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Headline o' the day, or let's shoot the messenger

Wednesday, December 09, 2009
This, from the Moscow Times:



The text of the article has Mayor Luzhkov, for it is he, moaning about forecasting abilities of Muscovite meteorologists rather than their snowmaking prowess.  Twas too good to pass over though.  

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posted by Croydonian

Buying back the rope they failed to hang us with. And then selling it again.

Thursday, August 27, 2009
So to speak. This quote - 'The Capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them' is often attributed to Lenin, although I cannot find a scholarly reference.

Anyway, that came to mind seeing this tale in Pravda:

"The Russian tobacco market has been showing a curious trend recently. The cheapest and premium class cigarette brands currently enjoy the biggest demand in Russia. Many tobacco companies focus their efforts on the inexpensive segment and resume the production of Soviet brands...BAT Russia took account of the changing demand and launched two new brands – Capri slim cigarettes...and The Golden Fleece (Zolotoye Runo), - a legendary Soviet brand which the company relaunched in April. The cigarette brands with the Soviet past from another company, Nevo-Tabak, also managed to improve their sales. The sales of such brands as Arktika, Troika and Leningad improved considerably during the recent six months".

Gives me almost as much amusement as those wags who sport Che T-Shirts with the all important addition of this text - 'This T-Shirt brought to you by capitalism'

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posted by Croydonian

Cyprus and Norfolk, both 'vast' in Russian terms. Apparently.

Monday, July 13, 2009
A headline from the English language version of the Pravda website:


Japan drools over Russia's vast territory

Oh aye, thought I, yet more doom-mongering over military flashpoints and scope for an extension to my piece on China's trans-Amur ambitions.

What Pravda is actually referring to are the Southern Kuriles, former Japanese territories occcupied by the former USSR in 1945. Because my life is empty and meaningless, I have gone to the effort of totalling up the size of the islands - round about 1,874 square miles. For sake of comparison, Norfolk is 2,073 square miles, and Cyprus 3,572 square miles. Mother Russia herself - excluding the Southern Kuriles - is some 3,522 times bigger. So is there a word out there which might act as a 3,522 fold multiplier to 'vast'?

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posted by Croydonian

How NOT to negotiate

Friday, May 01, 2009
I do not suppose that many people on this side of the world could declare, hand on heart, that they know where the Southern Kurils are, but this is where they are to be found:


Along with the southern half of Sakhalin / Karafuto, the islands were taken by the Soviet Union in 1945, and the inhabitants forcibly removed. The Japanese are not entirely happy about this. More on the dispute here.

Anyway, fast forwarding 64 years, The Japan Times notes the following: "Government officials must refrain from making comments suggesting Japan is willing to compromise in territorial negotiations and instead demand that Moscow return all four Russian-held islets off Hokkaido, a group of conservative professors and former diplomats said Thursday in Tokyo".

Not an unreasonable stance to take, as generally one does not either brag about the aces in the cards one has been dealt or bemoan the twos and threes to one's fellow gamblers.

However, this is all a bit late in the day - "[in a] statement critical of former Vice Foreign Minister Shotaro Yachi. It was reported in early April that Yachi said Tokyo could settle for a partial return of Kunashiri, Etorofu and Shikotan islands and the Habomai islets".

Maybe the Russians will be sporting and pretend that they missed Yachi's comments.

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posted by Croydonian

Survey o' the day

This twist of cloth is a St George ribbon, and I suppose the nearest equivalent the Russians have to Haig Fund poppies:It has the colours of the the Cross of St George medal, Imperial and post-Communist Russia's highest medal of gallantry. More here.

Anyway, Russians sport these things in memory of their dead in what they call the Great Patriotic War, and pollster superjob.ru has asked the man on the Nizhny Novgorod omnibus what he thinks of the annual campaign, and surprise, surprise, s/he approves:

"A total of 79% of Russians, mostly senior citizens (?? Strange demographics Russia must have), fully approve of the campaign".

Fifteen percent say their attitude toward the campaign was "rather positive," but add that the ribbon should not be worn all year long, but should be removed as soon as the campaign is over to stop it getting dirty.

Three percent of those polled say their attitude is mainly negative. These respondents say that people, mainly young, wear the ribbon for pure decoration and fail to share the organizers' belief in its meaning and significance.

Another 3% say their attitude is "very negative" and that the campaign desecrates the memory of the St. George Cross award".


Vlad sports one:


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posted by Croydonian

An early contender for man of the year.

Monday, April 27, 2009
Meet Anton Chumachenko, a United Russia (Putin's lot) candidate for a council seat in Sankt-Peterburg, and a mere boy at 23:

"A first-time candidate for office... Chumachenko won a seat on a local legislative council in St. Petersburg last month. Three weeks later, he publicly renounced his own victory, expressing disgust that votes had been falsified in his favor. "I don't need this kind of victory!" the recent college graduate wrote in an open letter to residents. "I don't want to begin my political career with a cynical mockery of rights, laws and morality."

More details at the Washington Post, but that extract should serve as a rebuke to the many electoral fraudsters in these parts.

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posted by Croydonian

Good money is where you make it department

Tuesday, April 07, 2009
In a development that might render Uncle Sam a little peevish, Israel Aerospace Industries is flogging its wares to Mother Russia:

"Russia's Defense Ministry has decided to buy three types of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) from Israel for $50 million, a respected Russian business paper said on Tuesday.
A contract signed with Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) envisions the purchase of the Bird-Eye 400 mini-UAV (weight - 5kg, range - 10 km), I-view MK150 tactical UAV (160 kg, 100 km), and Searcher Mk II medium-range UAV (426 kg, 250 km)".

Doubtless they will be keeping a close eye on the Chechens. I have been working on a joke starting 'why did the Chechen cross the road' for some time, but it has never got as far as beta testing.

Novosti spoils the report by illustrating it with a US drone - an MQ-1 Predator, I think, although I would not bet the farm on it. A little light googling discloses that UAVs all seem to be as ugly as sin, begging the question as to whether aeroplanes have only ever been pretty for the benefit of the pilots / navigators.

Exhibit A - An I-View 150:




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posted by Croydonian

Cuban missile crisis II?

Sunday, March 15, 2009
From Novosti:

"Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has proposed to Russia using a Venezuelan island for temporary hosting of Russian long-range aviation, a top-ranking Russian Air Force official said Saturday.

There is such a proposal on the part of the Venezuelan president. Chavez proposed to us a whole island with an airfield that we can use for temporary basing of strategic bombers," said Maj.-Gen. Anatoly Zhikharev, the chief of the long-range aviation staff".

I noted the presence of TU-160 Blackjacks in Venezuela a while back. Perhaps unexpectedly, there has never been a permanent Russian military presence in Cuba, although that is on the tables too.

Should be an early test for the mettle of Obama and Clinton, I would think.

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posted by Croydonian

Let them eat...

Saturday, February 28, 2009
...cabbage.

This, care of Komsomolskaya Pravda via The Moscow News:

"People should ditch kolbasa and fizzy drinks and turn back to homely foods such as kefir and cabbage to beat the crisis, Russia's chief doctor said in a new report".

I've looked up kefir - fermented milk, and kolbasa - a type of sausage, so readers will not have to.

If the Woolton Pie is going to make a comeback in these parts, I think the Government will have to sack Alan Johnson at Health and bring in someone rather more patronising. Stand up Patricia 'very, very regular bowel movements' Hewitt - cometh the hour, cometh the woman.


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posted by Croydonian

Want to halt nuclear proliferation? Call the Dept of *Energy*

Tuesday, February 17, 2009
As though the DoE does not have enough on its hands, it is now taking on nuclear proliferation, or as it rather idiotically puts it, 'eliminating [the] threat of dangerous weapons'. As opposed to those child-friendly bunker-busting bombs, assault rifles, muskets, broad swords and pointy sticks.

"The UK Global Threat Reduction Programme 2008 Annual Report highlights the progress made on projects including the safe destruction of chemical weapons in Russia, other former Soviet Union countries and elsewhere. The programme is funded from the UK's Global Threat Reduction Programme annual budget of £36 million".

One would think that Mother Russia (Upper Volta with gas...)could afford to do this herself, but she would be foolish to turn down our taxpayer-funded largesse. More to the point, what on earth has this got to do with the Department of Energy and (grr) Climate Change? Surely this is a job for the Foreign Office in the person of Thunderbird puppet Milliband, or perhaps Hutton and Defence. A mate is still scandalised by the change of name from the Ministry of War, but that's a topic for another day.

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posted by Croydonian

Pravda predicts martial law in the UK in 2009

Friday, January 16, 2009
Yes it does:

"The economic collapse in the UK will continue a foot with the US. Rights of the citizens will continue to be usurped by the state and all pretenses of civil rights will disappear after the Islamics in the city center start to agitate and push out through direct violence all remaining British nationals....Once the majority starts leaning to the hard right and violence starts to break out..the UK government will drop all pretenses of the citizens rights and clamp down with martial law".

Nope, can't see that happening.

And elsewhere:

"Demonstrations, riots and looting will break out in various sections of the [USA] hardest hit by the collapsing economy. The government, which in the US has a history of using draconian tactics once violence starts...will lead to casualties and an escalation of tensions. The US army's North America command will be called in to affect areas, forcing martial law and gun confiscations".

Or that.

"Mexico will face complete collapse as a nation"

Hmm.

"France will have early elections and will take a hard left turn"

They would be daft enough to do that, but they will not.

"As its economy collapses, Poland will become even more of a puppet for the US regime"

Pravda doesn't like Russia's near neighbours much.

"Look for total economic collapse from the Baltics"

See above.

"For the Balkans as general, look for war in 2009"

Possible I suppose.

"Israel will face a protracted series of wars on its borders, primarily in Lebanon and Egypt's Sinai and Gaza"

Also possible.

With a continued economic down turn, Iran will be rocked by riots

Possible too.

It isn't all pestilence, war, famine and death, however: "Spain will have elections and a center right government will win".

I like that one. A lot.

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posted by Croydonian

Great Russians

Monday, December 29, 2008
Our Russian chums have been voting for the Greatest Russian, in much the same way as our compatriots did a year or so back, with Churchill - correctly, IMHO - winning.

While there has been talk of voting manipulation by both organisers and voters, the results are now in, and the winner is a fairly uncontroversial figure - unless one is a Teutonic Knight - Alexander Nevsky. Nevsky has the advantage of being the subject of one of the world's greatest films, it must be said, with a rather nifty Prokofiev score.

Pyotr Stolypin, the early 20th century Tsarist PM and reformer, who might be called the father of Russian democracy, not that said democracy got much further than the maternity ward at the time made second. I have a vagueish recollection of Stolypin from A level history, the first decade of 20th Century history not being a period I have read up on much of late. After that it goes awry, with a certain odious Georgian rated third, ahead of Pushkin. Peter the Great was fifth, and a certain odious Volgan fifth.

Others in the top twelve include Dostoyevsky, Catherine the Great, Alexander II, Ivan the Terrible, Mendelev and Suvorov. Tolstoy did not make the cut, nor did Tchaikovsky. I would have voted for Peter the Great for what that's worth.

(Sniffing around for further details revealed that this tale was all over the conventional news sites, but having put fingers to keyboard I opted to finish the post)

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posted by Croydonian

Business first, national security later.

Monday, December 22, 2008
Way back lost in the mists of time I watched 'Top Gun' at a cinema in Leicester Square in the first week of its run, and in a packed cinema I was one of two people (the other one was my mate) who guffawed at this (approximate) line: "Those Russian Migs have got Exocets". (1)

Anyway, life is semi-imitating art, by the look of things, as "Turkey plans to buy 32 used Mi-28 (Havoc) helicopters from Russia in a deal worth a total of $1 billion, a national Turkish daily reported on Monday".

While the Mi-28 is not exactly bleeding age these days, it is not a rotored donkey either, and I imagine that Russia selling current aircraft to a NATO country is a first.

(1) - Note for normal people - this was during the cold war, and even La France Perfide would be unlikely to sell weaponry to the Soviet Union.

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posted by Croydonian

Georgia on her mind

Monday, December 08, 2008
The Russian Academy of Scientists, kindly folk that they are, has polled the Rodina's citizenry as to which countries they sympathise with or otherwise. I have not been able to access the source data, but have done what I can with figures published in the English language site of Pravda.




It may well be the case that they have a soft spot for the Finns and detest Canadians beyond measure, but working with what I've got, I do feel that we are letting the side down by being less popular than the US. Doubtless the Belarusians and Kazakhs are popular because they are happy to leave the boat resolutely unrocked.

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posted by Croydonian

Next year's news now

Monday, November 17, 2008
A bit late in the day, I have chanced upon the thoughts of Russian astrologer Pavel Globa:

"The global crisis of 2010 will strike the entire system and will thus transform the world order. “The crisis will last for ten years and will end by 2020. The European Union will fall apart, and so will NATO. Several European Unions will be formed instead: the South-European, the North-European, and the like. Germany will be in the alliance with France, whereas Russia and Ukraine will join the alliance with Eastern Europe,” the astrologist said".

Here's his track record:

"Globa’s most famous predictions that came true: the rise of Putin and Medvedev, the collapse of the USSR, the 9/11 terrorists acts, the decline of Fidel Castro. The list of his most famous predictions that did not come true to life include: Castro’s death in 2000, the bombing of Iraq in 2007, an attempted assassination of President George W. Bush"

Texan sharpshooter fallacy, anyone?

No consideration of astrolgers is complete without the bi-annual wheeling out of the tale of Kelvin Mackenzie and his letter of dismissal to The Sun's astrologer: "As you will already know..."

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posted by Croydonian

The art of understatement, pt 387

Wednesday, November 05, 2008
Continuing with the over the top comparisons, I present Pravda's thoughts on the Bush administration:

"Only Satan would have been worse than the Bush regime...Firstly, the people of the USA have voted out the Bush regime and the odious mass-murdering thugs which controlled it and saw Washington vying with Nazi Germany for a place on the Podium of Horror. Himmler and Rumsfeld the Torturers, Goebbels and Rice the propaganda machines, Hitler and Bush the Fuhrers, masterminding concentration camps, medieval-style torture chambers, illegal invasions, acts of mass slaughter and horrific acts of cruelty as international law was consigned to the dustbin".

Maybe George did not include the writer on his Christmas card list.

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posted by Croydonian

The new Bond film - as seen by the Russian Communists

Monday, October 27, 2008
They don't seem to approve:

"A Russian communist group has attacked the newest Bond girl, Olga Kurylenko, for her "moral and intellectual betrayal" in starring in a film about the "enemy of the Soviet people."..."In the name of all communists we appeal to you, Olga Kurylenko, wanton daughter of unclean Ukraine and deserter of the Slavic world. The Soviet Union educated you, cared for you, and brought you up for free, but no one suspected that you would commit this act of intellectual and moral betrayal," the St. Petersburg-based KPLO group's statement read, going on to call James Bond "the killer of hundreds of Soviet people and their allies."

Hundreds?

By my reckoning, the not uncomely Ms Kurylenko would have been 12 at the time Ukraine broke from the USSR. Maybe she should point her accusers in the direction of Robert Conquest's 'The Harvest of Sorrow', his book on the holodomor.

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posted by Croydonian

Vladimir Putin nicked for shoplifting in Italy

Monday, September 08, 2008
From ANSA:

"Italian police thought they were being hoodwinked this week when they caught a Russian shoplifter who said he was Vladimir Putin.

After checking out his passport it turned out that he was indeed the Russian leader's namesake. The 30-year-old was nabbed with an accomplice who helped him lift outfits in several high-end shops in the Adriatic resort city of Riccione".

I forsee a long stint in the salt mines once he is back in the Rodina.

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posted by Croydonian

My Enemy's Enemy is my Friend....

Saturday, September 06, 2008
Seems the only rationale for Nicaragua - in the person of Daniel Ortega - to have decided to join Mother Russia in extending diplomatic recognition to South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Can't see that going down well on the North side of the Rio Grande, frankly....

I doubt that Nicaragua will go so far as to open embassies in Sukhumi or Tskhinvali. Note the retina-burning quality of the South Ossetian flag:

That's a white stripe at the top, by the way. One for that splendid New Zealander who hosts the Flag rating website to take a look at, I think.

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posted by Croydonian

Quote o' the day

Monday, June 09, 2008
From Russian nationalist Alexander Belov, leader of the Movement Against Illegal Immigration, or DPNI:

"Those who shout 'Heil Hitler' must be gradually isolated".

Shades of that quote from Saint Augustine.

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posted by Croydonian