless the owner gave consent knowing they did not have to.
Which means prima facie in arresting somebody and seizing computer equipment claiming they could do so without a warrant the officers in question have exceeded their powers.
New Thread
What they didn’t have was a search warrant but, as previously explained, they didn’t need one.
Mistakes happen on the battlefield all the time. Sometimes quite large numbers of personnel are lost by mistake. You may want to ask yourself whether your enthusiasm for a hair trigger response is appropriate.
I don't really want to get into a long discussion about nuclear deterrence or the Ukraine war with you. It's not a computer game, ultimately.
If they arrested her with or without a warrant that is also separate from seizing property unless it is an indictable offence which it seems unlikely this would be.