Russian Intelligence War in the Uk

[afc wimbledon]

Originally Posted by Pointman

While I have never denied that Putin is most likely involved, it sounds perplexing, that no other country allegedly has an expertise to produce a Soviet-era chemical. USA and all has had three decades to figure it out. Is Russia that much ahead in chemical weapons?

I don't think anyone is suggesting a country couldn't make this stuff given time, but there is only one country with an interest in killing the guy and that's Russia, jealous ex's don't generally kill you with this kind of gear.

The reality is this was a message from Putin to both the world and his own people, he is clearly telling the world he is a world power not to be trifled with and also telling his people that you end up dead if you oppose him, even after you might think you were safely out of the country

[blankall]

Originally Posted by afc wimbledon

I don't think anyone is suggesting a country couldn't make this stuff given time, but there is only one country with an interest in killing the guy and that's Russia, jealous ex's don't generally kill you with this kind of gear.

The reality is this was a message from Putin to both the world and his own people, he is clearly telling the world he is a world power not to be trifled with and also telling his people that you end up dead if you oppose him, even after you might think you were safely out of the country

It's probably no coincidence that these assassinations coincide with the Russian election that was just held.

[Pointman]

Originally Posted by afc wimbledon

I don't think anyone is suggesting a country couldn't make this stuff given time

This exactly what that chemist suggested in the guardian article:

“No one country has these capabilities like Russia, because Russia invented, tested and weaponized novichok,” he said.

[Pointman]

Originally Posted by blankall

It's probably no coincidence that these assassinations coincide with the Russian election that was just held.

Not sure. Putin would win in a slam-dunk anyway. And he was killing people like that before, even when there was no elections.

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by Pointman

Not sure. Putin would win in a slam-dunk anyway. And he was killing people like that before, even when there was no elections.

Well yeah, when you control the media and jail or kill anyone who criticizes you, you're probably going to win any 'election.' Many Russians want to be governed by a strongman tyrant, and the ones who don't have been cowed into acquiescence.

[dobbles]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

Well yeah, when you control the media and jail or kill anyone who criticizes you, you're probably going to win any 'election.' Many Russians want to be governed by a strongman tyrant, and the ones who don't have been cowed into acquiescence.

I was listening to NPR on the radio at lunch yesterday and they were doing some reaction pieces to the election results and ended with a quote that I thought was pretty meta. To paraphrase it was, "Americans elect people they think will make things better; Russians elect people who keep things from getting any worse". To me that seemed fitting as to why they are OK with strongmen like Putin.

[CaptainCrunch]

It is enough that the people know there was an election. The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything.

[FlameOn]

Nuh uh. No assassination, no assassination, you did the assassination. Russian officials are now blaming the UK for poisoning Skripal

A Russian Foreign Ministry official has suggested Britain may have poisoned former spy Sergei Skripal.

“Logic suggests” the UK might have orchestrated the nerve agent attack in Salisbury, claimed Vladimir Yermakov, head of the ministry’s non-proliferation and arms control department.

In provocative comments, he said the only alternative conclusion was that UK authorities were “not able to provide protection from... a terrorist attack on their soil”.

The UK Foreign Office has accused Moscow of a “campaign of disinformation” over the poisoning of Mr Skripal and his daughter Yulia, who were found unconscious on a bench in the Wiltshire city on 4 March. The Kremlin continues to deny any involvement in the attack, carried out with a Soviet-era military-grade chemical.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-a8266521.html

[CaptainCrunch]

Canada tossing 4 diplomats and denying credentials to three more. US tossing out 60 diplomats and closing their Seattle Consulate.

[Robbob]

The list of countries tossing diplomats increases up to 20:

http://www.660news.com/2018/03/26/li...ian-diplomats/

[CaptainCrunch]

We have now slide back to a definite Cold War standing. The Russians have retaliated by expelling 85 diplomats, including 60 American's and 4 Canadians. They've also closed the US Consulate in St Peterberg.

On the same day they test launched the Satan-2 Hypersonic ICBM.

I wonder if teachers will start teaching the Bomb Drill.

The UK has reopened 14 unusual deaths.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by FlameOn

Nuh uh. No assassination, no assassination, you did the assassination. Russian officials are now blaming the UK for poisoning Skripal



https://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-a8266521.html

This is so Russia.

"We no kill him, you kill him and blame us! Filthy West!"

[CaptainCrunch]

Funny story, but its believed that the Cold War started about 6 months after WW2 in Austria with a attempted Russian Assassination of a German Double Agent in the American Zone.

Basically the Russian's stole American MP uniforms and went to the appartment of a German Double Agent who was being guarded by an American who was so incompetent that his bosses in US army counterintelligence refused to give him a loaded gun.

A keystone copesque shootout happened between American's and Russians and despite the comedy of the whole thing, it kicked off a 50 year hate.

[FlameOn]

UK Prime Minister says MI5 has identified the specific Russian GRU agents responsible for the Skripal Novichok nerve agent attack and has tracked them from when they set foot in the UK, all the way to when they planted the agent. Guess it was only a matter of time in a nation blanketed by CCTV.

Cue Russian and Trump counter narrative any minute. "They were Russians on vacation", "Anyone can buy Novichok on the black market", "Russians wouldn't have had to plant the agent if the West didn't provoke it"
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/05/w...k-skripal.html

[Locke]

Originally Posted by FlameOn

UK Prime Minister says MI5 has identified the specific Russian GRU agents responsible for the Skripal Novichok nerve agent attack and has tracked them from when they set foot in the UK, all the way to when they planted the agent. Guess it was only a matter of time in a nation blanketed by CCTV.

Cue Russian and Trump counter narrative any minute. "They were Russians on vacation", "Anyone can buy Novichok on the black market", "Russians wouldn't have had to plant the agent if the West didn't provoke it"
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/05/w...k-skripal.html

They're more than a little late.

[FlameOn]

Putin: Totally regular civilian Russians on vacation. Nothing to do with GRU, criminality or spying.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/...putin-novichok

[devo22]

One of the ##### Riot members who protested during the WC final is in critical condition after possibly being poisoned.

https://meduza.io/en/feature/2018/09...-then-his-legs

shocker.

[FlameOn]

So the Russians attempt to hack into the Swiss labs currently testing and holding the Novichok samples that British Intelligence obtained from the Skripal poisoning. Spies get caught and are expelled from Dutch territory and the EU.

RT Breaking News: Absolutely nothing to see here, just like there was nothing to see at those Olympics testing labs comrade.

Last Friday, Dutch officials revealed that they had arrested and expelled two alleged Russian intelligence agents who were caught attempting to hack into the Spiez Laboratory, a Swiss national laboratory that is home to the Swiss Federal Institute for NBC (Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical) Protection.

The Spiez lab was testing two sets of samples that were of interest to the Russian government on behalf of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW): the "Novichok" agent used in an attack in the UK against former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia and samples from a poison gas attack in Syria. The OPCW's headquarters is in The Hague in the Netherlands, which may explain why the attack on the Spiez lab was launched from there.

The incident, reported both by Joep Dohmen of the Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad and by Thomas Knellwolf and Titis Plattner of the Swiss newspaper Tages Anzeiger, occurred this spring. The circumstances of the arrests were not shared. An investigation carried out jointly by the two papers found that the pair were arrested as the result of a joint operation by multiple European intelligence services in Europe, including the Dutch Military Intelligence and Security Service (MIVD). The Swiss intelligence service, the NDB, issued a statement confirming a "case of Russian spies discovered in The Hague and then expelled."

The timing coincides with the announcement by Netherlands Prime Minister Mark Rutte on March 26 that his government was expelling two Russian diplomats. In April, Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov claimed to have received the analysis report from the Spiez Laboratory in the Skripal study "from a confidential source." Since the OPCW does not share data from laboratories with member states, the data Lavrov cited was either stolen or manufactured.

A spokesperson for the Spiez Laboratory, Andreas Bucher, said that he could not comment on the statement by the NDB but did confirm there was an attempt to breach the lab's network. "We can confirm that the Spiez laboratory was targeted for hacker attacks," Bucher told Tages Anzeiger. "We are prepared for that. Data did not leak."

https://arstechnica.com/information-...kripal-attack/

[CroFlames]

Originally Posted by devo22

One of the ##### Riot members who protested during the WC final is in critical condition after possibly being poisoned.

https://meduza.io/en/feature/2018/09...-then-his-legs

shocker.

They protested precisely when Croatia had possession and that really pissed me off.



But yeah, these assassination attempts are a clear signal that the Soviet system is back. Unbelievable is the only term that comes to mind when you look at what is happening in Washington and Moscow. Couple of wannabe dictators who want their legacies to be remembered for all the wrong reasons.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by CroFlames

They protested precisely when Croatia had possession and that really pissed me off.



But yeah, these assassination attempts are a clear signal that the Soviet system is back. Unbelievable is the only term that comes to mind when you look at what is happening in Washington and Moscow. Couple of wannabe dictators who want their legacies to be remembered for all the wrong reasons.

I agree and disagree. Even under the old Soviet system while assassinations happened. For the most part both sides tried to avoid antagonizing the other side, and on top of it, both intelligence agencies had a unwritten rule that they wouldn't violently go after intelligence assets on either side because it would detract from the KGB and CIA and MI-5's primary mission of intelligence gathering. A physical war between these agencies would have been inefficient.


The Russians under Putin are a different type of beast, they're willing to do these actions because frankly they're not worried about the costs.