Russia's at it again
- Thread starter Pogue Mahone
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) is joined by CEO Duncan Drasdo and Financial Director Andy Green from the Manchester United Supporters Trust for a special episode on all things behind the scenes at Old Trafford including a brief history of MUST and their aims today, views on INEOS and Sir Jim Ratcliffe so far, and the Old Trafford regeneration.
Most of the shale oil is already extracted, as i wrote, US production is at it's peak already, it can go higher, but not by more than 1m barrels per day. And it can only do that gradually. You can read IEA report, they made the last one just this week. In order for US to drive prices down to 40$ mark it needs to produce somewhere around 14 millions barrels and that is simply not possible.
We are not talking about prices remaining in 60-65 bracket, that's a comfortable price for Russia that allows it to increase it's reserves even. We are talking about prices going down significantly and staying there for quite a while and US oil simply can do that, first of all it's already at a near maximum capacity, but more importantly if prices will fall even to 50$ some of US shale production will be cut momentary. So these big shale oil reserves you talk about can only be a factor of the price remaining as it is now or maybe 5$ lower at the most.
Its not just US production - many countries are now discovering that they have shale deposits and with the extraction and transport technology improving, they will start to create their own oil and even ship it to other countries. That will keep the price of oil down for the foreseeable future.
The point is that there is an overarching agenda within most mainstream media outlets that attempts to paint Corbyn as some kind of wacky communist Soviet sympathiser. It's disappointing that this extends to the BBC whom should hold complete neutrality.
He does a pretty good job of that himself, what with calling NATO a ‘danger to world peace’, refusing to say if he’d meet the obligation to defend a NATO country invaded by Russia, saying NATO should ‘restrict its role’, saying NATO should demilitarise its Eastern borders with Russia, and openly calling for British withdrawal from NATO (later retracted when he said there wasn’t an ‘appetite’ among the public to leave at the moment).
He reads straight from Russian propaganda on NATO and Russian relations. Plus all the trident nonsense.
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'Great' backdrop on Newsshite:
That's fecking horrific. Use of the hat as well.
Corbyn actually looks like Lenin a bit.
Thing with shale is that even if the tech significantly improves the lifting cost is pretty high. Currently it is in the fifties, they might get it down to the 40 range, but due to the nature of the process it has a natural limit for efficiency. You have to force it out of the rock, normal oil deposits flows with lift from the gas beneath it, or stimulating efforts like water injection - it is like popping a balloon, meanwhile shale production is like forcing air into a balloon.
As an example the newest offshore fields going online in Norway has a break even at $16\barrel. The gulf nations who basically can use a drinking straw to find their oil under the sand are even lower.
Then again, to balance their budgets they need atleast $50 a barrel, since they are so oil dependant, but their lifting cost is ridiculously low.
I fully agree. It’s strange how an old leftie can’t break his attachment to a country that, while once socialist, is now brutally capitalist but I guess it’s a case of old habits die hard plus a product of viewing the world as “West irredeemably bad therefore others must be better”.
No doubt about it. The main point i was making is that there will be far more oil on the market due to the emergence of shale over the past decade than people previously thought and that will continue into the future as extraction technology continues to improve, transport options diversify, and more and more countries begin to gradually transition to renewables. Each of these will cause a protracted glut in the amount of oil and gas on the market and keep prices fairly low. If I were a better man, I would imagine we are going to see the 30s again before we ever see the 100s.
The other factor working against Russia though is that their cheaper fields (West Siberia) are depleting while other deposits are located in very challenging locations where they certainly can’t “use a drinking straw” like in the Gulf. This won’t have a short term impact but, with shale putting an effective ceiling on oil prices, it will limit their flexibility unless they diversify.
So that’s 2 Russian’s on Putin’s wanted list who have suffered attempts on their life within 8 days. One has now been classed as murder and one as attempted murder.
The days of the 100's are over, I've yet to meet a single person in the oil industry who believes otherwise.
10-15 years ago a car would use 1 litre on the mile, today they are down to 0,3 litres. Add the electric revolution and you've got a huge drop in demand - petrol by today constitutes 60% of hydrocarbon demand.
This is exactly what will save our arctic areas, the future price of oil simply won't justify the lifting cost.
Even as of today there are huge deposits found in Norway that due to the nature of the oil, complexity of lifting and size of investment isn't deemed worthy.
Today's oil industry is as much about limiting lifting cost as finding what we call the "elephants". The traditional 'ugly cousin' of the oil, the LNG, is today what is the most desireable. Traditionally we just saw the LNG as a useful tool for lifting the oil without the need for injection to the well. Today it is our greatest export article, far surpassing oil.
People might drive electric cars, but they'll still use gas to heat their homes and cook their food (weirdos, we use electricity).
I mean, would the other NATO countries meet the obligation if another was invaded by Russia?
That would mean all out war with them. Nobody wants that. It's a moot point because it will never happen so does it matter?
Similarly we don't/will never need Trident and shouldn't be wasting money on it.
But it’s precisely Putin’s strategy to push to see how far the mutual defence pact goes (particularly in the Baltics). So, while when push comes to shove, we might not declare war, I don’t see much upside in revealing our hand in this game of bluff. And when that person has appeared on Russia Today and has someone like Milne as his adviser, it’s not unreasonable to ask questions.
TLW said:The BBC's coverage of Corbyn is getting a bit over the top now:
I'd certainly hope so, or the treaty isn't worth the paper it's written on. Collective defence is the whole point, and why Russia is so keen to split NATO members.
Never? To me, this is ludicrous complacency. If human history tells us anything, it's that nations will go to war. Ten years ago, who would have thought that Europe's borders would start changing through military invasions again... but here we are with Russia invading Ukraine. The borders have changed.
You think there's no risk to the NATO countries bordering Russia? Putin certainly carries out a lot of military exercises on the border... I wouldn't want to show too much weakness if I were a Prime Minister.
The whole point of NATO and collective defence is to try and prevent all out war with Russia (or other major powers). Undermining NATO like Corbyn and Trump have been doing is precisely the kind of thoughtless talk that could actually trigger a war, if Russia think NATO won't defend itself.
Now would be the worst time imaginable to scrap our nuclear deterrent. Russia recently helped elect a wannabe-fascist to lead our closest ally. And an actual fascist came second in the presidential race of our geographically closest ally. Just this week, Russia warned the UK 'not to threaten a nuclear power'.
I wish nuclear weapons didn't exist. But we live in a world where they do and it's hard to imagine a more crazy decision than unilateral nuclear disarmament in the current geopolitical situation.
Corbyn and his ilk approach foreign policy as if the world is the pacifist utopia they'd like it to be, rather than how it actually is.
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That's the entire game. You don't want to go to all-out war with Russia, but to minimize their appetite for aggression you need to convincingly act like you would. The best way is to create a structure (NATO) that spends nearly all of its time preparing for the eventuality, so the Russians have just enough doubt about whether it will or not.
Plus, the real question for the Russians is how promptly do the Americans come. Its where history has brought us and I realize its not comfortable for European nations. But that's been the cost of keeping Germany off the stage when it comes to military affairs.
'Great' backdrop on Newsshite:
It gets better. It seems that just putting St Basil's behind him wasn't Russian looking enough for them.
♪Ohhhh Jeremy Lenin♪
Putin doesn't feck about does he?
Glushkov owed £87 million to other 'oligarchs'. His own daughter has had to go into hiding because the debt passes to her.
Sometimes it's not an international spy game, just the consequence of allowing the russian mafia to set up shop in our capital city.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ed-daughter-Nikolai-Glushkov-goes-hiding.html
Yes that's not true!
IIRC it would end the detection easily if you had a sample and then got a 100% IR match with the agent used, but you can interpret even without that.
6:50 here
Have you even watched the piece? It’s called ‘does Labour have a Russia problem?’. It’s questioning what a lot of people suspect about his faction of the left, in that they fetishise Russia because of their communist history and continued opposition to the capitalist west. Corbyn’s actions in parliament opened the door to those questions being asked of him and it doesn’t help that members of his own party seem to believe there is substance in the perception. In fighting in major parties always makes good copy.
The piece was fair to him I thought and it was a lovely graphic.
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Recent history has shown that modern warfare has evolved beyond the traditional big states waging war against each other directly. Proxy wars in wartorn areas for strategic geopolitical and financial gain and using PMC's are either already commonplace or will be in the future. We'll probably never see all out war again but if you don't want to rule it out, continue to feel so frenzied. It's not complacency, it's just that MAD/the state of current affairs is enough and has been enough since 1945 with very few exceptions. We came close several times to doomsday during the first cold war and we'll probably do the same now but it's simply not realistic to think we're genuinely close to the end of the world at the minute and that's what it'd mean if Russia were to properly wage war in a traditional sense so they're not going to do it.
It's not going to be boots on the ground combat and it's not going to be air combat either. We've entered technological warfare from now on which means the threats to things like power grids as has recently cropped up are very real but a foreign country like Russia invading us? No chance.
Regarding collective defence, it's easy to back vocally when the chances that Russia's sabre-rattling actually becoming a genuine threat to a sovereign NATO member are slim to none. They can continue shouting but Russia won't actually take on a NATO country, Putin is a power hungry dictator but he's not suicidal. Besides, Russia don't actually have the cash or the resources to wage a world war. Their military isn't in a great state, their economy is even worse (given their reliance on fossil fuels it's entirely possible they'll be even more vulnerable as time passes) and the videos of the stupidly huge nuke are more so Putin can remain in power with an iron grip than they are a message to anyone outside of Russia. Perhaps he's feeling threatened by the oligarchs, perhaps by Navalny (in symbolism rather than actual means) and by technology enabling young people to dissent (he's all about controlling dissent by force) and find out about the sheer corruption by which he controls everything. An ignorant populace is an easily controlled populace and having everything at our fingertips and instantly shared makes it much harder for dictators to rule.
As such, we don't need Trident. If we were under threat of attack then our closest allies have nukes anyway plus they're obligated to protect us and the chance that we'll ever use them is about as close to zero as you can get. A nuclear bomb being used in an attack from now until the end of time means death for everyone, aka MAD. It's just not going to happen. Why are we wasting money on it when we've got a trillion layers on backup?
We have them now because we've still got the vague notion that the UK actually matters or has any influence on the world stage and we're not ready to assume our proper place in the world. Only the big three really need nukes and even then they'll never see use. You'll say 'never say never' but c'mon. Who wants to be the one who wipes 7.4 million people+ off the face of the earth? You can't even be remembered in history if there's nobody to record it left.
It says in that article that he was wanted for supposedly embezzling money from Aeroflot, the state owned Airline.
So, so predictable these Russian officials.
If Putin felt the need politically to go in to Estonia or wherever, the invasion of Ukraine would be the template. 'Little green men' on the ground and a denial that they have anything to do with the Russian state. Sew doubt and uncertainty... claim 'the people' want to be part of Russia... hope no one comes to their aid and the territory can be absorbed over time.
For MAD to work, we need our nukes. Or you have to rely on the US nukes. I wouldn't chance it based on the state of US politics at the moment. I'd much rather just stump up the cash than gamble on the US staying stable and behind us.
https://thebulletin.org/2018-doomsday-clock-statement
They’re getting on my nerves now.
Sergei is a British citizen and his medical condition is confidential. We do not publish photographs of patients without their (or nok) permission or give out their medical details. This is a uk crime and as such subject to uk rules. Russians don’t seem to accept any rules except their own.
Yeah, you don't give the prime suspect in an attempted murder investigation access to the hospitalised victim so they can finish the job.
His daughter is a Russian citizen.
She is, so next of kin can visit theoretically but as she is the victim of an attempted murder they will need permission. She has not been arrested so consular visits are not required. She is a patient so her condition is still classed as confidential. As MUN has already stated anyone who may be indirectly connected to the attempt on her life will not be allowed to visit.
He won't go into Estonia because they're NATO, even disguised as the green men force a la Ukraine. As much as I don't think everyone else would actually rush up there to save the Estonians the implicit nature of the deal in NATO would stop Putin. They couldn't do it they way they did in Ukraine, especially not after Ukraine happened too. We're too alert to the possibility and the first hint of any suspicious activity would be a call to war. Like I said, Putin is a murderous dictator but he's not suicidal. He knows what it means to attack a NATO member (even if I personally don't think anything would come of it).
For MAD to work, you only need opposition parties with nukes. We're one and the same with the US (regardless of Trump) or even with France who also have nukes. We're all NATO so NATO have nukes and that's enough to put Putin off. Do you seriously think he'd nuke the UK if we didn't have Trident? Would he bollocks. That's all out nuclear war. Even if the US or France didn't respond with their own nuke, he's not going to pick on us specifically (think about the logistics and optics of that for a second and realise how impossible that is, Trident or not) and attack us/invade us so Trident is completely redundant. Absolutely, one hundred percent a waste of money, time and effort.
I'm well aware of the doomsday clock but it's just a warning sign by people who have opinions much like any of us. They may have been party to more facts than the general, I'm not sure but it's still just opinions.
Nobody is using a nuclear weapon against anyone else any time soon. Kim wouldn't do it despite all the hysterics about him. Trump won't do it either even if he gets full warhawk types advocating a first strike like the people rumoured to replace Tillerson are. Much as he's the type that would love to ride a nuke into history and stamp his name forever more in mankind's tale even he isn't stupid enough to doom us all. It's literally just propaganda and hysteria.
Nuclear weapons are the symbol of the end. That's why MAD works. They're not actually anything else and they don't need to be either.
Putin is prodding and probing because he knows how successful the approach in America was. He knows how successful Brexit has been too to sowing discord but as you referenced before, it didn't actually work with Le Pen. We're going to be made to look like the jokers who jumped the gun because the supposed right wing wave died on it's arse shortly after we let it get the better of us. The Dutch and Austrians rejected it, the French then rejected it too which is arguably much more important and now we're just gonna be left hanging once Trump has had his time in the sun. Once the world consolidates ourselves again and the balance swings back, Putin/Russia won't be the boogeyman they are now and he knows it. They're not really a big threat but the press has gone into overdrive a bit like the red scare back in the 50's.
You need to calm down.
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The good guy from the allies' perspective. Not the good guy from an objective perspective.
That may all be true yet we would still be stupid to give up our nukes unilaterally. I’d be happy to give ours up - if everyone else did too.
At the end of the day you keep nukes on the off chance this kind of reasoning is wrong.
There are less than 10 nuclear armed countries in the world and the other 190+ do alright.
There's no reason whatsoever why Britain needs them when we're part of a group that ensures we've got them anyway if we need them.
Is a coup/assassination attempt impossible?
If said act did occur, how would Russia react?
If said act did occur, how would Russia react?