Feel like that’s a bit of a misrepresentation. UK wasn’t cozying up to Russia, there was suspected links with Russia influencing Brexit - that’s two very different things. I’d think a big reason of why the U.K. is doing so much now is precisely because they know Russia did meddle in our politics.
Russian invasion of Ukraine | Fewer tweets, more discussion
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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.
London has been used to wash Russian dirty money for two decades now, under successive governments. Dirty money, as soon as it was cleaned, helped fund this war.
And Johnson's Government has deliberately underplayed Russian involvement in the Brexit referendum.
I think most people equate brexit more with Murdoch influence than Russian. Russia essentially piggybacked on the narrative that was already being spread far and wide by NewsCorp.
Russian influence is more on the financial side (well, and Lebedev obviously) and there was no attempt early doors to downplay like Germany did
I am happy to change the language if you and others feel it is harsh.
I am concerned that we have not done enough to rid Russian money from our politics. The Tories are still taking Russian-linked donations, even after February.
My point is that more pressure and focus should be given to the UK so that we don't simply slip back into the very dodgy status quo we had.
The ISC Parliamentary Report did state the UK Government deliberately failed to investigate Russian interference in Brexit:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...emlin-interference-scottish-referendum-brexit
It is not the same as Germany's involvement with Russia - I am not making that point. But it did involve an element of ignoring Russian influence because the Brexiteers were concerned it may undermine Brexit. Really not a good look.
Brexit might be the best thing the UK has done if Russia wins and causes massive destabilisation in the EU between Eastern and Western Europe. Hold on to your hats.
I never denied there was Russian involvement or that the government covered that up, of course they did, but the general populace when asked about who influenced that would point to Murdoch press, and they wouldn’t even be wrong. Russia saw a chink that was already there and took advantage because they knew it weakened the west.
The Russian money in the Tory party is obviously an issue but was also never going to be covered by this countries right wing press. It’s sad but true (and absolutely should be seriously investigated, albeit we know they won’t without some high level investigative journalism unearthing something major, rather than the Led By Donkeys shite we currently have raising it)
Citing things that stretch back for 20 years is not the here-and-now in which the UK has been one of Ukraine's most staunch supporters. Moreover, London is the world's most important financial centre - so it's not surprising that it has attracted some money-laundering schemes. The City of London finance sector is largely in private hands - it's not a nationalised industry run by the government.
As for Johnson and Brexit, that's just politics. He wanted Brexit and he got it - he's hardly going to admit any Russian influence on public opinion. Moreover, Russia has been working intensely for decades now to influence public opinion - by sowing confusion and muddying the truth - in almost every nation in the West. The UK is no different in that respect.
You seem very concerned to cast around for political leaders and countries to criticise ... perhaps motivated by the notion that anything short of past or present perfection is fair game.
Sorry, I wasn't disagreeing with you, just clarifying a point. I agree with what you have said.
I do think that if we had a Labour Government for the past few years, the right-wing press would be all over this.
I will reply to this and say no more in this thread, as this may be veering into geopolitics. My initial comment, which was a general one, was that Germany is getting a lot of criticism (and rightly so), whereas the UK has not. The UK's open door policy for Russian money - the money of oligarchs which is also by extension Putin's money - has had the double effect of allowing the Russian state to have more influence over UK politics, and to wash that dirty money which found its way back into the Kremlin's coffers and has helped fund this illegal, cruel, and needless war.
The UK has sent weapons and assistance. I want us to send more. Much more. Putin must be defeated.
But that does not mean that the inaction of the UK Government (current and previous) should be ignored and excused. The City of London (and its ancient privileges which have not been removed by the central government) has turned a blind eye to many money-laundering schemes, which has encouraged even more dirty money to flow into the UK. Added to that golden passport and golden visa schemes run by the UK Government, and we do not have the picture of a state that has listened to its own security services advice, let alone followed it.
If the UK is to avoid complicity in funding the next illegal war run by a dictatorship, much more action needs to be taken now to improve state security. I will leave it there.
This answers some of it.
They've been working on/with Johnson for a long time and he's gone to great lengths to cover up their involvement.
It may be mostly about Brexit but the UK/City of London and the offshire territories under its control are the #1 facilitator for dirty money in the world so are hugely important to the Russian elite and the money they have siphoned out of the Russian people over the last 30 years.
Won't change anything
Cosying up to Russia? How?
Not done the orcs much good though, has it? Unlike Germany, where everything seems to be just words, finding excuses or done as slowly as possible.
Yeah I think Putin greatly underestimated how giving money to the Conservatives would mean feck all loyalty from them.
Covered above, and I said I won't go into it too much in this thread. Probably more for the geopolitics. But it goes beyond donations to the Tories and interfering in UK elections, as bad as that is.
I am happy to tweak my language, but allowing Russian oligarchs to wash billions of pounds of their money in the City of London and in the UK economy ultimately meant funding, indirectly, Putin and helping contribute to the funding of this war.
As much as I hate this Government they are absolutely doing the right thing in helping Ukraine. In fact I would support them doing more. But we cannot forget the loopholes and deliberate policy errors of the past that helped Putin's regime. The semi-autonomous nature of the City should be challenged, and much more stringent regulation of financial transactions supported and implemented, to avoid this happening again.
Yeh, paradoxically he needs the anti-Russian PR, especially if the Russia report ever gets fully released. Unless its not really him driving the Ukraine help.
Of the past? The son of the former head of the KGB is an unelected lawmaker in the House of Lords and an influential newspaper owner, protected personally by Boris, and it's believed he's been helped to get his money out of the country without really feeling the effect of any sanctions. It's not a thing of the past here...
No, that's right, and I agree. I was more making the point that giving Lebedev a peerage was not some aberration. Government policies for at least 20 years have allowed dirty Russian money to be washed in London, of which a good chunk ultimately found its way back to Putin. We also allowed Russia to influence our politics, even after we knew Russian state actors were committing murders on British streets.
The UK has contributed to the funding of this war. What we are doing to help Ukraine seems to me to be the bare minimum considering we helped to fund this war, no matter what our intentions.
We also should absolutely hold the UK Government to account to change the policies and behaviours that caused this mess. I am very concerned that providing more and more weapons will allow the British state to mask the need for these crucial reforms, which have been advocated for by Parliament and the security services for years.
From the BBC liveblog:
Ukraine running out of ammo - officials
Ukrainian officials say their army is running out of ammunition as it engages in intense artillery battles with invading Russian forces.
Vitaly Kim, the governor of the Mykolaiv region on the southern frontline, said the fighting had become a "war of artillery". He added that the Russian army was much more powerful, while Ukraine's troops were running low on shells, AFP news agency reports.
He urged Western allies to speed up their delivery of long range weapons and ammunition to help Ukraine strike back.
"The help of Europe and America is very, very important," Kim said.
Ukraine's deputy head of military intelligence, Vadym Skibitsky, made similar comments in an interview with Britain's Guardian newspaper on Friday.
Ukraine running out of ammo - officials
Ukrainian officials say their army is running out of ammunition as it engages in intense artillery battles with invading Russian forces.
Vitaly Kim, the governor of the Mykolaiv region on the southern frontline, said the fighting had become a "war of artillery". He added that the Russian army was much more powerful, while Ukraine's troops were running low on shells, AFP news agency reports.
He urged Western allies to speed up their delivery of long range weapons and ammunition to help Ukraine strike back.
"The help of Europe and America is very, very important," Kim said.
Ukraine's deputy head of military intelligence, Vadym Skibitsky, made similar comments in an interview with Britain's Guardian newspaper on Friday.
This is in Russia ...
Not exactly. Putin wasn't allowed to get the third term in a row (God knows why this "in a row" was in the Constitution in the first place), so Medvedev switched with him for the third one. The change in the constitution happened later, during a later Putin's term, when they've erased/nullified Putin's previous terms. Medvedev did increase the length of those terms though, from 4 years to 6 years.
Medvedev is a tool, of course. Some people were hopeful when he first came in since he was clearly more liberal and open to the world than Putin was but I never really believed that he would have the guts to try and to get out from under Putin's heel... he didn't. It is believed that he at least considered not giving the place back — or that Putin felt like it may have been the option, we'll never know, so he completely fell out of Putin's favour after they've switched back and now Medvedev finally saw an opportunity to gain that trust back.
Any news on further arms shipments to Ukraine?
A bit worrying if we are supposed to be arming them.
The change in the type of warfare from hit and run on static targets and convoys to an artillery battle is really concerning for me. We (UK/USA/EU etc) need to ramp up deliver of shells. I would happy empty the British Army's supply of howitzers and shells if that will make a difference - we are not in need of them any time soon.
Might I ask if you have a sense that Putin is really in charge or that he’s still beholden to the criminal interests out of St.Petersburg that got him into politics?
I wonder if he even has the power to stop the war if he wanted to. But I’m not up on my Russian politics.
From the BBC:
"Russia having to resort to old artillery as it runs out of weapons
As we've been reporting, Russia is running short of modern weapons and is having to resort to using heavy anti-ship missiles in ground attacks against Ukraine - which are highly inaccurate and can cause significant casualties and collateral damage, the UK's defence ministry says.
We saw a few weeks ago during Russia's strikes on the southern city of Odesa they were using old soviet stock.
The analysis we're getting is that it's symptomatic of the Russians running out of weapons.
They've used up their more modern cruise missiles, they've used their more high-tech precision weaponry, so they're having to dig deep into the arsenals to find out what they have lying around.
I'm sure some Russians would dispute that - they'd say there are some tactical reasons for doing this, but it's quite likely, especially given the sanctions Russia is under, that a lot of its weaponry requires modern western technology imports to make new stocks.
So once they've used them all, given the sanctions they're under, maybe they have to resort to use old equipment."
"Russia having to resort to old artillery as it runs out of weapons
As we've been reporting, Russia is running short of modern weapons and is having to resort to using heavy anti-ship missiles in ground attacks against Ukraine - which are highly inaccurate and can cause significant casualties and collateral damage, the UK's defence ministry says.
We saw a few weeks ago during Russia's strikes on the southern city of Odesa they were using old soviet stock.
The analysis we're getting is that it's symptomatic of the Russians running out of weapons.
They've used up their more modern cruise missiles, they've used their more high-tech precision weaponry, so they're having to dig deep into the arsenals to find out what they have lying around.
I'm sure some Russians would dispute that - they'd say there are some tactical reasons for doing this, but it's quite likely, especially given the sanctions Russia is under, that a lot of its weaponry requires modern western technology imports to make new stocks.
So once they've used them all, given the sanctions they're under, maybe they have to resort to use old equipment."
Oh, no, he's in charge alright. And no, there are no hidden puppeteers behind him, be it some mythical oligarchs or criminals from St. Petersburg — he had cleared out everyone who had helped him to get there & felt that they could control him ages ago (Berezovsky would be the prime example). Watch the council meeting of Russian Security Council that happened a few days before the invasion, on 21th of February, and watch how he purposely humiliates some of the most influential people in the country to showcase his ultimate authority. It's feels like watching some prison movie.
I do believe that he has the power to stop the war if he wants to. He clearly doesn't though, but even if he did there's obviously a consideration of how the people, who are overstimulated by the ridiculous and ever-present propaganda, are going to react to him finishing the war with "the Nazis" without getting anything of significance back & leading the country into a huge economical crisis. He's backed himself into the corner and it looks like he's going to push though until something breaks — either Ukraine or his own regime. Hopefully the latter.
Talking about old weaponry and equipment, here are two russian soldiers at a checkpoint in Donbas equiped with Mosin Nagants and a Sovjet TA-57 field telephone from the 50's.
Occupiers don’t have time to export their "Cargo 200" from Ukraine - call intercepted by the Security Service of Ukraine:
https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2022/06/11/7351927/
https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2022/06/11/7351927/
Vladimir Putin, Russia’s resentful leader, takes the world to war:
https://www.ft.com/content/c039db89-7201-4875-b31f-b41a511496f1
https://www.ft.com/content/c039db89-7201-4875-b31f-b41a511496f1
Sanctions are hitting hard enough to hurt Russia, if not stop it:
https://www.theguardian.com/busines...ing-hard-enough-to-hurt-russia-if-not-stop-it
For example: "Output in industries from aviation to automotive has crashed. In May, the number of cars sold across Russia tumbled by 83% from the previous month, to 24,000. Rewind to May 2021 and monthly sales were nearer 150,000."
https://www.theguardian.com/busines...ing-hard-enough-to-hurt-russia-if-not-stop-it
For example: "Output in industries from aviation to automotive has crashed. In May, the number of cars sold across Russia tumbled by 83% from the previous month, to 24,000. Rewind to May 2021 and monthly sales were nearer 150,000."