I wasn't talking about the nuke odds, only about the odds of uniting for or against Putin if the situation in Russia gets really dire.

As we've seen recently and not just recently, things Putin says have little to do with reality. He may launch or not launch the nukes for any reason or no reason at all. Trying to appease him, or to guess what he'll do next - doesn't work.

Quite the contrary, uniting against Putin and his cronies is a better outcome for everyone involved. The odds of that are probably higher than the other way round, because the lies from Kremlin are already outrageous and will have to get even more blatant if they try to keep the lid on it.

Of course Soviets were able to sustain the lying for 70 years but they didn't have the intertubes.

I think you mean to commit a suicide... nuking the West won't un-collapse the ruble, it will just turn Russia and most of the world into a radioactive dump.

Russians are reasonably smart, they will eventually figure out that the best way to fix this is to get rid of the Kremlin clown, it's just taking them a minute.

I'm sure the guests will be overly happy to have their (early booking) advance payments lost because they cannot pay (in euro) the rest for their accommodation for the holidays.

Tsar Bomba

• The flare was visible at a distance of more than 1,000 km.[52] It was observed in Norway, Greenland and Alaska.
• The explosion's nuclear mushroom rose to a height of 67 km.[14] The shape of the "hat" was two-tiered; the diameter of the upper tier was estimated at 95 km (59 mi), the lower tier at 70 km (43 mi). The cloud was observed 800 km (500 mi) from the explosion site.
• The blast wave circled the globe three times,[16] with the first one taking 36 hours and 27 minutes.
• A seismic wave in the earth's crust, generated by the shock wave of the explosion, circled the globe three times.
• The atmospheric pressure wave resulting from the explosion was recorded three times in New Zealand
• Glass shattered in windows 780 km (480 mi) from the explosion in a village on Dikson Island.
  
• Ionization of the atmosphere caused interference to radio communications even hundreds of kilometers from the test site for about 40 minutes.

As some others have said already, banning Russia from SWIFT isn't very useful, and may in fact be counterproductive long-term. Banning them from SWIFT is like this: Imagine that most of Russia's exports were sent to the outside world via UPS, and you ban Russia from using UPS. It's very disruptive short-term (for both sides of the trade), but they're just going to switch to Fedex or whatever. Banning Russia from SWIFT is like that: it's short-term very disruptive, but it's not that hard for Russia to find an alternative, and long-term the ban weakens SWIFT. Banning Russia from SWIFT sounds like you're banning sending money to Russia by any means, but it's not. The West could ban sending money to Russia by any means, but Europe is highly dependent on Russian imports, so they're just going to pretend to "completely cut off Russia" by banning them from SWIFT.

The most damaging thing the West could do without putting boots on the ground would probably be to confiscate Russia's central bank reserves like the US did with Afghanistan's central bank.

If you wanted to get rid of Putin ASAP, I think the most effective thing that could be done would be to put a $1 billion bounty on Putin's head, plus a promise of immunity for any past misdeeds. You have to imagine that many of Putin's close associates would rather this nutcase be dead. The West was more-or-less fine with Russia's internal authoritarianism, and Russia's oligarchs had a good thing going, but now Putin has screwed it all up for them. All of these sanctions are clearly designed to eventually make Russians angry enough to get Putin toppled, but a bounty+immunity would be a lot more effective. (I think that issuing this sort of bounty would be considered an act of war, though.)

---

I was surprised that Kyiv didn't fall last night, and I keep hoping that the Russians are somehow fought off, but it's almost unimaginable that Kyiv isn't going to fall eventually. The force differential is just too large. If Zelenskyy is dedicated to the idea of Ukraine fighting a protracted resistance in the same vein as Afghanistan or Vietnam, he should record a really good speech to broadcast after he is inevitably killed by the Russians, so that he can become an ideal martyr.

Tsar Bomba
the most powerful nuclear weapon ever created and tested
...their instruments indicated a yield of 50 Mt (209 PJ)
...In theory, the bomb would have had a yield in excess of 100 Mt (418 PJ) if it had included the uranium-238[14] fusion tamper which figured in the design but which was omitted in the test to reduce radioactive fallout
...8-kilometre-wide (5.0 mi) fireball reached nearly as high as the altitude of the release plane and was visible at almost 1,000 km (620 mi) away.[49] The mushroom cloud was about 67 km (42 mi) high[50] (over seven times the height of Mount Everest)

• The flare was visible at a distance of more than 1,000 km.[52] It was observed in Norway, Greenland and Alaska.
• The explosion's nuclear mushroom rose to a height of 67 km.[14] The shape of the "hat" was two-tiered; the diameter of the upper tier was estimated at 95 km (59 mi), the lower tier at 70 km (43 mi). The cloud was observed 800 km (500 mi) from the explosion site.
• The blast wave circled the globe three times,[16] with the first one taking 36 hours and 27 minutes.
• A seismic wave in the earth's crust, generated by the shock wave of the explosion, circled the globe three times.
• The atmospheric pressure wave resulting from the explosion was recorded three times in New Zealand
• Glass shattered in windows 780 km (480 mi) from the explosion in a village on Dikson Island.
  
• Ionization of the atmosphere caused interference to radio communications even hundreds of kilometers from the test site for about 40 minutes.

Yeah if the recording is true its truly epic. RIP brave souls. Whats even more chilling, it appears that the Ukrainian forces are speaking Russian between each other.   

Ukraine island defenders who told Russian navy ‘go fuck yourself’ may still be alive
Ukrainian soldiers believed to have died while defending an island after telling a Russian warship to “go fuck yourself”, may still be alive, according to Ukraine’s State Border Guard.

goes where? to a bigger war?
We should have pushed hard for negotiations, instead, even now, before the severity of this goes to something incomprehensible with very large casualties.
Additionally, if you have a large fine, levy or reparations applied to Russia, how are you going to get paid?
This will only make them completely belligerent and not prone to any negotiations.

Before, they said that it (SWIFT disconnect) would be considered as a declaration of war.
Not sure what to make of such statement made in the past, we shall see now how it develops.
Shortly after SWIFT removal, i would be watching for the signs of general mobilization there, and if it happens, then SWHTF.

Ukraine ready for talks with Russia on neutral status - official...including on neutral status regarding NATO...

Moscow’s security demands include a pause of NATO’s eastward expansion, especially in Ukraine and Georgia, as well as a rollback of NATO troops in Eastern Europe.
The United States has dismissed those demands as nonstarters, demanding Russia pull back its forces from the border with Ukraine and instead offering dialogue with Moscow on issues including military exercises and transparency, as well as the placement of missiles.
...
“As I’ve said repeatedly, whether they choose the path of diplomacy and dialogue, whether they decide to renew aggression against Ukraine, we’re prepared either way,” Blinken told reporters.

Yeah, likely BS. SWIFT disconnection is the financial equivalent of nukes. China will help Rus, of course, although they will do so half-heartedly, and only so they can test their new digital renminbi thingy and/or gauge how much such disconnection impacts the disconnected. They could be next, if the shit hits Taiwan's fan.

Freezing Putin's or Lavrov's assets abroad? That's a joke. Might as well try to freeze his noncustodial btc wallet (which I'm sure is quite fat, incidentally).

If they really cut off Russia from SWIFT, it will be the largest testbed for btc to date. And yes, there will be the "bad btc, helps criminals" angle. But the people will see and understand. In Russia, in Canada, everywhere.

Interesting times indeed.

NEW: Agreement reached on cutting #Russia out of #SWIFT
 'Selected Russian banks' will be removed from the system - say EU, France, Germany, Italy, UK, Canada and United States

MORE: Russian banks which have previously been sanctioned will be disconnected from SWIFT; other Russian banks not affected

China confirms it has lifted wheat import restrictions on Russia
..."You don’t go and give a lifeline to Russia in the middle of a period when they are invading another country," Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said Friday in a rebuke of China's move. "That is simply unacceptable."

Nobody here 'really' knows what is the situation in Ukraine, probably.
I watched sky news, looked at the websites and all I can find, basically, is that "the fight continues".
Of course, it is all quite terrible.

Here is an interesting perspective of where this is probably going, but with HUGE caveats:

https://www.newsweek.com/2022/03/11/putin-has-never-lost-war-here-how-hell-win-ukraine-1682878.html

The longer it continues, the higher is the probability that it won't stop there.
Are we in 1938? A am not sure.

Putin hasn't showed his full potential yet, I highly doubt that he's even using 1/4 of his army capacity. His real motives are still unknown, if he truly wanted to capture Kyiv, wouldn't he be more aggressive? Is he performing a show, till the real attack occurs?

It's definitely not over yet, while Putin seems to not care about any financial repercussions, he's certain that the NATO and the EU won't interfere militarily.

Cyprus, Hungary, France, Italy and Greece agreed, all eye's are on Berlin now to negotiate to figure it out.

Even Germany made the shift, instead of sending only 5000 helmets they gave the green light to send anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons.

Lot's of countries showing solidarity sending equipment, Ukraine is getting armed to the teeth.

“At the same time, we are working flat out on how to limit the collateral damage of a disconnection from #SWIFT so that it hits the right people. What we need is a targeted and functional restriction of SWIFT."

LOL, should be fun. Much of German gold is in Fort Knox which is to say not in Fort Knox. They asked for it back a few years ago and were told they would get it in installments and not with the original serial numbers. In fact, that might be a big opportunity for Putin to land a solid blow on the US and the petrodollar.

I don't think the real assault has started yet.

Putin just sent special forces, reconnaissance units, and ad-hoc gangs of insurgents with the aim to destabilize the current government.

The real bombing has not started yet.

It is important Ukrainians destroy all major roads, bridges, airports, etc. to make it harder to carry out a full invasion.

Russia is probably getting kicked out of SWIFT.

Seems to be deleted and unlikely to be true given Turkey's position in the conflict.

Just like with Kremlin propaganda, posting clearly biased pro-Ukrainian tweets isn't the best source of news if that's what you're aiming for. It only takes a few minutes to cross check with other sources.

I know some will not align with his politics, and others will (somewhat rightly) criticize his use of the word "crypto" a little too frequently.  But this guy really does GET Bitcoin compared to his peers.  He even got the fact that it will help the power grid in Texas, and his understanding of that is fairly deep.

Anyway, I get a kick out of his delight at the nunchuck letter.

Some may say he is a politician and none of them can be trusted... also possibly valid.

https://twitter.com/tedcruz/status/1497031845984227328

Looks like China is about to snub Russia


$50000 bitcoin in one hour 

Correct me if I'm wrong but that guy in the first photo is a head taller than the chick he's hugging yet the runt playing nazi is a dwarf that a nazi would never call arian?

Also the runt's ears stick out while the others ears do not.

But its a false argument anyway because you can't paint an entire country from a few bad apples.  If you did then every countrys people would deserve to die.