Very interesting to see Russia redeploy units from Eastern Russia to Belarus.  

Makes you wonder:

Australia is closing its embassy’s in the Ukraine and evacuating all staff war imminent ?

Relatives in Polish military still say no war imminent. If they thought so the rest of the family would been advised by them to leave Poland by now, this would at least be one way to get the father in law to come visit.

They have described Australia pulling staff and citizens back as ‘prudent, but over reaction’.

I am still travelling to Poland in May, and my wife will prevent me from travelling to Ukraine AGAIN! But I am going to try and get there.

Australia is closing its embassy’s in the Ukraine and evacuating all staff war imminent ?

The media and Australia are saying it is imminent but I think it is not.  I guess you don't promote the Ukraine joining NATO and expect Russian to sit still?

US President Joe Biden says there is now every indication Russia plans to invade Ukraine, including carrying out a false flag operation to justify it, after Ukrainian forces and pro-Moscow rebels clashed in the Donbass separatist region.

Apparently there has been heavier-than-usual fighting within Ukraine between Ukrainian forces and pro-Moscow rebels (including a kindergarten being shelled), but each side is saying the other started it.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-02-18/biden-warns-russia-looking-for-pretext-for-war-ukraine/100841580

Makes you wonder:

Doesn’t make me wonder at all. Well actually it does, it makes me wonder if this clown knows anything at all about Svalbard.

Having one cable cut twice does not automatically imply non accidental, in this case it seems it’s not of ‘natural’ cause but that doesn’t imply nefarious cause either.

What happens to the US economy if the second cable is cut? Close to NOTHING! Svalbard is an isolated Norwegian island and merely cutting a cable or two would not disable any satellites, it would disable a cable or two.

No swathe of US internet goes through there, that will mostly go through geostationary satellites.

Polar orbiting satellites would be for weather, and other imagery data collection, and possibly military application - except NO US military data would go through Svalbard, it’s a demilitarised zone and Norway is very keen and careful to keep it that way - despite what Russia would/might say.

Looks inevitable that Russia will invade Ukraine.

Meanwhile, Tony Abbott.  Yes, that Tony Abbott MP making a fool of himself:
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/a-moment-in-which-our-world-could-all-change/news-story/b46a66f84d449ac439c4fca4835b1777

Seriously, he's acting like a Republican war-monger who still sees the USA as the 'Saviour of the World' (it isn't).  Silly Tony.

The Biden administration sought to hit back at Russia’s aggressive action while stopping short of declaring that it had officially invaded Ukraine, which would have triggered the array of hard-hitting sanctions President Biden has been warning about for months.

Instead, amid meetings Monday with his national security advisers and calls with several foreign leaders, Biden and his team reiterated their grim assessment of the crisis and imposed a smaller set of sanctions prohibiting U.S. investment and trade specifically in the breakaway regions.

Pissweak.

The Biden administration sought to hit back at Russia’s aggressive action while stopping short of declaring that it had officially invaded Ukraine, which would have triggered the array of hard-hitting sanctions President Biden has been warning about for months.

Instead, amid meetings Monday with his national security advisers and calls with several foreign leaders, Biden and his team reiterated their grim assessment of the crisis and imposed a smaller set of sanctions prohibiting U.S. investment and trade specifically in the breakaway regions.

Pissweak.

Would you rather the premier global empire go to war with them? I'd sure hope not.

Pissweak.

What would Donald do

This situation has been enabled by the weakness and ineptitude of the Biden administration.  

Putin would know Biden's weaknesses from studying Biden's 50 years in public life.  Putin would also see Biden's diminished mental capacity.  He understands that fish rot from the head.  

And just to be sure, Putin has been watching and testing Biden and his administration even before he became President.  The list of indications that Biden can't handle himself on the international stage includes:

• the shady dealings of the Biden family in China, Russia and the Ukraine (you don't think Putin could use that against Biden?)
• Biden's silly and ineffectual response to Russian hacking of US infrastructure
• the US administration boxing itself into a domestic political corner about the COVID lab-leak theory
• China lecturing the US on human rights
• the ongoing disaster in Afghanistan
• Biden's comments about Russia having "military superiority" in Ukraine
• the lack of unity within and between NATO and the US on Ukraine,  
• the admission that the West's response to an invasion of Ukraine would "depend on whether it was a minor incursion", and
• the response would be sanctions not military action.

Biden continues this weakness.  He drew a line in the sand, eventually saying that if any Russia soldier crosses the Ukraine border, there would be a strong response.  Putin's response was to simply and unilaterally move the Ukraine border, and then order his troops and tanks in!  And Biden's administration seems to be unable to decide whether or not this is an invasion.

Would Trump or someone else have done better?  Who knows?  All I can say is that on that score, I look to what Trump achieved in North Korea, his stance on Taiwan, his specific targetting of top enemy military brass, and his historic Middle East peace treaties.  He was unorthodox, unpredictable, and unashamedly pro-America. This made opposing Trump a high stakes game for any foreign government looking to take him on.  He was crazy enough to threaten to annihilate North Korea and possibly crazy enough to do it.  It kept adversaries largely in check, and with no new wars.  

Would this Ukraine situation have happened with Obama?  Again, who knows.  But at least he was a sentient, clever guy, and a good negotiator and builder of coalitions.  He could speak with authority, and was actually a leader and decision-maker.   We don't have that now.

Weakness makes fights more likely, not less.  

Those chickens may be coming home to roost.  Taiwan may be next, especially if there is actual war in Ukraine.

Fun times.

Looks like some stronger sanctions coming through. Let’s hope it works.

Very interesting to see the Deutsch stop certifying the Nordstream 2 gas pipeline overnight.

That won't impress the Russians.  But they were idiots for closing down their Nuclear Power Plants which had the effect of the EU becoming more dependent on Russian gas....

As for the Ukraine - I have no doubt Moscow will install a puppet leader in Kiev and then use Ukraine as a buffer against NATO, a bit like how they use Belarus.  And Russia will then strangle gas supplies to the EU in retaliation.

Peter Hitchens blames the West for snookering Russia since the fall of communism. I mean NATO is basically an anti-Russian alliance and despite promises that it wouldn't go any further than Germany its been bought right up to Russia's door-step with attempts to get Ukraine to join - Daily Mail.

He starts out by explaining the collapse of communism and the fact that the we had repeatedly broken promises to the new Russia -

Then came the brilliant American diplomat George F. Kennan, a man nobody could accuse of being soft on Communism.

But, unlike so many others, he could tell the new transformed Russia apart from the old USSR.

Kennan had been architect of the USA's policy of containment of the USSR. He came out of retirement to deplore Bill Clinton's support for pushing Nato east. I quote his prediction at length because he was so right.

'I think it is the beginning of a new Cold War,' said Mr Kennan. 'I think the Russians will gradually react quite adversely and it will affect their policies.

'I think it is a tragic mistake. There was no reason for this whatsoever. No one was threatening anybody else.

'This expansion would make the Founding Fathers of this country turn over in their graves. We have signed up to protect a whole series of countries, even though we have neither the resources nor the intention to do so in any serious way.

'[Nato expansion] was simply a light-hearted action by a Senate that has no real interest in foreign affairs.

'What bothers me is how superficial and ill-informed the whole Senate debate was.'

He added: 'I was particularly bothered by the references to Russia as a country dying to attack Western Europe.

'Don't people understand? Our differences in the Cold War were with the Soviet Communist regime.' Exactly.

We really have no right to ring-fence Russia (and maybe China too) with western satellite states because they find it threatening. And frankly the west is militarily in decline and can't afford to contain these ascendant powers anyway.

Looks inevitable that Russia will invade Ukraine.

Meanwhile, Tony Abbott.  Yes, that Tony Abbott MP making a fool of himself:
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/a-moment-in-which-our-world-could-all-change/news-story/b46a66f84d449ac439c4fca4835b1777

Seriously, he's acting like a Republican war-monger who still sees the USA as the 'Saviour of the World' (it isn't).  Silly Tony.

Wasn't Tony going to "shirtfront" Putin at some stage?

I read somewhere that Putin is a martial arts expert.

After the Afghanistan debacle last year, Putin saw a good opportunity to pushback against NATO.

Hence the situation today.

Exhibit A of clueless Western Imperialist BS:


https://youtu.be/wdrvpSfJM1w

The tragedy is, I can't tell whether that's truth or comedy.

I remember the old days, when real life left room for satire.  Not any more.

Looks inevitable that Russia will invade Ukraine.

Meanwhile, Tony Abbott.  Yes, that Tony Abbott MP making a fool of himself:
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/a-moment-in-which-our-world-could-all-change/news-story/b46a66f84d449ac439c4fca4835b1777

Seriously, he's acting like a Republican war-monger who still sees the USA as the 'Saviour of the World' (it isn't).  Silly Tony.

Wasn't Tony going to "shirtfront" Putin at some stage?

I read somewhere that Putin is a martial arts expert.

Putin is ex-KGB. He would have kicked Tones into next week.

Piton looks ready to pounce today I really hope he does not.

Putin looks ready to pounce today I really hope he does not.

You know the West has lost the plot with headlines like these in the local rag:

Wasn't Tony going to "shirtfront" Putin at some stage?

I read somewhere that Putin is a martial arts expert.

Putin is ex-KGB. He would have kicked Tones into next week.

He was a middle manager, not a special forces operative.

It would have been a win for Tony but perhaps a more even contest for Julie Bishop.

And so it begins....  Ukrainian Black Sea port of Mariupol is being shelled/bombed atm.

Also around Kharkov in the NE too.

I find it funny that the United States Postal Service ships to Russia no questions asked but Australia is blacklisted indefinitely.