Europe War in Ukraine - Thread 4 - thread rules updated

[Gethelred]

This is the thread for discussing the War in Ukraine. Should you want to discuss the geopolitics, the history, or an interesting tangent, head over here:

Europe - Backdrop to the war in Ukraine

This is the thread for the geopolitics, history and framework around the Russia-Ukraine conflict. If you want to discuss the events of the war, head over to this thread: https://www.bigfooty.com/forum/threads/war-in-ukraine-thread-4-thread-rules-updated.1376293/page-146

www.bigfooty.com

If a post isn't directly concerning the events of the war or starts to derail the thread, report the post to us and we'll move it over there.

Seeing as multiple people seem to have forgotten, abuse is against the rules of BF. Continuous, page long attacks directed at a single poster in this thread will result in threadbans for a week from this point; doing so again once you have returned will make the bans permanent and will be escalated to infractions.

This thread still has misinformation rules, and occasionally you will be asked to demonstrate a claim you have made by moderation. If you cannot, you will be offered the opportunity to amend the post to reflect that it's opinion, to remove the post, or you will be threadbanned and infracted for sharing misinformation.

Addendum: from this point, use of any variant of the word 'orc' to describe combatants, politicians or russians in general will be deleted and the poster will receive a warning. If the behaviour continues, it will be escalated. Consider this fair warning.

Finally: If I see the word Nazi or Hitler being flung around, there had better have a good faith basis as to how it's applicable to the Russian invasion - as in, video/photographic evidence of POW camps designed to remove another ethnic group - or to the current Ukrainian army. If this does not occur, you will be threadbanned for posting off topic

This is a sensitive area, and I understand that this makes for fairly incensed conversation sometimes. This does not mean the rules do not apply, whether to a poster positing a Pro-Ukraine stance or a poster positing an alternative view.

Behave, people.

 

[Ballarat Bob]

NATO has no designs on Russia it's a purely defensive alliance set up during the cold war to oppose Soviet threats.
Any confrontation with the Western allies in a conventional war in Europe would favour Russia in physical numbers but they have shown they have appalling leadership in the military , poor armoured capabilities which are crucial if they expect to roll rapidly across western Europe. Their aircraft are substandard compared to western options. Their navy has proven to be incompetent in the black sea I wouldn't expect much more elsewhere. And logistics within the armed forces of Russia have been severely lacking. Open up a conflict with NATO and you also open up a front from Finland in the north and Turkey in the south and Russia's eastern seaboard from North America. Even during the cold war the Soviets had a massive advantage in manpower and equipment in Europe they still didn't try it on.
Regardless I think the idea of a Russian push against NATO is a pipe dream
The nuclear threat of mutually assured destruction is still the main deterrent.
I think Putin gets put forward as some major strategist who is playing 3d chess , he's a dictator and imperialist who harks back to the old Soviet union. He wants an empire , he needs external enemies to distract from him and his cronies stripping the country of its wealth.

 

[Sir_Loin]

NATO has no designs on Russia it's a purely defensive alliance set up during the cold war to oppose Soviet threats.
Any confrontation with the Western allies in a conventional war in Europe would favour Russia in physical numbers but they have shown they have appalling leadership in the military , poor armoured capabilities which are crucial if they expect to roll rapidly across western Europe. Their aircraft are substandard compared to western options. Their navy has proven to be incompetent in the black sea I wouldn't expect much more elsewhere. And logistics within the armed forces of Russia have been severely lacking. Open up a conflict with NATO and you also open up a front from Finland in the north and Turkey in the south and Russia's eastern seaboard from North America. Even during the cold war the Soviets had a massive advantage in manpower and equipment in Europe they still didn't try it on.
Regardless I think the idea of a Russian push against NATO is a pipe dream
The nuclear threat of mutually assured destruction is still the main deterrent.
I think Putin gets put forward as some major strategist who is playing 3d chess , he's a dictator and imperialist who harks back to the old Soviet union. He wants an empire , he needs external enemies to distract from him and his cronies stripping the country of its wealth.

If it ever got to article 5 under the NATO treaty Russia would be wiped off the face of the earth in a conventional war. They do not have the capability to compete against NATO in any domain.

It would be a horrible thing to happen but Russia wouldn’t have a chance in hell.

 

[Millky95]

If it ever got to article 5 under the NATO treaty Russia would be wiped off the face of the earth in a conventional war. They do not have the capability to compete against NATO in any domain.

It would be a horrible thing to happen but Russia wouldn’t have a chance in hell.

At this point I don't think Russia would be Poland in a conventional war let alone all of NATO

 

[Visions]

Russian propaganda from official channels is at an all time amateurish low (right up there with the SIMS incident).

Zelensky is that good he can be in 2 places at once….

 

[Zidane98]

You keep calling me a liar, mate, but as I pointed out yesterday, very little of what I posted were my words.

They're direct quotes from sources which nobody could possibly say are pro-Putin.

So, again, another direct question for you to skip: was the Estonian military, the ISW, the BBC or The Times lying in the information you claimed were "lies" yesterday?

As for what I posted on the Russian language issue in Ukraine post-Maidan, happy to further clarify.

This is where it all started:

Language policy in Ukraine - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The Constitution of Ukraine, adopted by the Verkhovna Rada on 28 June 1996, states at article 10: "The state language of Ukraine is the Ukrainian language. The State ensures the comprehensive development and functioning of the Ukrainian language in all spheres of social life throughout the entire territory of Ukraine. In Ukraine, the free development, use and protection of Russian, and other languages of national minorities of Ukraine, is guaranteed".[22]

So from 1996, Russian and other minority languages are guaranteed protection under the constitution. This is the policy independent Ukraine develops under.

In 2012 the Law on the Principles of the State Language Policy is enacted (same link as above), classifying Russian and numerous other languages as Regional languages. This allows areas with over 10% language speakers to do government business, appear in court etc. in those languages - a facility similar to what most countries have.

Post-Maidan in 2014, the law is repealed, though importantly:

Since then, various Ukrainian cities and regions have declared Russian a regional language in their jurisdictions, these being the municipalities of Odesa, Kharkiv, Kherson, Mykolaiv, Zaporizhia, Sevastopol, Dnipropetrovsk, Luhansk and Krasny Luch; and the Oblasts of Odesa, Zaporizhia, Donetsk, Kherson, Mykolaiv and Dnipropetrovsk.


Some familiar names in there, huh?

Europe was furious at the repeal of the law and that act's context within the emerging unrest - they harped on about this stuff for a long time and some of us followed it the whole way - from the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe - the #1 EU agency which monitored the civil war from 2014 onwards:


Meanwhile, the decisions taken yesterday by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine to cancel the 2012 law on the “Principles of the State Language Policy” could lead to further unrest, especially in a context where language policy is such a divisive issue. The High Commissioner urged the authorities to take measures to ensure that the concerns of all ethnic and linguistic groups are being taken into account. She encouraged the authorities to refrain from taking any hasty actions that could lead to further escalation.

“At this crucial time in its history, Ukraine needs leaders, laws and policies that unite rather than divide. Like my predecessors, I call on the Ukrainian authorities to adopt a balanced and inclusive approach towards language policy. The authorities have to consult widely to ensure that future language legislation accommodates the needs and positions of everyone in Ukrainian society, whether they are speakers of Ukrainian, Russian or other languages,” Thors said. Consultations should also encompass international organizations, including the Council of Europe and the OSCE, to ensure that any new language legislation meets European standards.

Restraint, responsibility and dialogue needed in Ukraine, including Crimea, says OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities

THE HAGUE, 24 February 2014 – OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities Astrid Thors today expressed her satisfaction that solutions to end the violence and loss of life in Ukraine are emerging. However, she cautioned that the situation remains very fragile.

www.osce.org

None of the post-Maidan governments have included leaders who promoted laws and policies that united rather than divided and the language laws were very firmly a part of this attempt to divide - a fact no European countries disagreed with back at the time Ukraine was enacting them.

In 2019 Poroschenko was still at it and Zelensky endorsed the even harsher laws:

Language policy in Ukraine - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

2019 Law on Protecting the Functioning of the Ukrainian Language as the State Language​

Signed by	Petro Poroshenko
Signed	15 May 2019
Effective	16 July 2019[95]
Bill title	5670-d, "On Protecting the Functioning of the Ukrainian Language as the State Language"
First reading	4 October 2018
Second reading	25 April 2019
Status: In force	The law "On Protecting the Functioning of the Ukrainian Language as the State Language" made the use of Ukrainian compulsory (totally or within certain quotas) in the work of some public authorities, in the electoral procedures and political campaigning, in pre-school, school and university education, in scientific, cultural and sporting activities, in book publishing and book distribution, in printed mass media, television and radio broadcasting, in economic and social life (commercial advertising, public events), in hospitals and nursing homes, and in the activities of political parties and other legal entities (e.g. non-governmental organizations) registered in Ukraine.[12] Some special exemptions are provided for the Crimean Tatar language, other languages of indigenous peoples of Ukraine, the English language and the other official languages of the European Union; as languages of minorities that are not EU official languages, Russian, Belarusian and Yiddish are excluded from the exemptions.[12]

Oh yes, they really did include Yiddish, I wonder why?

And again, how did Europe react?

Well, I could post a bunch of articles expressing their outrage, but to save length and time I'll skip ahead and just post the fact I expressed earlier - that in order to join the EU, Ukraine had to change its post-Maidan language laws, which as I quoted earlier, all of Europe found divisive and objectionable.

Language policy in Ukraine - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

2023 changes to national minorities' rights​

On 8 December 2022, the Ukrainian parliament passed a bill that amend some laws on the rights of national minorities in light of the Council of Europe’s expert assessment and in order to meet one of the European Commission’s criteria for the opening of Ukrainian European Union membership negotiations.[14]


So the repeated introduction of divisive anti-minority language laws post-Maidan was only finally ended because Ukraine had to meet EU standards.

As repeatedly demonstrated, they'd really prefer not to meet those standards.

It's OK to be proud of your country, language etc., but the standard of civilised societies is that you also allow for minority languages to have a protected status and don't attempt to erase them in favour of only your national language.

You also don't go out of your way to make it hard or impossible for your citizens to do the basic communicating with government which is every person's human right.

This is simple, basic human decency stuff, isn't it?

Oh, and just to save some back and forth, are Wikipedia and the OCSE lying this time?

As usual, you post utter nonsense. Russian is freely spoken in Ukraine to this day - as is many other minority languages. These languages are not banned.


It is an absolute falsehood to suggest that Russian is banned in Ukraine. No more than it is to suggest that Ukranian speakers in the Independent People's Republic of Belgorod are discriminated against because Ukranian isn't an official language in Russia despite it being widespread all throughout Russia.

All in here for you tovarisch:

No, the Russian language was not banned from Ukraine

Russia Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov recently doubled down on an inaccurate statement he’s made before: that Ukraine ba

www.politifact.com

As we all know every accusation by the Kremlin is generally a confession.

Meanwhile in the human rights abusing DPR regions run by Moscow speaking Ukranian pretty much gets you thrown in jail:

Ukrainian stripped of official language status in Russian proxy Donbas “republic”

The self-proclaimed and Russian-controlled ‘Donetsk people’s republic’ has announced that Ukrainian will no longer be a ‘state language’ in the pseudo republic, and has claimed that this status will be held by Russian alone

khpg.org

There is also a Russiafication going on in Donbass:

Rights Group: Ukrainian Language Near Banished In Donbas Schools

The instruction of the Ukrainian language has been virtually wiped out in areas that Moscow-backed separatists control in eastern Ukraine where an armed conflict has simmered since April 2014, the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group (KHPG) says.

www.rferl.org

The most ironic thing of all about your post is Ukraine offers protection for minorities far more than Russia ever will or does.


Your lies about Ukranian language law in Ukraine have been official debunked tovarisch.

 

[Sir_Loin]

At this point I don't think Russia would be Poland in a conventional war let alone all of NATO

Can’t remember the exact quote but I saw something that was along the lines of the Poles being the first ones to Moscow over any other NATO country if it kicked off. They have some justified ledger squaring to do.

 

[Zidane98]

No real reason to disbelieve him, but the fact remains that there are no shortage of other accounts from the time, from far more acceptable to you Western sources, who all say this promise was made. We both know that, do you really want me to link to them?

And beyond that, it's simple common sense any fool can appreciate that moving the boundary of Cold War tension and conflict from way over in Germany where Russia quite deliberately established it to keep itself safe and well out of range, to a stone's throw from Moscow, is going to cause tension and conflict all over again.

I remember being horrified reading of NATO's expansion way back in the 90's. 'WTF are they thinking? Why start it all up again?'

Russia has clearly said every step of the way that it's a red line to camp NATO on its borders. We just keep ignoring them.





You seem to be blissfully unaware of the massive irony here - ALL signatories are supposed to defend Ukraine.

When exactly will the US and UK be putting boots on the ground to defend Ukraine?

As you say, that's exactly what is stated in the treaty...

Of all the ridiculous pro Russian propaganda, this has got to be up there.


The US is providing ammunition, defensive weapons, training and logistical support to Ukraine. That is a significant contribution towards the defense of Ukraine.



What exactly are Russia doing with the 44 TU-160 Blackjack bombers that the US brokered an agreement for Ukraine turning over to Russia?


What are Russia doing with the plethora of Kh-55 cruise missiles that were transferred from Ukraine to Russia brokered by the US under the Budapest agreement?


What is Russia's current contribution to the defense of Ukraine per its obligations?

 

[Zidane98]

Can’t remember the exact quote but I saw something that was along the lines of the Poles being the first ones to Moscow over any other NATO country if it kicked off. They have some justified ledger squaring to do.

They suffered greatly from Russia allying with the Nazis at the start of WW2.

 

[Cap]

Wait a minute

I thought he was peaceful.

 

[Sir_Loin]

They suffered greatly from Russia allying with the Nazis at the start of WW2.

Went far beyond that. Even when the Russians switched sides they sat back and let the Nazis flatten the Warsaw uprising.

 

[Jamolad]

"The western military complex is profiting majorly from this conflict."

[next breath]

"Also, the west are not replenishing their stocks of weapons and ammo."

Huh?

 

[Sir_Loin]

Wait a minute

I thought he was peaceful.

He is very peaceful when he wins all the wars he starts.

 

[Aussie in exile]

I say to all countries that board Russia is to start blowing up Railway and road bridges in Russia that lead to their borders as anybody who thinks Russia will stop at Ukraine is living in cloud cuckoo land.

 

[Bloods86]

I say to all countries that board Russia is to start blowing up Railway and road bridges in Russia that lead to their borders as anybody who thinks Russia will stop at Ukraine is living in cloud cuckoo land.

Yeah, NATO is going to keep making them invade countries along NATOs border until it's just Russia and NATO.

NATO is just mean, making them do this against their will.

All Russia wants is separation from NATO and it'll seek to border as many NATO members as it needs to, to enforce that separation.

 

[Zidane98]

Yeah, NATO is going to keep making them invade countries along NATOs border until it's just Russia and NATO.

NATO is just mean, making them do this against their will.

All Russia wants is separation from NATO and it'll seek to border as many NATO members as it needs to, to keep that separation.

Well what do we have here

Russia has likely already sacrificed air defense on NATO borders by sending prized S-400s to shore up losses in Ukraine: UK intel

Moving S-400s from Kaliningrad, one of Russia's "most strategically sensitive" outposts, indicates how the war has stretched Moscow, the UK MOD said.

www.businessinsider.com

Russia removing S400 air defense systems in Kaliningrad. That Russian exclave surrounded by NATO nations just desperate to invade & attack Russia.


This makes a complete mockery of anyone making the "Russia is defending itself against NATO" claim.


The facts are that because of Putin being an imperialistic fascist there is now a completely new 1300km NATO border with Russia. A border that Russia also does not bother bolstering to prevent those pesky NATO nations from invading & attacking it.

 

[Jello_B]

What leader of a major power has ever been "wholesome?"

Even a supposed 'saint' like Ghandi, if you search for the threads you're after to utterly discredit him, pull hard enough and ignore what good he did, you'll reveal an absolute monster.

Netanyahu and Biden oversaw the killing of 20K civilians in what, the first month?

Does that make them 50X the 'monster' Putin is?

To put it another way, on another aspect Putin is often criticised over, Russia has a major demographic gap issue stemming from the years immediately after the USSR's collapse.

If you were the leader of Russia and your primary moral consideration is the ongoing prosperity and security of the country for the benefit of current and future citizens, do you go out of your way to encourage the kind of nuclear family relationships that steadily built Russia's population in the past, or do you gamble that the same levels of tolerance toward LGBT+ relationships we see in the West will prevent a serious demographic problem unfolding down the track?

In that context, is a degree of intolerance for one thing and an encouragement of another immoral?

They're not easy questions.

As to Putin being a dictator, it's often said, but Russian politics is every bit as complex and arguably more complex than US politics. Can we reduce the US system to a one word sentence we heard from a biased journalist, like maybe 'the US system switches dictator every four years, chosen from one of two possibilities who the vast majority of the population don't want as their next dictator.'

Would that be a fair summation of the breadth and depth of the US system?

I have no doubt Putin's done plenty of really bad things, I guess the only way to really measue his morality is to know his history really intimately and ask yourself each step of the way - 'what would I have done?'

It's always a very interesting exercise and a great way to deeper understanding of characters and scenarios.

Netanyahu is a war criminal. Him and his mates should be hung.
I don’t have much good to say about Biden either.

 

[Cap]

 

[Zidane98]

Went far beyond that. Even when the Russians switched sides they sat back and let the Nazis flatten the Warsaw uprising.

In exchange for letting the Russians invade & occupy the Baltics.

 

[Sir_Loin]

The EU needs to do more. That’s all Macron is saying. I think most reasonable observers would support that. It’s a good step in the right direction.

 

[Cap]

The EU needs to do more. That’s all Macron is saying. I think most reasonable observers would support that. It’s a good step in the right direction.

Absolutely, the need to show more leadership and get Ukraine what it needs

Hopefully the vote in Germany for additional long range missiles is also successful.

 

[BlueE]

I read part of this, it all seems to be hedging around the topic of assurances, referring to the opinion of western leaders about what should happen or what the Soviets might not like, or "joining the dots" between conversations with several parties.

If there's something as definitive, in opposition, as Gorbachev himself saying that the assurances he got were to do with East Germany, not general eastward expansion of NATO, and that he considered the assurances that were made fulfilled, perhaps you could point me to that section.

It's not "hedging", with a trove of declassified security documents that show in detail multiple security assurances against NATO expansion were given to Soviet leaders from Baker, Bush, Genscher, Khol, Gates, Mitterrand, Thatcher, Hurd, Major and Warner.

However the "hedging" could apply to how the West then treated these assurances.

The documents reinforce former CIA Director Robert Gates’s criticism of “pressing ahead with expansion of NATO eastward [in the 1990s], when Gorbachev and others were led to believe that wouldn’t happen.”[1] The key phrase, buttressed by the documents, is “led to believe.”

The first concrete assurances by Western leaders on NATO began on January 31, 1990, when West German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher opened the bidding with a major public speech at Tutzing, in Bavaria, on German unification. The U.S. Embassy in Bonn (see Document 1) informed Washington that Genscher made clear “that the changes in Eastern Europe and the German unification process must not lead to an ‘impairment of Soviet security interests.’ Therefore, NATO should rule out an ‘expansion of its territory towards the east, i.e. moving it closer to the Soviet borders.’” The Bonn cable also noted Genscher’s proposal to leave the East German territory out of NATO military structures even in a unified Germany in NATO.[3]

This latter idea of special status for the GDR territory was codified in the final German unification treaty signed on September 12, 1990, by the Two-Plus-Four foreign ministers (see Document 25). The former idea about “closer to the Soviet borders” is written down not in treaties but in multiple memoranda of conversation between the Soviets and the highest-level Western interlocutors (Genscher, Kohl, Baker, Gates, Bush, Mitterrand, Thatcher, Major, Woerner, and others) offering assurances throughout 1990 and into 1991 about protecting Soviet security interests and including the USSR in new European security structures. The two issues were related but not the same. Subsequent analysis sometimes conflated the two and argued that the discussion did not involve all of Europe. The documents published below show clearly that it did.

The “Tutzing formula” immediately became the center of a flurry of important diplomatic discussions over the next 10 days in 1990, leading to the crucial February 10, 1990, meeting in Moscow between Kohl and Gorbachev when the West German leader achieved Soviet assent in principle to German unification in NATO, as long as NATO did not expand to the east.

The Soviets would need much more time to work with their domestic opinion (and financial aid from the West Germans) before formally signing the deal in September 1990.

The conversations before Kohl’s assurance involved explicit discussion of NATO expansion, the Central and East European countries, and how to convince the Soviets to accept unification. For example, on February 6, 1990, when Genscher met with British Foreign Minister Douglas Hurd, the British record showed Genscher saying, “The Russians must have some assurance that if, for example, the Polish Government left the Warsaw Pact one day, they would not join NATO the next.” (See Document 2)

Having met with Genscher on his way into discussions with the Soviets, Baker repeated exactly the Genscher formulation in his meeting with Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze on February 9, 1990, (see Document 4); and even more importantly, face to face with Gorbachev.

Not once, but three times, Baker tried out the “not one inch eastward” formula with Gorbachev in the February 9, 1990, meeting. He agreed with Gorbachev’s statement in response to the assurances that “NATO expansion is unacceptable.” Baker assured Gorbachev that “neither the President nor I intend to extract any unilateral advantages from the processes that are taking place,” and that the Americans understood that “not only for the Soviet Union but for other European countries as well it is important to have guarantees that if the United States keeps its presence in Germany within the framework of NATO, not an inch of NATO’s present military jurisdiction will spread in an eastern direction.” (See Document 6)

Afterwards, Baker wrote to Helmut Kohl who would meet with the Soviet leader on the next day, with much of the very same language. Baker reported: “And then I put the following question to him [Gorbachev]. Would you prefer to see a united Germany outside of NATO, independent and with no U.S. forces or would you prefer a unified Germany to be tied to NATO, with assurances that NATO’s jurisdiction would not shift one inch eastward from its present position? He answered that the Soviet leadership was giving real thought to all such options [….] He then added, ‘Certainly any extension of the zone of NATO would be unacceptable.’” Baker added in parentheses, for Kohl’s benefit, “By implication, NATO in its current zone might be acceptable.” (See Document 8)

Well-briefed by the American secretary of state, the West German chancellor understood a key Soviet bottom line, and assured Gorbachev on February 10, 1990: “We believe that NATO should not expand the sphere of its activity.” (See Document 9)

The Brookings link you've given is three years before these security documents were declassified and collated for the National Security Archives and can be expected to put their own biases on the reporting with Gorbachev perhaps saving face for not getting the assurances in a written agreement. Further quotes from the same interview he says

Gorbachev: "Everything that could and should be done to consolidate this political commitment has been done. And done. The final settlement agreement with Germany states that no new military structures will be created in the eastern part of the country, no additional troops will be deployed, and no weapons of mass destruction will be stationed. This has been observed all these years.

So there is no need to portray Gorbachev and the then Soviet leadership as naive people who were fooled. If there was naivety, then later, when this question arose, and Russia at first “did not object.”

The decision of the United States and its allies to expand NATO eastward was finally formed in 1993. I called it a big mistake from the very beginning. Of course, this was a violation of the spirit of the statements and assurances that were given to us in 1990. As for Germany, they were legally enshrined and they are being respected."

 

[BlueE]

Wait a minute

I thought he was peaceful.

You mean in response to "this generous and realistic "peace plan" Zelensky brought with him to Davos"?



LOL.

Why does your avatar remind me of this gif?

https://media.giphy.com/media/s4T64Kx2p0fhm/giphy.jpg

 

[Cap]

You mean in response to "this generous and realistic "peace plan" Zelensky brought with him to Davos"?



LOL.

Why does your avatar remind me of this gif?

https://media.giphy.com/media/s4T64Kx2p0fhm/giphy.jpg

What don't you like about the peace plan, it would bring peace

You want Ukraine to hand over some women and children to be tortured and r*ped to keep the Russian army busy?

 

[Cap]

Institute for the Study of War (@thestudyofwar) on Threads

NEW: Russian President Vladimir Putin continued to demonstrate that Russia is not interested in negotiating with Ukraine in good faith and that Russia’s maximalist objectives in Ukraine – which are tantamount to full Ukrainian and Western surrender – remain unchanged. Putin notably amplified a...

www.threads.net

So much for being a Peaceful leader desperate to negotiate

 

[Sir_Loin]

Are certain posters capable of synthesising information and then putting into a post that doesn’t bore the shite out of people. FFS think for yourself for once and stop posting reams of total crap that you’re either too lazy to read or are too stupid to interpret.