Ukrainian Rufugees

To be honest Tone I shouldnt get involved but the hatred I have for these absolute clowns makes me angry. Johnson doesn't make decisions regarding this war, he's just a puppet on a string. Putin described us sometime ago as an insignificance and to be fair he was right. The west are complicit in this war, burying their heads in the sand years ago while Putin attacked Georgia then Ukraine in 2014. This conflict has been planned for the best part of a decade.

 

I'd imagine that the majority want to stay close to Ukraine. And establishing appropriate security checks in the current climate, seems prudent.

But we have to make any entry process quick, easy and painless, without compromising security.

 

Exactly. We're not going to be 'swamped' with a flood of Ukranian refugees. The least we can do is not put ridiculous bureaucratic obstacles in the way of the few who do want to come here.

 

You're right. Its a shit show and there's route forward that doesn't look disastrous to me. Any direct intervention from the west on humanitarian grounds risks a wider conflict. Setting out a clear 'we'll abide by article 5' position from NATO gives Russia a clear run at several countries. The sanctions will have negligible impact and will hurt our economies and citizens as much as Russia's.

Even an immediate diplomatic solution, which seems unlikely, puts Europe immediately back onto a Cold War footing.

What a shit show.

 

I don't see any kind of a short term solution.
But I don't agree that sanctions will have negligible impact. It's not just government sanctions now, it's huge numbers of western companies pulling out of Russia at a rate of knots. Russia isn't North Korea - its citizens have now become used to a level of western style consumption. Refusal to buy Russian oil and gas will hit their economy very hard and people will be poorer. Even those who have money will have very limited ways to spend it. No foreign holidays, no involvement in international sport, no foreign bands/artists visiting, no Netflix, Disney, Twitter, Instagram, western shops and consumer products, restaurant chains etc. Life is going to be pretty bleak and one dimensional. Some older people who lived under the Soviet regime may accept that but no one under 35 will have experienced anything like it. Add to that the numbers of dead and wounded young men as the war drags on and on and Ukrainian resistance takes its toll. Our best hope is surely a gradual ramping up of domestic opposition to Putin and his cronies leading, eventually, to regime change.

Also, I'm not sure that Putin is going to be in any position to pose much threat to countries neighbouring Ukraine. Teh Russian army is proving to be pretty useless so far. They are sustaining heavy losses of men and equipment and even if they succeed in conquering the whole of Ukraine, which looks a long way off yet, they are going to face a protracted guerilla resistance for as long as they remain there. Their economy will contract significantly, limiting their ability to manufacture more military equipment. At the same time, NATO will be busy building up troops and equipment in the bordering countries to deter any further Russian incursions. It looks to me that Putin has bitten off far more than he can chew here. The biggest worry is that he resorts to chemical or nuclear weapons in his desperation to achieve some kind of 'victory' in Ukraine.

 

I should have been clearer. Sanctions will have a negligible impact on Putin's military and political strategy. There'll be some pain in the short term, but I think the supply chain impacts for Oil, Gas, Wheat will be worked around. There are many countries in the east who'll increase their trade with Russia and act as resellers to the West. The level of dependency that the west has on Russian oil and gas is huge and will take many years to redress. I think there's more window dressing than substance to these sanctions, in the longer term.

 

See my edit above.

From what I've read, the oil and gas embargo will hit them very hard. The kind of crude they produce is not compatible with Chinese storage systems and it would take many years for that to alter. In the short term the stocks of LPG in Europe are now reasonably high and the better weather is on its way, reducing demand. The US has capacity to increase supplies too.

 

I'm not sure Putin ever had or had any intention of invading any country tied to NATO. It does seem his intention to invade and annexe Ukraine has been on the agenda ever since he started his campaign against them, knowing full well that indecision from the west would allow him in effect free reign.
To be fair I don't think the US could do much more as to risk a full scale conflict between them and Russia and the horrendous implications it would have. Interesting to see in the future how much the likes of China and India join in the condemnation of Putin and his actions, both seem reticent at the moment to fully cut economical ties. This ain't as simple as it looks and it seems a war of attrition is ahead as too how long it will take for sanctions to have any meaningful effect.

 

The UK has reopened a number of North Sea Oil fields too.

 

Hopefully the need to reduce reliance on Russian oil and gas will concentrate the minds of western governments to put far more time and money into expanding renewable energy sources at a faster than planned rate.

 

I've no doubt it will. It'll also need a short term ramp up on use of fossil fuels though, which ain't great.

 

The amount the Ukrainian criminal gangs trafficking people in to London it may be easier for them to bring refugees in,

 

Looks like UAE are prepared to increase supplies of oil, this needs the backing of OPEC

https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/oil-price-uae-opec-petrol-124004848.html


Looks like UAE are back tracking on the agreement : https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Oil-Rises-As-UAE-Backtracks-On-OPEC-Output-Boost-Statement.html

 

At $110+ a barrel it's got to be tempting.