Finland & Sweden, and NATO membership.

[gosub]

Helsinki has nuclear bunker capability for every single person in the city. They are very well built and include shit that's needed for a long stay, down to kids' playgrounds.

have you ever been in a nuclear bunker? 2 hours was enough for me

 

[maomao]

Helsinki has nuclear bunker capability for every single person in the city. They are very well built and include shit that's needed for a long stay, down to kids' playgrounds.

Meanwhile we'te putting defence pacts in place that could require the use of nukes and we can't even manage a fresh print run of Protect and Survive.

 

[gosub]

Meanwhile we'te putting defence pacts in place that could require the use of nukes and we can't even manage a fresh print run of Protect and Survive.

or 'how to try ensure as many bodies as possible pre self entomb to help limit the spread of disease'

they were different days, people used to use their holidays at Portland Down, helping find a cure for the common cold

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

Meanwhile we'te putting defence pacts in place that could require the use of nukes and we can't even manage a fresh print run of Protect and Survive.

I get the impression that after two months of threats of everything from consequences greater than ever faced, to tsunamis, from a bunch of clowns who feed their troops out of date dogfood, those who make these decisions are rather of the opinion that Russia is full of shit.

 

[cupid_stunt]

 

[maomao]

I get the impression that after two months of threats of everything from consequences greater than ever faced, to tsunamis, from a bunch of clowns who feed their troops out of date dogfood, those who make these decisions are rather of the opinion that Russia is full of shit.

Hawkish ex military types on Twitter are reckoning as few as 25% of Russian warheads will work. That's 400 nukes. No thanks.

 

[gosub]

I get the impression that after two months of threats of everything from consequences greater than ever faced, to tsunamis, from a bunch of clowns who feed their troops out of date dogfood, those who make these decisions are rather of the opinion that Russia is full of shit.

more how slow the FSB are at landscape gardening.


How long does it take to make a grassy knoll? Its clearly their turn.

 

[agricola]

Hawkish ex military types on Twitter are reckoning as few as 25% of Russian warheads will work. That's 400 nukes. No thanks.

Of all the stupid things said on Twitter during this crisis, and there have been many, that one is by far the worst.

 

[A380]

The interesting thing, for me, is that this stuff shows the disconnect between Russian PR and European and US electorates - this is the method of political warfare that Russian power structures, and before that Soviet power structures, believed would divide European and US societies, drive holes in NATO and allow them to complete their military operations without too much interference from the US and other NATO powers, even to the point where they could use tactical nukes in Europe without getting a nuclear
response from the US.

And instead of that, it's getting nothing but derisive laughter.

It, imv, goes far beyond just ineptitude - this stuff displays a staggeringly lack of grasp, both political and technical, of maskirovka. The KGB of old were much better at this stuff - they weren't the masters of it, they were no better or worse than any other intelligence/political action service, but this - as well as the failure to understand the politics in Ukraine, points to catastrophic disintegration of intelligence and the political will to use.

Staggering stuff.

Presumably, intelligence agencies are similar to most other Government departments. You would need investment in people and tech and things like staff training, career development and some kind of promotion selection process with at least an element of meritocracy to it to get good product and results. I can't see any reason to suppose the current FSB and SVR are any more immune from the corruption and cronyism that seems to have infected the rest of Russia's private and public sectors. And as with their army, a lot of the issues probably wouldn't show up till the system comes under stress.

 

[A380]

Meanwhile we'te putting defence pacts in place that could require the use of nukes and we can't even manage a fresh print run of Protect and Survive.

I've got some new doors on order....

 

[cupid_stunt]

Hawkish ex military types on Twitter are reckoning as few as 25% of Russian warheads will work. That's 400 nukes. No thanks.

They are not going to start a war with NATO, conventional or nuclear, because they know they can't win.

 

[cupid_stunt]

I'll quote this in full -

Here’s more on Helskini’s decision on whether to apply for Nato membership. A former Finnish prime minister, Alexander Stubb, said Finland is 99.9% likely to join the alliance.

Speaking to the BBC, Stubb said the Finnish president will announce the country’s intention to join tomorrow, followed by an announcement over the weekend, and a joint statement from Finland and Sweden early next week.

There is “overwhelming support” in Finland for joining Nato, Stubb said, citing a poll earlier this week which showed 76% in favour and 12% against.

Stubb, who served as prime minister from 2014 to 2015, said, "The only person we can thank is Putin, he’s the reason we’re joining."

He said Finland is “not at all” worried about Russia’s threat of “a military-technical response” if it joins the alliance, adding that when Iceland, Denmark and Norway joined in 1949 “the rhetoric was similar”.

But he warned that Finland could be vulnerable to Russian intimidation, cyber attacks and disinformation during the “grey zone” of the membership application process.

LINK

 

[kebabking]

Of all the stupid things said on Twitter during this crisis, and there have been many, that one is by far the worst.

Depends what you mean.

The Russian military appears to be pretty shit at operating and maintaining anything more complex than a playing card. If their conventional missiles have - as some of the long range land attack and anti-ship missiles do - a failure rate of up to 60%, and their fast jets have an availability/serviceability rate of 30% (USAF is on about 85%), then asking what the reliability rate of the most complex systems they have is, and being a bit cynical about whether it matches the rhetoric, is quite legitimate.

That doesn't mean that even a 10% reliability rate for their nukes (while fucking hilarious) makes a nuclear exchange against them winnable/survivable.

Personally I think it's likely to be much higher than that, not least because I think their nukes, particularly the big, long range strategic nukes are likely to be where they concentrate their technical, human - and financial - resources.

Even if it were true, the 400 warheads thing, and spread evenly over the whole range of tactical and strategic warheads and launch platforms, and then spread over Europe and the US, it would probably end agriculture in Europe, there'd be no clean water for the next 10,000 years, and it would immediately kill perhaps 100 million people.

Doesn't stop them being shit though...

 

[nogojones]

Ingvar Kamprad who founded and ran IKEA until his death in 2018 was a Nazi. A proper one. He joined the Swedish National Socialist Party in 1943, the same year he founded his company.

And used slave labour from "communist" East Germany to make his futons and whatever

 

[gosub]

Depends what you mean.

The Russian military appears to be pretty shit at operating and maintaining anything more complex than a playing card. If their conventional missiles have - as some of the long range land attack and anti-ship missiles do - a failure rate of up to 60%, and their fast jets have an availability/serviceability rate of 30% (USAF is on about 85%), then asking what the reliability rate of the most complex systems they have is, and being a bit cynical about whether it matches the rhetoric, is quite legitimate.

That doesn't mean that even a 10% reliability rate for their nukes (while fucking hilarious) makes a nuclear exchange against them winnable/survivable.

Personally I think it's likely to be much higher than that, not least because I think their nukes, particularly the big, long range strategic nukes are likely to be where they concentrate their technical, human - and financial - resources.

Even if it were true, the 400 warheads thing, and spread evenly over the whole range of tactical and strategic warheads and launch platforms, and then spread over Europe and the US, it would probably end agriculture in Europe, there'd be no clean water for the next 10,000 years, and it would immediately kill perhaps 100 million people.

Doesn't stop them being shit though...

Russian Nuclear Engineer Fined for Mining Bitcoin at Top-Secret Lab - The Moscow Times

 

[maomao]

They are not going to start a war with NATO, conventional or nuclear, because they know they can't win.

I would find a proper civil defense programme more comforting than the word of some random on an internet site.

 

[spitfire]

I would find a proper civil defense programme more comforting than the word of some random on an internet site.

Hi. I'm actually Vladimir Putin and I promise not to start a nuclear war. Keep it under your hat though, no one must know my secret identity.

 

[kebabking]

I would find a proper civil defense programme more comforting than the word of some random on an internet site.

I'm still concerned, I still think a 'limited' nuclear attack is a possibility, not least because the Russian government has been catastrophically wrong about most things so far, so why not that?

Personally I think full civil defence programme is a good thing, because it helps deal with all manner of disasters, but I'll be honest and say that any nuclear attack where a full set of shelters - ala Finland - is the difference between surviving and not surviving, is a nuclear attack who's aftermath I don't want to live to experience.

 

[maomao]

I'm still concerned, I still think a 'limited' nuclear attack is a possibility, not least because the Russian government has been catastrophically wrong about most things so far, so why not that?

Personally I think full civil defence programme is a good thing, because it helps deal with all manner of disasters, but I'll be honest and say that any nuclear attack where a full set of shelters - ala Finland - is the difference between surviving and not surviving, is a nuclear attack who's aftermath I don't want to live to experience.

I would do my best to survive in almost any situation (and recognise that in a lot of scenarios that would be next to useless) and I think a lot of people would. People scrape livings on rubbish heaps rather than do themselves in.

 

[cupid_stunt]

I would find a proper civil defense programme more comforting than the word of some random on an internet site.

What would you suggest would be a proper defence programme?

Beyond your suggestion of a fresh print run of Protect and Survive.

 

[maomao]

What would you suggest would be a proper defence programme?

Beyond your suggestion of a fresh print run of Protect and Survive.

Well, assuming full Finland is out of reach, remembering these can be used for a range of natural disasters as well and bearing in mind this is off the top of my head

Some bunkers but more importantly emergency supply stores: water purifiers, basic medicines, food (maybe supermarkets could be made to keep rotating stores of staples, there are a wide range of emergencies where this could help).

Having people trained in disaster relief in each area. A territorial army type effort but without the focus on killing people.

In the event of further rising tensions distribution of sandbags, water containers and materials with which to construct shelters.

 

[maomao]

Laugh away knob end. A lot of that stuff would have come in handy two years ago.

 

[cupid_stunt]

Well, assuming full Finland is out of reach, remembering these can be used for a range of natural disasters as well and bearing in mind this is off the top of my head

Some bunkers but more importantly emergency supply stores: water purifiers, basic medicines, food (maybe supermarkets could be made to keep rotating stores of staples, there are a wide range of emergencies where this could help).

Having people trained in disaster relief in each area. A territorial army type effort but without the focus on killing people.

In the event of further rising tensions distribution of sandbags, water containers and materials with which to construct shelters.

Finland, population of 5.5m, has spent decades planning their civil defence, even with your scaled down suggestion, you think the UK with a population of 67m could do all of that in just a few weeks or months?

Whilst insulating every home before winter, because you want Europe to stop all gas imports from Russia overnight?

You really have no grip on reality, do you?

 

[bluescreen]

Laugh away knob end. A lot of that stuff would have come in handy two years ago.

The thing about Finland's civil defence that is so impressive is the way it's all co-ordinated, so that local govt, industry, essential services all have a role to play and can switch into integrated emergency mode. It's not just for defence against attack but for any kind of disaster. We could learn a lot from them here in UK, where we end up depending on ministers' mates to procure face masks and no one has a clue how to organise local relief so it all has to be done from scratch, everyone reinventing the wheel.
Sikhs and other religious are better than the government.

 

[maomao]

Finland, population of 5.5m, has spent decades planning their civil defence, even with your scaled down suggestion, you think the UK with a population of 67m could do all of that in just a few weeks or months?

Whilst insulating every home before winter, because you want Europe to stop all gas imports from Russia overnight?

You really have no grip on reality, do you?

I'm bemoaning the lack of action over a number of years and making a wish list of things we could get started on while being painfully aware of my own impotence. But no, let's just keep handing over public money to Tory drinking buddies to do fuck all and accepting that's all we could ever do.

 

[kebabking]

As bluescreen and maomao say, having a societal wide civil defence ethos means that you tend to not just think about firey death from the sky, but you think about flooding, and wildfire, and pandemics, and how to avoid and mitigate them.

I also think that the Nordic states societal cohesion, and lower inequalility - economic, health, education etc.. is not unrelated to their 'we look after everyone, everyone looked after us' attitude to civil defence.

We have much to learn from them.

 

[agricola]

Finland, population of 5.5m, has spent decades planning their civil defence, even with your scaled down suggestion, you think the UK with a population of 67m could do all of that in just a few weeks or months?

Whilst insulating every home before winter, because you want Europe to stop all gas imports from Russia overnight?

You really have no grip on reality, do you?

We could at least make a start on it, and there are so many other aspects where it would be useful.

 

[frogwoman]

Finland, population of 5.5m, has spent decades planning their civil defence, even with your scaled down suggestion, you think the UK with a population of 67m could do all of that in just a few weeks or months?

Whilst insulating every home before winter, because you want Europe to stop all gas imports from Russia overnight?

You really have no grip on reality, do you?

I don’t agree with maomao on everything but i don’t think the suggestions are unreasonable at all tbh and not all of them are unachievable either. If we had done a better job at civil defence we wouldn't have been looking at such a huge Covid disaster too tbh

 

[strung out]

Finland, population of 5.5m, has spent decades planning their civil defence, even with your scaled down suggestion, you think the UK with a population of 67m could do all of that in just a few weeks or months?

Whilst insulating every home before winter, because you want Europe to stop all gas imports from Russia overnight?

You really have no grip on reality, do you?

Not one of your finest posts.

 

[kebabking]

And here it is....

Tasavallan presidentin ja pääministerin yhteislausunto Suomen Nato-jäsenyydestä

valtioneuvosto.fi