[user104658]

Originally Posted by Twosugars

is it a lolling matter?
so you think we should not do anything?

The UK is in literally no position to do anything at all about Russia, and certainly not over what I'm sorry to say is (in global terms) a very minor incident.

I can only assume that the idea that the UK can "do something about" Russia stems from the same place as someone's lusicrous suggestion in another thread that Britain is a "global super power"; i.e. A complete misunderstanding of where we sit on the global hierarchy. Like someone forgot to post the memo that Britain WAS powerful at the height of the British empire... But those days are over.

So it's not really a matter of "should" morally, I guess. We CAN'T "do anything about Russia", and we shouldn't try because the attempt would cause nothing but harm.

DEFINITELY not over something that is quite blatantly an internal Russian political issue that happens to have spilled over. Its not like they're attacking the UK.

[bots]

Originally Posted by Toy Soldier

The UK is in literally no position to do anything at all about Russia, and certainly not over what I'm sorry to say is (in global terms) a very minor incident.

I can only assume that the idea that the UK can "do something about" Russia stems from the same place as someone's lusicrous suggestion in another thread that Britain is a "global super power"; i.e. A complete misunderstanding of where we sit on the global hierarchy. Like someone forgot to post the memo that Britain WAS powerful at the height of the British empire... But those days are over.

So it's not really a matter of "should" morally, I guess. We CAN'T "do anything about Russia", and we shouldn't try because the attempt would cause nothing but harm.

DEFINITELY not over something that is quite blatantly an internal Russian political issue that happens to have spilled over. Its not like they're attacking the UK.

We can do things like asset freezing, throwing out diplomats, making it more difficult for Russians to enter the UK. We can say ... hey Russia, we are jolly upset about this. Will that stop them doing it again? No. Will it inconvenience them? Maybe a little. That's about it.

The world cup is being hosted in Russia so lets boycott it ..... Politics should never ever interfere with sport. So, it's a big No No. Let's show Russia how upset we are by stopping Prince William attending .... yeah that's really going to cause a seismic shock.

The bottom line is we can implement measures as a face saving exercise, but they will mean squat to anyone.

[user104658]

Originally Posted by bitontheslide

We can do things like asset freezing, throwing out diplomats, making it more difficult for Russians to enter the UK. We can say ... hey Russia, we are jolly upset about this. Will that stop them doing it again? No. Will it inconvenience them? Maybe a little. That's about it.

The world cup is being hosted in Russia so lets boycott it ..... Politics should never ever interfere with sport. So, it's a big No No. Let's show Russia how upset we are by stopping Prince William attending .... yeah that's really going to cause a seismic shock.

The bottom line is we can implement measures as a face saving exercise, but they will mean squat to anyone.

But Russia IS still a super-power and also a huge marketplace... So yeah, we could put sanctions on them, technically... Except that the UK ceasing trade would have an insignificant impact on the Russia economy, would have MORE impact on the UK economy (although to be fair still not very significant) and would basically be kicking the bear for a frankly not very good reason. I mean I know it might seem bad but every country is involved in political assassination, its naive to think otherwise. It would be different if they had assassinated a UK political figure or something but... Basically, this is just internal Russian crap that happened to spill over into a UK city. Obviously the fact that a UK police officer was collateral damage is horrendous, but again, let's not start pretending that all countries aren't guilty of causing significant collateral damage in other nations.

[Northern Monkey]

Originally Posted by Toy Soldier

But Russia IS still a super-power and also a huge marketplace... So yeah, we could put sanctions on them, technically... Except that the UK ceasing trade would have an insignificant impact on the Russia economy, would have MORE impact on the UK economy (although to be fair still not very significant) and would basically be kicking the bear for a frankly not very good reason. I mean I know it might seem bad but every country is involved in political assassination, its naive to think otherwise. It would be different if they had assassinated a UK political figure or something but... Basically, this is just internal Russian crap that happened to spill over into a UK city. Obviously the fact that a UK police officer was collateral damage is horrendous, but again, let's not start pretending that all countries aren't guilty of causing significant collateral damage in other nations.

I tend to agree.I reckon British,US,Russian and god knows how many other countries secret services have been doing this stuff for years.Only when Russia does it they do it not so covertly.They use nerve agents and radioactive materials which they know will be traced back to them.I think they do it this way to send a message.Just like when they send aircraft and ships over to ping our radar.
The problem with their methods is that they ramp up tensions.They force our PM into a situation where she has to react somehow so we as a country don’t appear weak.It also gets our politicians putting huge pressure on the PM to ‘do something’.Our problem is that there’s not much we can do unilaterally.It has to be a Nato response to have any impactful effect.As you say though it’s not wise to poke the bear too much over something like this I don’t think.The PM is in a tricky situation really.