Not all mobile phones though I heard.

Was listening to Andrew Castle on LBC this morning and there was a Chelsea supporter on saying how sorry he felt for Abramovitch... all the good he has done... thick as PS...Sawdust between the ears for a Brain... even said that Abramovitch wasn’t an Oligarch......Andrew had him bang to rights... it’s a fact Chelsea will not be the same again...!!

I'm sorry, but that is not remotely true. It's complete tosh (and not just because Zelensky himself has asked for the sanctions precisely because they DO make a difference). There are so many ways this assertion is wrong that it's near impossible to list them, but my post above is a start.

The sanctions are already having an enormous effect on Russia and, as that effect is cumulative, it's reasonable to expect them to become more and more onerous for Russia to bear over time. In politics, you have to play the long game. If you're saying the sanctions do nothing because the war hasn't ended within 24 hours of their being announced, then you know very little about politics.

In the end, you cannot prosecute a war without a). money and b). even in a dictatorship, popular support. Thus far, the sanctions have diminished Putin's supply of both to a considerable degree. And it will only get worse for him. The biggest tell is that over the past week, Putin has started to arrest and remove the leaders of his own security apparatus. When a leader starts casting around for someone to blame because things are going so badly for him, you know that a). the writing is on the wall, and b). things are not going very well for him at all.

My guess is that the next couple of weeks are critical and may well be the storm before the calm. Putin's reign is reaching its denouement and he's now likely to throw the kitchen sink at Ukraine because the sands of time are starting to move against him and he has very little to lose.

Sydenham by birth. Selhurst by the Grace of God.

The problem is that the Communist system (in particular, its architects) was never dismantled in the years after the wall came down. Yeltsin's interregnum was a shambles. That's where the missed opportunity for real change lies. And once the Yeltsin regime fell apart the KGB, which had never disappeared but simply kept a lower profile in the early Yeltsin reign, simply stepped back in and took over, led by Putin who as you know is former KGB himself. The apparatus to do so was still largely in place thus the takeover was swift and relatively easy.

It's not really a generational thing or a media thing (although yes, the Putin state does exercise increasing control over the media). More than anything, it's "a Russian history thing". If a reading of Russian history tells you one thing and nothing else, it's the ability of Russia's people to absorb suffering largely without complaint (think Stalingrad or Kursk for two examples). That's the main reason, incidentally, that the Allies won World War II. The Red Army was simply prepared to sacrifice its population until the Nazis ran out of men and materiel.

Russians, in short, have been cowed by over a century of servility and this went (and is still going) a long way to allowing Putin to get away with actions that we would quickly rise up against in the west. It's not that they can't protest; it's that protesting isn't in their nature. The combination of Putin's autocratic rule and the apathy of the Russian people in accepting their lot is the biggest problem of all, ephemeral as it is. And this does slow down the effectiveness of sanctions. The sanctions ARE causing suffering, but the Russian people are the world leaders in putting up with that sort of pain.

Sydenham by birth. Selhurst by the Grace of God.

Yes, I think the younger Russian generations are somewhat different than their predecessors and are broadly opposed to the war (at least some of them), but their reaction is far more muted, far slower in coming, and they're far less aggressive in making themselves heard than would be the case with the same generation in the west. And thus, the internal pressure on Putin such as it is, is more muted even if it exists. Part of the goal of the sanctions is, I think, to try to change this. By backing Putin into a corner where he becomes ever more desperate the hope is that the Russian people themselves turn against him. I'm not sure that will happen but if it does (it's possible, but not guaranteed) it'll be a slow process. It's a gamble worth taking, though. By far the best way (for the west) to get rid of Putin is to have him brought down from within.

Sydenham by birth. Selhurst by the Grace of God.

That’ll be the 15 years in prison for making your opinion. Or is it just 8 years? Have you seen this? [Link]

COYP