Russia

[BigRedBuster]

1 hour ago, NebraskaHarry said:

This dude goes to Russia because he didnt think the US was being ethical for spying on people (which I'm not saying he's entirely wrong) so he leaked classified stuff to the public. But man, you went to Putin's Russia where that's all they do, poison their opposition and start genocidal wars. 

Yeah....ever since he went to Russia to get away from this corrupt government, he lost all credibility.  

[RedDenver]

2 hours ago, BigRedBuster said:

Yeah....ever since he went to Russia to get away from this corrupt government, he lost all credibility.  

I disagree. Where was the guy supposed to go? The US can get most people extradited from a lot of the world.

 

I'm not saying Snowden is necessarily a credible source that people should trust, but I also don't think going to Russia loses him all credibility either.

[BigRedBuster]

1 hour ago, RedDenver said:

I disagree. Where was the guy supposed to go? The US can get most people extradited from a lot of the world.

 

I'm not saying Snowden is necessarily a credible source that people should trust, but I also don't think going to Russia loses him all credibility either.

I disagree. If you’re going to be principled enough to turn on your own country….you lose cred if you run off to one worse to protect yourself. 

[nic]

Anyone think Putin would be desperate enough to use WMDs? Are there people in the chain of command that would not follow those orders?

 

https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/27/europe/putin-binary-moment-russia-ukraine-war-tipping-analysis-intl/index.html

 

[RedDenver]

15 hours ago, BigRedBuster said:

I disagree. If you’re going to be principled enough to turn on your own country….you lose cred if you run off to one worse to protect yourself. 

It's a fair point and I agree he should have stayed and faced the (unjust IMO) consequences here. However, if you're going to run from the US, then you can really only run to a few countries. Whether he ran to Russia or China isn't really of consequence to me.

[Undone]

Three ruptures (read explosions) to the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline are being reported. This is potentially really, really bad. Sweden supposedly actually recorded explosions that measured 2.3 on the Richter scale.

 

I think personally it's hard to say who did this, and I don't think it was just random accidents.

 

The common consensus will be that it was Russia themselves that did it, and maybe they did.

 

I greatly fear that completely innocent Europeans will actually freeze this winter from all of this s***.

[knapplc]

 

[BigRedBuster]

27 minutes ago, Undone said:

Three ruptures (read explosions) to the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline are being reported. This is potentially really, really bad. Sweden supposedly actually recorded explosions that measured 2.3 on the Richter scale.

 

I think personally it's hard to say who did this, and I don't think it was just random accidents.

 

The common consensus will be that it was Russia themselves that did it, and maybe they did.

 

I greatly fear that completely innocent Europeans will actually freeze this winter from all of this s***.

This is going to be really interesting as this is investigated.  I'd love to blame Russia for it.  But...why would they do this?  All they have to do is turn off the pipeline and it accomplishes the same thing.

 

If I had to bet, I would say it was someone who doesn't want Russia selling gas to Europe and funding their war with it.  Probably a radical group working on their own.  But, saying that, it would have to be someone who has the ability to plant explosives deep in the sea.  So, someone with at least some form of military technical ability.

 

I'm very concerned about how this is going to affect Europe going forward.  Very concerned about the civilians.  But, this can affect our economy too.  My industry alone has some feed stock raw materials that come from Europe.  Cutbacks on natural gas have already affected the supply.

[Undone]

2 minutes ago, BigRedBuster said:

This is going to be really interesting as this is investigated.  I'd love to blame Russia for it.  But...why would they do this?  All they have to do is turn off the pipeline and it accomplishes the same thing.

 

If I had to bet, I would say it was someone who doesn't want Russia selling gas to Europe and funding their war with it.  Probably a radical group working on their own.  But, saying that, it would have to be someone who has the ability to plant explosives deep in the sea.  So, someone with at least some form of military technical ability.

 

Yep. And not only could they have just turned it off without blowing it up, they want this revenue. I heard someone say "they want the price of natural gas to spike even further," but you still can't get the revenue from the product unless you deliver on the product...right?

 

I think it's a safe bet personally to say us plebs won't ever figure out who really did it. But it's not crazy whatsoever to believe that it was done intentionally to exacerbate the current status in Ukraine in some way, regardless of who did it.

 

Again, I greatly fear for average, innocent people all over Europe who may actually not be able to heat their homes in about 2-3 months when it's really cold.

[walksalone]

They could shut it off, but if they blow it up, then they can blame somebody....  Sneaky underhanded Cossacks...

 

Has anyone ever read Red Storm Rising?

[Undone]

2 minutes ago, walksalone said:

They could shut it off, but if they blow it up, then they can blame somebody.... 

 

Absolutely one of the other main possibilities for sure.

 

But just as a thought exercise, you have to think about how they'd prioritize short/medium term repercussions to doing this against whatever the primary end game would be.

 

Because somebody is going to attempt to fix that pipeline sooner rather than later anyway.

 

Maybe they'd even want to try to pin it on Biden. I know he made some comments back in February about "having the ability to shut down Nord Stream 2." Really hard to say, but a major setback to any hopes that things start to turn around and go in a positive direction with the entire situation - which has global repercussions to say the least.

[knapplc]

It would be difficult for most people to access this pipeline, which runs under the Black Sea. it's between 80 and 110 meters below the surface - deeper than Navy SEALs are certified to dive. You'd need a sub to get to these lines.

 

[BigRedBuster]

24 minutes ago, knapplc said:

It would be difficult for most people to access this pipeline, which runs under the Black Sea. it's between 80 and 110 meters below the surface - deeper than Navy SEALs are certified to dive. You'd need a sub to get to these lines.

 

Which is going to make it more difficult to repair. 

[commando]

why is gas still flowing in that line?  can't russia turn the spigot off?   they want that gas bubbling to the surface for show is my guess.    

[knapplc]

If I was one of these conscripts I would surrender the instant I had the chance. 

 

They don't have even basic medical supplies to give these guys. Horrifying.