I realised that the supply chain is vulnerable, but that's not surgery, it's all but total war. What's stopped them all these years since Stuxnet? How come the DPRK got there? The Iranians started this in '57! America, France, Argentina, Sweden, Russia, Brazil, China; who hasn't facilitated it?!
Yes, the option to try and prevent a country gaining nuclear weapons technology by force requires something akin to total war - if not actual shooting war, at the very least a total embargo of goods and services though probably including some targeted attacks on vital infrastructure (as Stuxnet could be described, an attack that took out about a fifth of the centrifuge capability in the Iranian nuclear programmes). But, that's not something that can be maintained for any significant period of time unless you're willing to take the military route with BOTG, so the effect is simply to slow progress, even if economic sanctions can be maintained. So, DPRK got there eventually. Iran will get there eventually (if they wish to). And, those nations that get there despite facing economic war from the West aren't likely to be friendly to the West or others who opposed their actions.
The way to prevent nations from developing nuclear weapons is to take the other route, not economic or actual shooting war but through peaceful processes - offer a carrot by encouraging trade, engage in normal diplomatic relationships, etc. But, couple that with a small stick of requiring transparency and international inspection to confirm that pledges to cease work of nuclear weapon development. The sort of deal that had been carefully worked out and was starting to bring Iran back into the international community of nations ... until Trump torpedoed the whole thing out of stupid spite, ensuring that Iran remains a pariah state and encouraging their support for groups like Hamas and Hezbollah, stirring up tensions in the Middle East and beyond.
To bring things back on topic, the evidence from how he handled things like wrecking progress towards peace in the Middle East by scuppering the best hope in the deal to make it better for Iran to stop work on developing nuclear weapons and supporting it's axis of resistance than continue isn't good that he has any ability to negotiate a peace deal. Letting Trump try and arrange peace in Ukraine would result in things getting worse for everyone (with the possible exception of Trump himself).
My God Alan (@Alan Cresswell). You're right. I hadn't realised that their behaviour toward American (is that still 'plausibly' denied?) nuclear armed Israel was a direct result of Trump. Has your 2nd para ever been echoed in public? In the Guardian? It hasn't ever been joined up on the BBC, although the pieces are there in plain sight. Unless I missed a Panorama. What the hell else am I missing?
That second paragraph is a mash up of my memories of lots of stuff in the media explaining the approach to the Iran nuclear deal as it was being negotiated, and lots of stuff in the media explaining why Trumps decision to pull out of that deal was bat shit crazy.
Oh God. Was it discussed on SoF? My fatalistic bias saw them getting the bomb as inevitable. That the international peaceful approach could not stop that. But I now see that it was the only hope regardless, and worth it.
That second paragraph is a mash up of my memories of lots of stuff in the media explaining the approach to the Iran nuclear deal as it was being negotiated, and lots of stuff in the media explaining why Trumps decision to pull out of that deal was bat shit crazy.
This - it was entirely and openly shouted about by pretty well anyone in the (British) media with a brain at the time - Guardian, Times, Telegraph, BBC (probably Sun and Daily Mirror but I can’t speak first hand) - I’d have said it was *the* mainstream British take, never mind *a* mainstream British take.
I dismissed it obviously. Like the claim of how close we came to stopping global warming. That you proclaimed Alan (@Alan Cresswell). Another bloody great loop of cognitive dissonance kicks in.
Recent article on the BBC website reported on Ukrainian prisoners of war being executed by the Russians. Obviously disturbing and depressing but should we read anything more into this?
Recent article on the BBC website reported on Ukrainian prisoners of war being executed by the Russians. Obviously disturbing and depressing but should we read anything more into this?
The Russians have been committing war crimes, including the summary execution of POWs and civilians, since the start of the war. What we should read into this is that Russian troops are inclined to commit war crimes and their commanders are either unwilling to stop them, unable to stop them, or complicit.
Recent article on the BBC website reported on Ukrainian prisoners of war being executed by the Russians. Obviously disturbing and depressing but should we read anything more into this?
The Russians have been committing war crimes, including the summary execution of POWs and civilians, since the start of the war. What we should read into this is that Russian troops are inclined to commit war crimes and their commanders are either unwilling to stop them, unable to stop them, or complicit.
I don't think it is a problem at the lower levels (front line soldiers killing their captives), It is at the upper level. Someone is ordering the murder of the POWs. Goes to the highest levels in my book.
Recent article on the BBC website reported on Ukrainian prisoners of war being executed by the Russians. Obviously disturbing and depressing but should we read anything more into this?
The Russians have been committing war crimes, including the summary execution of POWs and civilians, since the start of the war. What we should read into this is that Russian troops are inclined to commit war crimes and their commanders are either unwilling to stop them, unable to stop them, or complicit.
I don't think it is a problem at the lower levels (front line soldiers killing their captives), It is at the upper level. Someone is ordering the murder of the POWs. Goes to the highest levels in my book.
Why? Russian grunts will not be the most morally developed of people. D-Day Canadians never took prisoners. Neither did WW1 Guardsmen. You remember what Stillwell said about taking Japanese prisoners?
Recent article on the BBC website reported on Ukrainian prisoners of war being executed by the Russians. Obviously disturbing and depressing but should we read anything more into this?
The Russians have been committing war crimes, including the summary execution of POWs and civilians, since the start of the war. What we should read into this is that Russian troops are inclined to commit war crimes and their commanders are either unwilling to stop them, unable to stop them, or complicit.
I don't think it is a problem at the lower levels (front line soldiers killing their captives), It is at the upper level. Someone is ordering the murder of the POWs. Goes to the highest levels in my book.
I am not saying Roman grunts are any more moral than grunts of other nations, but I am saying they have long been trained to follow orders from higher echelons. They do not seem to have much agency on the battlefield.
Please give your sources about what the Guardsmen did in WWI and the Canadians did on D-Day.
In the case of Stillwell, he was a Lt General and Chief of Staff for the Chiang government. In other words, he was part of the upper echelon.
No I won't give sources that you, as a military man I believe, should know all about; one search revealed gold standard sources. That soldiers take prisoners in the heat of battle at all is miraculous. It is good rational practice if other un-surrendered enemy soldiers witness it. But have you seen Band of Brothers?
It was either Wilfred Owen or the manic Siegfried Sassoon who took at least one German machine gun position, armed only with a revolver, and accepted their surrender.
Many here will know that.
Stil[l]well was saving American lives by his remark, 'If you have to go to any lengths to take a Japanese prisoner, don't', as I recall from World at War (the episode containing the blackly funniest account I have ever heard). The men needed no encouragement.
Band of Brothers is a fictional rendition of Stephen Ambrose's nonfictional book of the same name. It did strive for accuracy to the historical context. It used a number of military consultants. The actors even got to know the men they were portraying. There is one scene where the company had captured a group of Germans. They placed one of their men to watch over them. That person offered the Germans cigarettes and, then while the rest of the company was distracted, proceeded to kill the Germans. That scene, though, does not represent the actions of the allies as a whole.
I would say the riskiest part of surrendering to opposition forces is those few minutes when the opposition is deciding what to do with you. There can be times when the opposition does not have the means to take on POWs, there can be a callous disregard for human life. But a well-disciplined force will be trained on how to deal with POWs and try to abide by the appropriate conventions. Are there abuses? Unfortunately, yes. But if it is a systematic murder of people taken captive, then it is an upper echelon problem.
Russia has shown it does not follow the conventions of war: kidnapping kids in occupied areas; indiscriminate bombing of civilian targets; abusing of female POWs. Granted'similar claims can be made against Israel and its operations in Lebanon and Gaza. But we know where those decisions are coming from--upper echelon people.
No I won't give sources that you, as a military man I believe, should know all about; one search revealed gold standard sources. <snip>
This is a discussion forum, not just a two -person conversation. You may expect people to treat your assertions with all the weight your cited sources warrant.
Recent article on the BBC website reported on Ukrainian prisoners of war being executed by the Russians. Obviously disturbing and depressing but should we read anything more into this?
The Russians have been committing war crimes, including the summary execution of POWs and civilians, since the start of the war. What we should read into this is that Russian troops are inclined to commit war crimes and their commanders are either unwilling to stop them, unable to stop them, or complicit.
I don't think it is a problem at the lower levels (front line soldiers killing their captives), It is at the upper level. Someone is ordering the murder of the POWs. Goes to the highest levels in my book.
Why? Russian grunts will not be the most morally developed of people. D-Day Canadians never took prisoners. Neither did WW1 Guardsmen. You remember what Stillwell said about taking Japanese prisoners?
Yes we did. You are conflating D -Day with the Normandy Massacres committed by the 12th SS 'Hitler Youth' Division who massacred 158 Canadian prisoners of war from June 7th to 17th 1944. The war crimes were directed at members of the North Nova Scotia Highlanders and the Sherbrooke Fusiliers. After that the informal practice was that SS prisoners would not be taken.
Recent article on the BBC website reported on Ukrainian prisoners of war being executed by the Russians. Obviously disturbing and depressing but should we read anything more into this?
The Russians have been committing war crimes, including the summary execution of POWs and civilians, since the start of the war. What we should read into this is that Russian troops are inclined to commit war crimes and their commanders are either unwilling to stop them, unable to stop them, or complicit.
I don't think it is a problem at the lower levels (front line soldiers killing their captives), It is at the upper level. Someone is ordering the murder of the POWs. Goes to the highest levels in my book.
Why? Russian grunts will not be the most morally developed of people. D-Day Canadians never took prisoners. Neither did WW1 Guardsmen. You remember what Stillwell said about taking Japanese prisoners?
Yes we did. You are conflating D -Day with the Normandy Massacres committed by the 12th SS 'Hitler Youth' Division who massacred 158 Canadian prisoners of war from June 7th to 17th 1944. The war crimes were directed at members of the North Nova Scotia Highlanders and the Sherbrooke Fusiliers. After that the informal practice was that SS prisoners would not be taken.
Thank you for your input, @Sober Preacher's Kid. As I understand it, Canada actually interned 37,000 POWs in Canada during WWII.
No I won't give sources that you, as a military man I believe, should know all about; one search revealed gold standard sources. <snip>
This is a discussion forum, not just a two -person conversation. You may expect people to treat your assertions with all the weight your cited sources warrant.
My apologies. Hopefully Antony Beevor via Der Spiegel will suffice for a start.
In his book 'Tommy', a portrait of the British soldiery in WW1, the military historian Richard Holmes Points out that it was tacitly accepted on both sides that there was apoint in any engagement after which it was too late to attempt to surrender. And I understand that, at least in their WWII incarnation, because of the nature of their operations, the SAS did not take prisoners. The Waffen SS I think did not observe the conventions of warfare and were treated accordingly.
The Waffen SS I think did not observe the conventions of warfare and were treated accordingly.
This assessment carried through to the post-war decision that the SS was a criminal organization and therefore members of the Waffen-SS were not entitled to their military pensions. This was later revised so that anyone who entered the Waffen-SS in 1943 or later (after the organization started using conscription to fill its ranks) was entitled to the same pension as members of the Wehrmacht.
In his book 'Tommy', a portrait of the British soldiery in WW1, the military historian Richard Holmes Points out that it was tacitly accepted on both sides that there was apoint in any engagement after which it was too late to attempt to surrender. And I understand that, at least in their WWII incarnation, because of the nature of their operations, the SAS did not take prisoners. The Waffen SS I think did not observe the conventions of warfare and were treated accordingly.
British special forces in the Falklands specifically killed all Argentine air and naval crew they found. As they did the SAS in N. Africa. In between, in Indonesia, they killed every living thing in Operation Claret. They all got their pensions.
In his book 'Tommy', a portrait of the British soldiery in WW1, the military historian Richard Holmes Points out that it was tacitly accepted on both sides that there was apoint in any engagement after which it was too late to attempt to surrender. And I understand that, at least in their WWII incarnation, because of the nature of their operations, the SAS did not take prisoners. The Waffen SS I think did not observe the conventions of warfare and were treated accordingly.
British special forces in the Falklands specifically killed all Argentine air and naval crew they found. As they did the SAS in N. Africa. In between, in Indonesia, they killed every living thing in Operation Claret. They all got their pensions.
My SBS MC very close friend, who did the killing in the Falklands, regards the SAS as 'a bunch of ruffians'. He also had to rescue them off Grytviken. Held up at one point by the sea freezing round his kayak.
(How much different the Battle of Britain and WW2 would have been if the most Nazified German arm, the Luftwaffe, had killed RAF pilot parachutists. But they were still knights of the air. If we'd lost air superiority, our cities would have looked like theirs in '45 and they could have attempted Sea Lion. Only the Royal Navy, with no air cover, and the full use of chemical and biological agents on beachheads could have stopped that.)
Sounds like Germany is ready to send peacekeeping troops to Ukraine, and Great Britian is pledging to guarantee Ukraine's sovereignty and security (assuming a peace deal can be had). No doubt France will be doing the same. Do you think Russia will want to make a deal now?
Sounds like Germany is ready to send peacekeeping troops to Ukraine, and Great Britian is pledging to guarantee Ukraine's sovereignty and security (assuming a peace deal can be had). No doubt France will be doing the same. Do you think Russia will want to make a deal now?
As far as the UK is concwened, any guarantee would be worth as much to Ukraine as it was to Polanc in 1939 or Belgium in 1814.
Your analogy suggests that the UK would, indeed, ultimately be prepared to go to war with Russia to defend Ukraine, even if that really did lead to a Third World War. Is that what you meant to say?
As far as the UK is concwened, any guarantee would be worth as much to Ukraine as it was to Polanc in 1939 or Belgium in 1814.
Your analogy suggests that the UK would, indeed, ultimately be prepared to go to war with Russia to defend Ukraine, even if that really did lead to a Third World War. Is that what you meant to say?
Surely a guarantee of another country's integrity implies willingness to defend it? Or are we talking about 'All support short of actual hrlp', as in one episode of 'Yes, Prime Minister'?
Surely a guarantee of another country's integrity implies willingness to defend it? Or are we talking about 'All support short of actual hrlp', as in one episode of 'Yes, Prime Minister'?
Well that is what I am asking. If Britain gives such a guarantee to Ukraine, will we actually stick by it? Even if, for example, the US refuses to support Ukraine in this way?
My point is, does the U.K. actually have the capacity to support Ukraine in any meaningful way? We couldn't stop Poland being overrun in 1939, or Belgium in 1914. In both cases, ultimate success involved assistance from other powers. My guess is that Putin will be eying up Lithuania next, and/or Estonia.
But in both case we did actually go to war, and stayed at war as hundreds of thousands of soldiers were killed and the economy became totally geared to war. Would we do so this time? That is the point! Your question "do we have the capacity to support in any meaningful way" OF COURSE YES!!! The question is would we?
A major reason why the UK could not protect Poland or Belgium was the inability to transport its troops quickly. NATO already has troops in Lithuania and Estonia. The means of transport are much improved. The ability to meet the enemy is almost instantaneous now.
Sorry, what's that for? There are no more than 2000 NATO troops on top of the 44,000 local troops. In WW2, where should Britain and France have sent their troops to defend Poland? In what alternative universe is Russia going to invade Poland?
Sorry, what's that for? There are no more than 2000 NATO troops on top of the 44,000 local troops. In WW2, where should Britain and France have sent their troops to defend Poland? In what alternative universe is Russia going to invade Poland?
The number of NATO troops in Lithuania and Estonia are there as trip wires. If either country is invaded by the Russians they will cause their sponsoring countries to intervene very quickly. Most major militaries have rapid reaction forces.
Regards Poland. Poland has already claimed a Russian missile, has flown over their air space. NATO jets scrambled to intercept but it avoided them. I think that is how Poland will be drawn into the war. Russia will not hesitate to use whatever air space it wants to use if it launches an all-out barrage on Ukraine.
Sorry, what's that for? There are no more than 2000 NATO troops on top of the 44,000 local troops. In WW2, where should Britain and France have sent their troops to defend Poland? In what alternative universe is Russia going to invade Poland?
The number of NATO troops in Lithuania and Estonia are there as trip wires. If either country is invaded by the Russians they will cause their sponsoring countries to intervene very quickly. Most major militaries have rapid reaction forces.
Regards Poland. Poland has already claimed a Russian missile, has flown over their air space. NATO jets scrambled to intercept but it avoided them. I think that is how Poland will be drawn into the war. Russia will not hesitate to use whatever air space it wants to use if it launches an all-out barrage on Ukraine.
We know. 2023. And it didn't avoid as in evade them. And it was the 3rd. And? Russia . is . not . going . to . attack . NATO. Just because the US is now unpredictable.
Hegseth has sabotaged the Ukrainian negotiating position by ruling out the possibility of NATO membership. And Trump talked to Putin then talked to Zelensky afterwards. They are pressuring Zelensky into an unfavourable settlement. At least it looks that way to me.
Ukraine would have to dot a number of i-s and cross a number of ts before it could apply for membership in NATO. But I think they are looking for some sort of security arrangements with EU countries separate from NATO.
The point is that, before Hesgeth’s declaration of the US position, there remained some uncertainty over what NATO might do. That uncertainty was worth something in any peace negotiations. If Russia made bellicose noises, NATO might have been prepared to do more in defence of Ukraine.
At least as I see it, the uncertainty about how NATO might respond to Zelensky’s appeal was a negotiating lever.
Comments
You just mentioned it, I took the bait--hook, line and sinker.
The way to prevent nations from developing nuclear weapons is to take the other route, not economic or actual shooting war but through peaceful processes - offer a carrot by encouraging trade, engage in normal diplomatic relationships, etc. But, couple that with a small stick of requiring transparency and international inspection to confirm that pledges to cease work of nuclear weapon development. The sort of deal that had been carefully worked out and was starting to bring Iran back into the international community of nations ... until Trump torpedoed the whole thing out of stupid spite, ensuring that Iran remains a pariah state and encouraging their support for groups like Hamas and Hezbollah, stirring up tensions in the Middle East and beyond.
To bring things back on topic, the evidence from how he handled things like wrecking progress towards peace in the Middle East by scuppering the best hope in the deal to make it better for Iran to stop work on developing nuclear weapons and supporting it's axis of resistance than continue isn't good that he has any ability to negotiate a peace deal. Letting Trump try and arrange peace in Ukraine would result in things getting worse for everyone (with the possible exception of Trump himself).
This - it was entirely and openly shouted about by pretty well anyone in the (British) media with a brain at the time - Guardian, Times, Telegraph, BBC (probably Sun and Daily Mirror but I can’t speak first hand) - I’d have said it was *the* mainstream British take, never mind *a* mainstream British take.
The Russians have been committing war crimes, including the summary execution of POWs and civilians, since the start of the war. What we should read into this is that Russian troops are inclined to commit war crimes and their commanders are either unwilling to stop them, unable to stop them, or complicit.
I don't think it is a problem at the lower levels (front line soldiers killing their captives), It is at the upper level. Someone is ordering the murder of the POWs. Goes to the highest levels in my book.
Why? Russian grunts will not be the most morally developed of people. D-Day Canadians never took prisoners. Neither did WW1 Guardsmen. You remember what Stillwell said about taking Japanese prisoners?
I am not saying Roman grunts are any more moral than grunts of other nations, but I am saying they have long been trained to follow orders from higher echelons. They do not seem to have much agency on the battlefield.
Please give your sources about what the Guardsmen did in WWI and the Canadians did on D-Day.
In the case of Stillwell, he was a Lt General and Chief of Staff for the Chiang government. In other words, he was part of the upper echelon.
It was either Wilfred Owen or the manic Siegfried Sassoon who took at least one German machine gun position, armed only with a revolver, and accepted their surrender.
Many here will know that.
Stil[l]well was saving American lives by his remark, 'If you have to go to any lengths to take a Japanese prisoner, don't', as I recall from World at War (the episode containing the blackly funniest account I have ever heard). The men needed no encouragement.
I would say the riskiest part of surrendering to opposition forces is those few minutes when the opposition is deciding what to do with you. There can be times when the opposition does not have the means to take on POWs, there can be a callous disregard for human life. But a well-disciplined force will be trained on how to deal with POWs and try to abide by the appropriate conventions. Are there abuses? Unfortunately, yes. But if it is a systematic murder of people taken captive, then it is an upper echelon problem.
Russia has shown it does not follow the conventions of war: kidnapping kids in occupied areas; indiscriminate bombing of civilian targets; abusing of female POWs. Granted'similar claims can be made against Israel and its operations in Lebanon and Gaza. But we know where those decisions are coming from--upper echelon people.
Yes we did. You are conflating D -Day with the Normandy Massacres committed by the 12th SS 'Hitler Youth' Division who massacred 158 Canadian prisoners of war from June 7th to 17th 1944. The war crimes were directed at members of the North Nova Scotia Highlanders and the Sherbrooke Fusiliers. After that the informal practice was that SS prisoners would not be taken.
Thank you for your input, @Sober Preacher's Kid. As I understand it, Canada actually interned 37,000 POWs in Canada during WWII.
My apologies. Hopefully Antony Beevor via Der Spiegel will suffice for a start.
This assessment carried through to the post-war decision that the SS was a criminal organization and therefore members of the Waffen-SS were not entitled to their military pensions. This was later revised so that anyone who entered the Waffen-SS in 1943 or later (after the organization started using conscription to fill its ranks) was entitled to the same pension as members of the Wehrmacht.
British special forces in the Falklands specifically killed all Argentine air and naval crew they found. As they did the SAS in N. Africa. In between, in Indonesia, they killed every living thing in Operation Claret. They all got their pensions.
Sorry, as [they] did the SAS.
(How much different the Battle of Britain and WW2 would have been if the most Nazified German arm, the Luftwaffe, had killed RAF pilot parachutists. But they were still knights of the air. If we'd lost air superiority, our cities would have looked like theirs in '45 and they could have attempted Sea Lion. Only the Royal Navy, with no air cover, and the full use of chemical and biological agents on beachheads could have stopped that.)
What for?
Your analogy suggests that the UK would, indeed, ultimately be prepared to go to war with Russia to defend Ukraine, even if that really did lead to a Third World War. Is that what you meant to say?
Quite, and in the case of Belgium, successfully….
It will be one heck of a grudge match.
Well that is what I am asking. If Britain gives such a guarantee to Ukraine, will we actually stick by it? Even if, for example, the US refuses to support Ukraine in this way?
The number of NATO troops in Lithuania and Estonia are there as trip wires. If either country is invaded by the Russians they will cause their sponsoring countries to intervene very quickly. Most major militaries have rapid reaction forces.
Regards Poland. Poland has already claimed a Russian missile, has flown over their air space. NATO jets scrambled to intercept but it avoided them. I think that is how Poland will be drawn into the war. Russia will not hesitate to use whatever air space it wants to use if it launches an all-out barrage on Ukraine.
We know. 2023. And it didn't avoid as in evade them. And it was the 3rd. And? Russia . is . not . going . to . attack . NATO. Just because the US is now unpredictable.
Well, he's been president for four days now, which day is he going to end the war?
The point is that, before Hesgeth’s declaration of the US position, there remained some uncertainty over what NATO might do. That uncertainty was worth something in any peace negotiations. If Russia made bellicose noises, NATO might have been prepared to do more in defence of Ukraine.
At least as I see it, the uncertainty about how NATO might respond to Zelensky’s appeal was a negotiating lever.