blabyboy

I'm not so sure on those timings. This article presents a different outlook both on the military and economic fronts for Russia if they continue. If Ukraine et al can hold them for a year, then it may be that the balance shifts over to Ukraine. https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russia-sustaining-loss-forces-better-than-ukraine-says-iiss-research-centre-2025-02-12/

I think you underestimate Putin. He's been at the tiller for at least 20 years, plenty of time to effect political society in Russia. Yes he does manipulate common viewpoints, but let's not ignore the way he has made sure that political discourse in Russia has been strangled by his grasp. See Navalny as exhibit A. This is not about frothing to fight Russians, but Putin has already demonstrated he is willing to break agreements and has said he is ideologically opposed to Ukraine existing as a valid state its own right. So at what point do you engage him, Ukraine, Poland, Germany...? This guy hankers for the USSR of the 60s and 70s in both stature and geographical size. That's rather discomforting too. We need to put him on the back foot, make him consider his moves, and the only way we do this is with boots on the ground in an official capacity.

Starmer has already said that he sees UK forming part of the "willing" that will defend Ukraine. What is unsaid in those bullet points is what constitutes US backing... Is it military support, or just a verbal agreement from Trump not to start negotiating behind Europe's back, or something in-between?

Starmer said "we are at a crossroads in history," and unveiled the following plans: The UK, France and others have agreed to work with Ukraine on a plan to stop the fighting - this plan will be discussed with the US and together they will take the plan forward During the summit, four points were agreed: To keep military aid flowing into Ukraine, to have Kyiv at the table for any peace talks, for European leaders to to aim to deter any future Russian invasion of Ukraine and a "coalition of the willing" will be formed to defend Ukraine and guarantee peace there Additionally, the UK will be giving Ukraine access to £1.6bn ($2.01bn) to buy new missiles Europe must do the heavy lifting in any peace deal, Starmer said, but the agreement would need US backing Starmer's as bad as Blair for soundbite/not soundbites..

See Bibi has taken the que from Trump on negotiating tactics https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9q4w99je78o

I think this really useful in smoking out Trump and Vance on the support question. Ultimately, if the 'willing' troops go on the ground, would the US back them up if there was aggression from Russia? Although, I can well imagine Trump just smiles and says something akin to "Maybe we will, maybe we won't".

It's an interesting viewpoint for sure, good read.

It just didn't feel right, so I checked. Last year the UK spent £53.9 billions on defence. (Parliament UK) The Iran and Afghanistan war cost to the UK was between £8.4 billions (Wikipedia) and £9.6 billions ( The Gruniad) over several years. If we split it by 3 to keep highish, then the cost for a year fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan amounts to approximately 6% of the current budget. The UK allocated £13.3 billions last year for foreign aid - enough to accommodate a war spread over several years if we took all of it across, which we haven't .But we have allocated a portion and that is what Starmer has effectively done recently and why Dodds resigned. In order to prevent war in the future the UK and others are going to need to increase their spending significantly just to keep some sort of deterrence in any aggressors thoughts. And bear in mind that we may not actually use much of those extra munitions, weapons and vehicles as intended for years, if ever so the opportunity cost of this increase is massive - less for health, less for education, less for pensioners and most likely more taxes in some form. It will not be cheap, it will not be orders of magnitude cheap, it will be bloody expensive to not go to war and we could be paying over the odds for years without realising that investment (hopefully).

The problem here is that your second paragraph costs almost the same as going to war, as Annalise Dodd's resignation the other succinctly pointed out. There are hard decisions coming for the UK whichever course it chooses and sacrifices will need to be made by us all.

It's more the men in grey suits in the background... Now they will earn their coin.

I think he's in Texas for the upcoming Starship launch. For when these feckers need to escape off planet for the next war they'll start

Yeah but this time dude....this coin is different y'know. Guaranteed returns bro

Macron already saying they will continue to stand with Ukraine too. Summit in London this weekend for European leaders and Zelensky. Need to start pooling their money...and the armaments

The Zelensky interview with FOX News this evening should be interesting...

We did ok🤤

That may or may not be the case, but until the situation has formed up, you need to keep all options available and in-play. If you take it off the table too early then it narrows the options, perhaps in a direction you do not want to go.

They won't and he isn't. It's a negotiating tactic. Trump has said that US would protect UK troops if needed. That's a backstop in all but name.

https://elevenlabs.io/blog/what-happens-when-two-ai-voice-assistants-have-a-conversation Interesting development. Makes me nostalgic for the modem handshakes in the 90's

Really? Would you mind sharing your working out please?

That seems to be the prevailing attitude of World leaders at present.

Yes, I was going to link that too, but well done for being quicker. 😀 Those graphs do have some rather steep gradients don't they.... And the costs to residents is not really addressed.

Yep. "I do wonder whether this sort of decision will look right in 10 years," added Sir Ian Cheshire, who has held many executive roles at companies such as B&Q owner Kingfisher and Barclays bank." From the article I linked.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cvgd9v3r69qo The price of a salute eh..

I think CongressWoman Luna said it'd be at least a couple of weeks as they had located a large number of pages that were not filed into the last report completed in 1992. We will await and see I guess.

Yep. Measure it just as the price jumped due to local fluctuations...which then dropped back a week after 🤔 However, you will get price drops in Summer after the April measurement for sure. And.... BP is the first of the UK lot to take up Trump's message. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3374ekd11po