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Um, really? That's such a clumsy attempt at justifying this invasion, oh woops, I mean 'special military operation'. And I realise that's not your quote, that's from the official Russian MOD social media page.

Also he's wrong about Russia and China being able to work around the SWIFT system. 'The RMB cross border payment system still relies on banks as nodes, which can be sanctioned and influenced. For example China's own payment system can avoid the SWIFT sytem controlled by the US, but the nodes in...

I'm half brown and half white (does that make me biege?). I'm of two minds about this statement, the idealist in me says we should respect all people equally and not take any pleasure in the death and suffering inflicted on any side. But the realist in me acknowledges the attitudes that prevail...

Great post, I completely agree. Just to add to Russia's growing list of problems, a build up of NATO forces in the Baltics, Poland and Romania will also force Russia to reinforce its borders, which will now include the Belarussian border now that they have basically declared themselves a vassal...

I use this thread to read usefull stuff, I've added about 60-70 posters to my already lengthy ignore list from this thread alone. You're on my very short list of people whose posts I bother reading, so I'm missing most of the armchair cheerleading (But I get it second hand everytime you and...

I don't think it is possible for Russia to fully 'capture' Ukraine, they don't have the numbers to occupy the entire country and supress the on-going insurgency. It's probably going to be a long and bloody conflict with millions displaced and a death toll measured in the 100,000's, with much of...

Germany will experience energy shortages and rising costs for as long as the sanctions are in place. We are all going to experience the effects of this ill conceived war for many years to come, there are no winners. But those most affected will be the Ukrainian and Russian people. A simple...

You're clutching at straws. The simple fact is that Russia cannot easily replace the European markets for its main exports. Putin has seriously miscalculated the consequences of his actions and Russia will pay a heavy price in the long run.

How are they going to deliver their primary export, natural gas, to Asian markets?

Not quite, its 38.7% by nominal GDP. And you can remove Japan and several other countries from the potential markets for Russian exports. It doesn't make sense to just export to Asia instead of Europe, how long is it going to take to build new pipelines to get Russias main export to Asia?

Good to see you back, even if its only temporary. Keep up the informative posts, I enjoy reading them. Hope life is well with you, and just ignore the haters.

Approximately $400 billion of Russias $650 billion in foreign reserves are currently held with central banks in countries which are enforcing the banking sanction. 23% is held in gold by the Russian central bank, 14% with the Chinese central bank which can be accessed. The Russian central bank...

In the long term Russia can work around SWIFT, its just going to be much more costly and difficult, Iran managed it. But its the Russian bank sanctions that are actually more damaging to the Russian economy, even those sanctions already actioned let alone further sanctions against the Russian...

According to the international bank of settlements, international banks have approximately US $121 billion in assets owed to them by Russian based entities, and there is approximately $US 128 billion in loan and deposit funding by Russian entities to foreign banks, so its roughly equal. Not all...

Great whataboutery, what does that have to do with the original post.

I just watched the Dr Strange 2 trailer, I'll let you do the honors and post it (maybe another thread), a couple of mind blowing cameos.

How good was that shot when Moon Knight is in the air and his cape forms a crescent. Really looking forward to this.

That's another discussion, it doesn't change the fact that this particular story has some huge holes in it.

F-22 just answered your question. I'm no expert on ASW, but the problem with the story is the part where the Russian frigate 'fired' upon the Virginia class sub. There is only one weapon they could have fired at a submerged sub with (a torpedoe) and you don't fire warning shots with them. Also...

That's even worse than a random twitter account. This is such a clumsy and obvious piece of fake news, it's part of a concerted wave of propaganda coming out of Moscow. News agencies are just repeating the fake news story originating from the Russian MOD.