Lighthouse

Crudely, but it’s massively skewed by the companies registered there. If Musk were to move Tesla’s HQ to Riga, Latvia would probably jump 10 places without the real world ‘wealth’ of the country changing.

The west is NOT running scared of Putin. We have a strategy, we're playing as calmly as we can and are not being drawn in to escalation. We hold all the cards, Putin's options are limited. Stick it out in Ukraine. He will probably occupy most of the country eventually but it'll be costly in terms of lives and money. It's going to be very rough domestically. Escalate and attack NATO; he'll get an arse whooping in a conventional war. Try to push the big red button; the military will step in and say enough is enough. Try to compromise or retreat; he's terrified of appearing weak more than anything else.

For a start we don’t have anything the Ukrainians can fly, secondly I believe they would be defined as offensive weapons as opposed to defensive. I don’t quite get why that’s an issue but that’s the distinction. Russia doesn’t have license to do anything they’ve done in Ukraine over the last 8 years, or in Syria or Chechnya. Sadly it’s the world we live in. I don’t know if and when we intervene, I honestly have no idea at what point that crossover happens. It’s a big escalation and opens up thousands of cans of worms. They could launch missiles at NATO countries, shoot down a couple more commercial airliners or anything they choose. As horrible as it is, Russians can go a lot worse than killing 50 people in a maternity hospital. We haven’t been to war with a nuclear power though, that’s the distinction here. From a purely political POV Ukraine just isn’t important enough to warrant that.

It does when Russia can’t afford to replace its losses on the battlefield. When logistics continue to flounder and vehicles and weapons fall victim to disrepair. When the morale of Russian citizens plummets and their conscript army has no desire to fight.

We’re basically doing all we can without escalating the situation into full on Nato vs Russia conflict. Our strategy is clearly to make this way as tough, expensive and demoralising as possible for Russia, whilst at the same time crippling their economy. This isn’t as trivial as Oleg and Sergei not having a latte on their coffee break, every multinational company that pulls out equals thousands of jobs lost and another chunk out of Russia’s economic output. I don’t know what else you think we should be doing?

Talking about our lack of tolerance for loss of life and how we’d be defeated as a combat unit over a weekend, against the same opposition which hasn’t managed to overcome Ukraine in two weeks, is a reflection of the whole defence organisation> It’s not relevant anyway, this isn’t UK vs. Russia, there’s a reason we’re in NATO.

Just out of interest, have you ever spoken to any of the families of servicemen killed in Iraq 1, 2 and Afghanistan? Perhaps you should give them your in depth assessment of how pathetic and gutless they all are.

Russia seized Crimea at a time of political upheaval in Ukraine, with protests across the country in both directions. They were too preoccupied and disorganised to do much about Russia seizing their Black Sea naval operation. I'm not an expert either but from the people I know who live there, giving away territory to a man like Putin, after months or even years of him using thermobaric weapons against schools and hospitals, is not going to feel anything like a win.

Illya Zabarnyi is a very well regarded CB at Dynamo Kyiv and already plays for the NT aged 19.

Basically no to all of that. If Putin gets any of the LPR/DPR or Crimea, legit, he will only come to the conclusion that it worked and try it again further down the line, except probably with better military planning and execution. Ukraine will never cede territory to Russia and nor should they. If it did happen it will do anything but heal that wound. The Ukrainians are furious about this and the idea of Putin getting rewarded for it with chunks of their country will not lead to any kind of peace. Too much damage has already been done to hope for any kind of positivity with regards to Putin. What was a see-saw country between East and West now has a sack of cement firmly on the pro EU/NATO end. I know someone who has literally changed her spoken language over this.

Poland is going to give Ukraine all their Mig-29s, under the agreement that Uncle Sam will replace them with comparable aircraft, most likely F16s.

I suspect you'd be getting pretty much ignored whilst they're going to town on each other, it'd be largely anti-climactic.

I'd quite like a Road Runner style cartoon death, where I'm walking down the street and I just hear the whistle of the bomb from above, with a gradually enlarging shadow appearing directly on top of me. Then the bomb will stick momentarily, nose first, into the top of my head, I'll pull out a small sign which says "Help!", then, Kaboom!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_racking

Neither is going to happen any time soon. I’m sure some Europhiles on here will be able to explain in much more detail than me but there are a whole bunch of social and economic requirements for applying to join the EU, which Ukraine weren’t even close to meeting BEFORE the invasion, let alone now. As much as I admire Zelenskyi, I do think he has been somewhat cynical using this crisis to try and push through EU membership. Forget NATO, that won’t happen in Putin’s lifetime.

Nothing quite says, "got us by the bollocks," like closing your stock market for two weeks, half the worlds banks and payment solutions pulling out and a rouble that’s worth it’s weight in toilet paper.

Finish!

Sister Mary is having none of it.

Russia should depose Putin, admit this whole thing was an obscene and tragic waste of innocent lives right from the start, pull out of everywhere (including Crimea and the so called LPR/DPR) and the world can return to sanity. What will happen is a long and protracted continuation of what's happening now. Russia will eventually amass an unknown area of Ukraine but continue to face stiff resistance until eventually this whole thing collapses in on itself and they simply don't have the money to keep the war going. It'll take years and tens of thousands of lives.

Bhutan have never attacked Guinea Bissau with land, sea or air power, so we can pretty much do away with our armed forces completely. Thank you Warrior, your insight will save this country billions in tax spending.

Interesting that members of the SNP have chosen now to reiterate their desire to scrap Trident.

We just need to keep cracking on with wind turbines and form a concerted effort with the rest of Europe not to rely on hydrocarbons in the future.

I’m guessing it’s somewhere between erectile dysfunction and rabies but like you say, start small and work our way up.

Some of the Ukraine chat has been moved to the lounge, if anyone wants to carry it on there.