That’s the crazy thing. By all accounts, this dude went into exile and all he did was buy scratch tickets and sausages at his local shop. He wasn’t trying to drum up a resistance movement or anything. And Putin still not only wants him dead, but he wants to send a message.
The problem with attaining absolute power is that it becomes a matter of life and death – your life and death – to hang onto it.
It’s no fun being an autocrat. Just ask Nero, who was terrified of being assassinated, or Domitian, who complained that nobody would believe there was a conspiracy against him until it was successfully carried out (guess how he died?).
One of the best things about democracies is the fact that the leaders generally know they can step down and live comfortably in retirement.
Putin is sending a message to the West. It’s really that simple.
Yeah but whats the message? “I wont keep my word so dont do prisoner exchanges again”?
It’s a message to anyone who might cross Putin. “You will die and I will pick the time and place. The West is powerless to stop me.”
Sounds right. Internally in Russia I am sure it will have the desired terrorizing effect. We sure could use a strong leader in the USA right now. Instead we have that weakling dullard trump and his idiot followers. Dark times.
This sort of thing is our specialty. For some reason, keeping diplomatic, Aramco listing and arms sales relationships with Saudi Arabia is more important than punishing rampant corruption in our defence industry, horrific war crimes in Yemen or, you know, 9/11.
Did anyone ever figure out who killed that MI-5 agent found zipped into his athletic bag and officially ruled suicide despite the zipper being on the outside?
In that case it felt like the British government just didn’t want to deal with what really happened. For quite a while it’s felt like the influx of Russian money into London took Britain’s balls away. Of course American government is just a pawn of the Russian government so like I can talk.
Most governments now are merely fronts for corporate interests anyhow. I used to think that sort of statement was paranoid hyperbole. But I really think that now it’s pretty much true. The only thing any government cares about is keeping its kickbacks flowing and its ability to loot the public coffers unimpeded.
And there it is…
So for anyone with half a brain that had missed 15 years of news, yes Putin IS trying to reverse the fall of the Soviet Union. Georgia, Ukraine, the Baltics are next, destabilizing Western democracies so he can move his plan forward unchecked.
All of the probing with his offensive forces and poisonings are tests to check NATO resolve. And Trump is playing right into his hands by weakening NATO and trade with our own allies. Trump is such an asshole.
Also note how Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic are moving into their old Eastern Bloc roles via far right Russian backed politicians.
It’s pretty obvious that neither the Cold War nor the Civil War actually ended when we thought they did.
Confirmed nerve agent.
Also according to BBC the agent was not Sarin nor VX gas, yet is much more rare than them. This has shades of the North Korean poisoning, but they used VX gas.
Hmmmmm, did someone violate their Chemical Weapon Convention obligations?? I wonder if they have picked up the woman that bumped into them by the gym yet.
True enough, though perhaps we’re thinking too narrowly even at that. To Americans, the Cold War was this distinct, unique sort of experience, but to the rest of the world it was the umpteenth enactment of power plays and clash of empires that had been going on since people organized into groups. It had its specific and perhaps unique elements, but it was only the Americans who saw global jousting for power and position as a post-WWII aberration, one that could be “ended.”
Of course, to the USA, “ending the Cold War” meant, in effect, recognition of the USA’s dominant position in the world; the sort of “peace dividend” we were looking for was effectively an acceptance of Pax Americana. As we’ve found, it doesn’t work that way. The USSR may have ended up in the dustbin of history, but Russia has been jockeying for power and influence for centuries; there was no logical reason it should have stopped. Well, no logical reason except to us, because, well, 'Murica.
How about some banality of evil?
https://twitter.com/i/web/status/971595788315918336
SKA is allowed to ignore the salary cap, its payroll is 6 times that of an average team, it has dibs on every star who considers the KHL.
The KHL even has an official explanation for this… It goes like this: “Allowing all the best players to concentrate in one team has created unique chemistry that transitioned seamlessly to the Olympic squad. Making the KHL season easy for them has safeguarded against injuries and bad morale. This is why we won the gold”
Future historians will categorize the last 300 years of history as an extension of the War of the Spanish Succession.
As a followup to this, check out the top salaries from 2016 in the KHL (hint, 14 of the 30 are from SKA):
Russian state media to “traitors”.
Don’t move to Britain, you’ll die. Maybe it’s the weather (sic)
Apparently Skripal is connected to Steele of Trump dossier fame.