But can he play wingback in a rotational 3-4-3?

It does seem they are doing exactly what they want..ignoring any international pleas.
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just like Hilter and his gang did its spooky

Kind of interesting that Putin is one of the few leaders genuinely popular with his own people

if he's genuinely insane then yes, taking out london would plunge the world into economic chaos

if he's just a garden variety sociopath, then no. There are 20+ more realistic and valuable targets than a small island with no material natural resources.

comment by Don't Click (U14639)
posted 1 minute ago
Kind of interesting that Putin is one of the few leaders genuinely popular with his own people
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Us-against-them, siege mentality. It works. And don't you know it.

Russia is not extreme. Yes, they have differing views and know how to rub US/UK up the wrong way but I don't think there's a genuine hatred there or that they in any way would want to see the US/UK destroyed. There are a lot of pro-westerners in Russia.

They're just a pain in the ar$e really.

I don’t think Putin will attack us while he’s still on the playing staff at Everton, but he’s getting on a bit, so there’s maybe a risk after he retires

http://www1.skysports.com/football/player/13050/tony-hibbert

Russia's not the bad guy, the US and the West are just as to blame as Russia. The Ukraine government was overthrown, is recognised, the same thing happened in Crimea, not recognised.

The US surrounding the Russian nuclear sub station in Crimea prior to it being anexed etc.

Anyway looking at whats happening in the Ukraine,and potential threat to surrounding neighbors, could Russia be more of a threat to the UK than even IS??

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Who thinks IS who are not even on the same continent are a threat to the UK?

Don't see them as a threat to be honest.

Just Putin pushing the buttons, seeing how far he can go, by if we implemented strong sanctions he would back down.

I am going to Russia in 3 months, and people are saying there is no animosity on the streets at all.

comment by Redinthehead - FreeGaza - فلسطين (U1860)
posted 59 seconds ago
Anyway looking at whats happening in the Ukraine,and potential threat to surrounding neighbors, could Russia be more of a threat to the UK than even IS??

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Who thinks IS who are not even on the same continent are a threat to the UK?
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Are you kidding. IS are "based" on a different continent. But those brain washed monkeys, who align themselves with that cult. are all over the place.

comment by RenegadeOF (U9457)
posted 37 seconds ago
Russia's not the bad guy, the US and the West are just as to blame as Russia. The Ukraine government was overthrown, is recognised, the same thing happened in Crimea, not recognised.

The US surrounding the Russian nuclear sub station in Crimea prior to it being anexed etc.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
PMSL

OK fair enough the West isn't all good and Russia aren't pure evil......

but one realistically may want to attack and invade it's neighbours to conquer and keep, the other inadvisably gets involved in the odd 3rd world skirmish and desperately wants out

you really need to rethink the whole good guy bad guy thing

I may be wrong but wasnt it US troops that forced the Ukraine government to Moscow in the first place?

comment by Leiva la vida Lucas {Proud owner of the 5 000 000th comment} (U2720)
posted 8 minutes ago
I may be wrong but wasnt it US troops that forced the Ukraine government to Moscow in the first place?
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Eh?

but one realistically may want to attack and invade it's neighbours to conquer and keep, the other inadvisably gets involved in the odd 3rd world skirmish and desperately wants out
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Realistically, I reckon the only reason NATO hasn't tried to invade Russia over the Ukraine crisis is because it's huge and has loads of nukes. Would be a completely different story if it were Iraq, Afghanistan, Panama, Granada, Haiti or some such.

I dont know where Moscow came from in that comment

Wasnt it NATO forces that moved into Ukraine first though...which resulted in Putin moving into Crimea

Putin just likes flexing his muscles, metaphorically and literally, going by the number of topless photo's of him that seem to appear all the time.

The Ruski's lap it up because like all the major world powers they are led by testosterone.

A degree of common sense will prevail in the end before anything too destructive too close to home happens.

IS are a different kettle of fish. They want to basically take over the world and genuinely believe what they say they believe. They are a throwback to medieval crusaders, and even though the west has to take a very large share of the blame for why they exist, they still need to be dealt with before they reek more havoc.

Like all the major religions, if taken literally, they threaten (encourage) to kill all who don't believe what they believe. Many Muslims don't believe this of course, but it appears a significant enough number do believe it and are willing to act on it (or can be persuaded to), for them to taken seriously.

Comment deleted by Site Moderator

Russia is no threat to Western Europe, but their ambitions in the former Soviet bloc countries are a different matter. Though rather than some vain land grab, I think it just wants to keep those countries in its orbit for what it sees as security purposes. The NATO encirclement doesn't help matters in curbing their paranoia.

Its all about trade anyway...Most of Ukraine's exports go to Russia. Also by allying with the EU, it means Ukraine wont have to depend on Russia for much of its import and they can just use EU products.

Not sure how they gonna work out the gas & oil transportation stuff though.

comment by Lefty (U17934)
posted 1 hour, 34 minutes ago
comment by Redinthehead - FreeGaza - فلسطين (U1860)
posted 59 seconds ago
Anyway looking at whats happening in the Ukraine,and potential threat to surrounding neighbors, could Russia be more of a threat to the UK than even IS??

--------
Who thinks IS who are not even on the same continent are a threat to the UK?
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Are you kidding. IS are "based" on a different continent. But those brain washed monkeys, who align themselves with that cult. are all over the place.
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IS are as much threat to the UK as Saddam was.

I am not sure thats true.

Saddam didn't really press ahead with any designs on expanding outside of Iraq's borders, beyond Kuwait, and the '45 minute' threat thing was obviously a load of guff.

IS clearly have designs on getting as far as they can. Now obviously that is nowhere near the UK currently and is unlikely to be in the forseeable future but that's not to say it will always be the case and with other Islamic death cults like Boko Haram propping up elsewhere in the world, they can't just be ignored.

Nobody is trying to say IS are not a threat to the UK are they?????

Saddam was not a threat to the UK, not in the slightest, hollow threats are not dangerous.

I hate to say it, but pretty much everything in the OP is incorrect.

The russian economy is facked mainly because of sanctions. Intenrational money markets and investors have been taking all their money out of russia due to the instability and pressure from western govts (capital flight) causing the rouble to plummet in value and other things such as imports have been ceased. Add to that the huge difficulties russian companies have borrowing credit and it's really messed their economy.

The demand for oil has decreased due to a slowdown in the global economy, particularly in china. At the same time, OPEc who traditionally cut production to increase prices can't do it as they still wouldn't sell enough. They're trying to stop production of expensive hydrocarbons like shale gas and tar sands so they get their market dominance back. The US is currently self sufficient with regards to oil/ gas, and OPEC are hoping to price the shale producers out of the market by making production unprofitable. In doing so they are also hurting themselves in the short term and further scréwing russia over, so there might be other political motives there too

Saudi can still function at $9-$12 per barrel.

Agreed that they want to keep world price low so as to make other oil exploration unprofitable.

It's what any cartel would do.