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War on Terrorism (Politics)
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Mick Harper wrote:
The Ukrainians, uncritically quoted by their lackeys in the western media, keep on saying this is a Russian trap, which seems ridiculous to me but excuses their plodding progress. I can't see how the Russians can hope to keep the Crimean water supply unless they control the western bank of the Dnipro.

But then I can't see Crimea is much use to them without it. As I have been saying since Day One of the war, this is the verpunkt -- not Kiev, not Kharkov, not the Donbas, not Mariupol, not Odessa. Whether it is the verpunkt for war or peace remains to be seen but, given the mentality of Russia, Ukraine, the USA (and a bit NATO), I fear the worst.


I can't see the Ukranians trying to cross the river Dnipro en masse. Why would you? They therefore will have to come the long way around the side. The Russians' last line of defence of the Crimea to keep the water supply will therefore be Nova Khakhova to Melitopol. That's about three times the length of Hadrian's wall.

Verpunkt=Schwerpunkt ??
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Mick Harper
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Sh'very good of you to point it out, Blofeld, but spelling it properly won't help you. (A map would.) Basically you can't hold one side of a waterway, no matter how securely, and consider the water supply safe. How are you going to get the 100% Ukrainian water (if the frontline is Nova Khakhova to Melitopol) to flow down your ickle canal?

"Open the lockgates, number one!"
"Can't, sir, the Ukes are waving tommy guns at me."
"Just do it. And leave them open."
"You were right, sir, they all laughed. There are all sorts coming your way, comrade colonel. Dead cows, mainly."
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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I predict the water will be kept on for the duration of the "special operation".

"The Ukrs are damming the water that flows to Crimea, General"
" Prepare to open fire, Sergei"
"But sir, destroying the dam will also mean that the Crimeans will have no water"
"Yes Sergei, but neither will they in Kherson."
"You will flood the whole area, Sir."
"Correct. That is the whole idea, to flood the whole area on both sides of the river."
"You can't do this."
"No, Sergei, they won't do this, when they realise that we can"

"So it is bluff."
"The threat is stronger than the execution, Sergei."
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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I am glad you agree with me at last, Wiley.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Scholz is doing the normal, making a promise of 2% Nato defence spending, then saying it's an aspiration, then it will happen by 2025.

Trump will call him out if Biden won't....
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Mick Harper
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Politicians love these aspirations with a number attached. It looks so specific but so isn't. As I remember, the 2% was baked in from the early days of NATO and, whether intended or not, was offset by the 2% you were supposed to be giving in aid to the Third World. Countries either comfortably exceeded it or came nowhere near it, depending on their ordinary year-to-year military budget.

You probably won't remember Trump, a forgotten figure now, but a real firebrand in his day. Attending a NATO summit, he told the Europeans either to pay the money they had been promising for twenty years or he was taking his toys home with him. How we smiled.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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There is more big German news in today's Guardian. Evil right wingers have been trying to launch a coup.

Twenty-five people were arrested, and by lunchtime eight of them were in police custody, among them a serving soldier of the elite KSK unit, a lawyer, a pilot, a gourmet chef and a prince, the alleged ringleader who had led the plans to overthrow the German state and replace it with a “monarchistic order”.

A gourmet chef. He was arrested, no doubt just as he was preparing a bombe glacee.

Doubt has been expressed as to the extent to which the group was capable of actually carrying out its plans to overturn the German state, starting by storming the Reichstag building and handcuffing and arresting MPs. Yet there has been much relief that they did not succeed. The Green MP Sara Nanni said while she believed the group might not have been smart enough to carry out what the interior minister, Nancy Faeser, referred to as its “violent fantasies”, nevertheless, “no matter how crude their ideas and how hopeless their plans, the very attempt is dangerous”

Yes, it's the fantasist nutters you most need to worry about, not terrorists with proven track records.

The group targeted on Wednesday certainly seemed to be serious about its aims. According to investigators, its members were made to sign a non-disclosure agreement: anyone thinking of breaking it was threatened with punishment by death.

You do wonder if it would have been easier foil the plot by simply leaking that the Prince was now helping the security services. Maybe that's not ethical but, come on guys...these are extreme right wingers.
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Grant



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I always remember those Muslims who were caught with castor beans in their kitchen and arrested because they might have extracted ricin from them.
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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The castor beans were planted.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Seems to Wiley, the latest nudge and a wink to Ukraine is that if Russia continues to bomb your civilian infrastructure, you can bomb their military bases in Russia.
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Mick Harper
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Whose side are we on? It turns out that 'bombing military bases in Russia' meant strapping nine kilos (!) of explosives on two ex-Russian 1970's drones which badly frightened an alsatian patrolling an airport perimeter. I think we can safely say no Americans were involved in this escalation which even Pentagon planners would recognise might be thought a casus belli if they were.

PS Which is not to say it was not a mini-masterstroke by the Ukrainians, the Russians being the way they are. Remember it was that German youth flying his micro-lite to Red Square that brought down the Soviet Union.
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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Mick wrote:
The castor beans were planted

I have been asked to make it clear this was a joke.
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Mick Harper
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The situation in Kosovo will be a good test of how grown-up everyone really is. A quick history lesson:

1. Kosovo doesn't have any. No such people, no such country. It was a post-1945 administrative sub-region of a sub-region of Yugoslavia.
2. Nato created it by making it independent on account of it being inhabited by Albanians persecuted by Serbs.
3. It now has a sliver of territory along the Serbian border inhabited by Serbs persecuted by Albanians.
4. It would be simplicity itself to return the sliver to Serbia in which case harmony, peace and prosperity will reign for evermore.
5. This would mean rewarding Serbia and its patron Russia and obliging Nato to read the riot act to its Kosovan allies who are intent on keeping the sliver because it is part of their sovereign territory and must not be given up for such footling gains as harmony, peace and prosperity for evermore.

So let the heartaches begin
I can't help it, I can't win
I've lost that girl for sure
And tears won't help anymore
So let the heartaches begin
I can't help it, I can't win.
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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Modern dictatorships have a weird attitude to the rule of law. By definition they are not greatly trammelled by it themselves yet they go to considerable lengths to dress up their actions as lawful even though they only hold themselves up to ridicule by doing so.

My previous favourite example was Putin jailing Alexi Navelny for exiting and entering Russia quite publicly (though apparently illegally) after being poisoned by Putin and needing treatment in Germany. The Myanmar military junta giving Aung San Suu Kyi a thirty-three year stretch for corruption is now in the lead. You can be sure she will be given a parole hearing after she's served a third of her sentence.
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Mick Harper
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I keep watching Ulster going down the tubes in all directions. I keep hearing journalists explaining to me that it is going down the tubes because it has no government and it has no government because the DUP won't be in it on account of something or other even though everyone knows the real reason is they don't want to serve under the ex-terrorist Sinn Fein party.

I keep watching Lebanon going down the tubes in all directions. I keep hearing journalists explaining to me that it is going down the tubes because it has no government and it has no government because none of the other parties will join it on account of something or other even though everyone knows the real reason is they don't want to serve under the ex-terrorist Hezbollah party.

And the only way out of the situation anyone can come up with is fresh elections that everyone knows will produce the same situation. Time for the man on the white horse (or whatever). It is only because everyone thinks democracy is best that prevents this. As AE always teaches: never have a fixed policy. Democracy is just a form of government, like all the others.
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