russia got to stop antogonizing the west, it only serves to harden populations against Putin

So they are scared that the UK is gonna sabotage one of their oil platforms?

>So they are scared that the UK is gonna sabotage one of their oil platforms?
>
>- u/Amoumoua 10/31/2022

That doesn't even make sense. Why would they be scared of their military ally?

They're worried because multiple Ruzzian spies have been arrested while conducting surveillance of national energy infrastructure using illegal drone flights in restricted airspaces. Right after they blew up NordStream no less.

It’s a joke, Russia is blaming the UK for the pipeline.

Ahh, true. Seen so many Ruzzian/Iranian trolls and bots lately, that one went right over my head.

Isn't the Norwegian/Russian border still open?

I think so, but only a few have crossed

If I were Russian I'd be pretty cross.

Or, I'd be russian to get across

It’s hard to tell with Russian troll farms.

I wonder if a lot of the seemingly stupid actions are more aimed at influencing the russian population?

Luckily that's not my cross to bear

Transformers movie shit on the nightly news. (I’m going for Halloween as a time traveler from 2012 so bear with me.)

Russia has been attacking Ukrainian civilian infrastructure, which all the experts say will not work to break Ukrainian will to fight. But at the same time, it surely hardens EU will to support Ukraine.

Russia's actions at the strategic level are utter idiocy. I guess Russia thinks actions like that make they appear strong and ruthless?

Because they are working on a whole other level. There are so many levels of yes-men, and scenarios that are only going through because the people above and below are terrified to push back. So you get to the point of "let's antagonise the West, we're Russia! We're Bear-STRONG!" and a bunch of dudes side-eyeing each other just agree.

(This is a ridiculously high level of simplification by armchair-analysis of course. But the point is..kinda made)

They aim to create refugee crisis in Europe, they want to influence populations of countries which aid Ukraine to withdraw the support and sanctions on russia

Political analysts made clear years ago that Putin's reason for swinging the sabre is to silence domestic opposition, in the simplistic trick Goebbels codified already in the early '30s: "Enact martial law, start a war, and anyone who opposes you will be called 'unpatriotic, and lose their voice.'"

Putin couldn't care less if he takes all of the Ukraine with no further loss in manpower. He's already achieved the goal of "nobody even breathe a word of dissent now" mood in the Duma. Litterally, an article commented six months ago how quiet every session is today, just Putin rambling a bit, some experts say some rehearsed stuff, and then the session is ended, no body sticking their necks out from the other side of the isle, just content to still be allowed in there.