English spies and their Yulia Scripal' :)

i see you are still clinging to your nonsensical conspiracy theory with you're fingertips.

 

Firstly can you provide a link to this story? Secondly, have you read Hoffman's book? We'll get into it after your response.

 

Zheleznyakov suffered permanent ill health effects including hepatitis, epilepsy, loss of concentration and fits of epilepsy.

Nothing wrong with her here:



Then we have the Independent's report below. I thought the strap-line particularly poignant. Then we have the curious case of a mainstream newspaper disassembling the government's spin with various criticisms including that the narrative is "fraying", and highlighting the fact that she did not blame Russia and specifically did not mention Novichok as the nerve agent that poisoned her.

I could have written that article because it really does contain most of the unanswered continuing questions that surround this affair. So hat's off to the Indy for publishing and not later deleting said article. These are the same questions that I, Cerb and others here (and elsewhere) have been discussing since day one.

I sense that the government's D Notice on the affair and the horse manure spin pressed on the scribblers truly pissed some of them off and now things have died down they have the opportunity to respond.

[quote}
These are the unanswered questions that still remain after Yulia Skripal’s shock reappearance

Sowing confusion is often seen as a typically Russian technique to blindside and divert the enemy. But the Russians have hardly needed to sow any chaos here, because the British have helpfully done it for them

Eighty days after being found with her father, collapsed on a bench near a Salisbury shopping centre, Yulia Skripal has made a near-miraculous reappearance. She was filmed at an anonymous park-like location, reading a handwritten statement about her plight. In substance, what she said added almost nothing to the two statements issued by the Metropolitan Police in her name before. But the whole short recording was crucial in the messages it was designed to send – to the British, Russian and international public.

It was designed, first, to reiterate the official British version of what happened, at a time when that version has started to fray rather badly. So, she said, she and her father had been the victims of a nerve agent attack; she had been in a coma for 20 days; the medical treatment had been extremely unpleasant in many respects – her tracheotomy scar was visible evidence. She was now much better, but still recovering. She did not wish to “avail herself” of the assistance offered by the Russia embassy.

But there were also conspicuous differences from the official British version. There was no blaming of Russia. There was no naming of the nerve agent. And Yulia Skripal gave no indication that she envisaged her long-term future anywhere other than Russia (contrary to an earlier British official “leak” that she and her father were to be given new identities and resettled in a third country).

Her appearance seemed, second, intended to quash some of the more extreme speculation flourishing mostly on social media – that the Skripals were dead; that there had been no nerve agent attack, and that even if the pair were alive, they would never, ever be seen again.

And, third, there was a message addressed specifically to Russia, countering its charges that the UK had “kidnapped” one of its citizens and was unlawfully refusing consular access. Here was Yulia Skripal – well, let’s presume it was not a hi-tech confection or a “double” – saying, on camera, that she did not wish to meet Russian diplomats, at least not now.

What we have here, it seems to me, is an attempt by the UK to limit the damage to its own reputation – damage perhaps it never envisaged, because it assumed everyone would “buy” the “wicked Russia” story. And the reason this had to be done, now, or at all, was that the UK’s silence – media blackout? – about the Skripals had become embarrassing; it invited unwelcome questions, and perhaps it also risked the UK’s “triumph” in orchestrating a collective Western expulsion of Russian diplomats. It is worth noting that some of the more persistent questions have come from journalists not in Britain, but in Italy, Germany and elsewhere.

At least one of the UK’s opening assertions – that Russia was the only country to have manufactured the nerve agent in question – was challenged early, by the head of the government’s own defence research establishment at Porton Down. Since then, it has been shown that the formula was in the public domain from the mid-1990s and that both the Czechs and the Germans had access to the substance and shared the expertise with their Western allies. So the presumption of Russian provenance, let alone Kremlin guilt, was always flawed.

Questions also surround the actual findings of the chemical weapons watchdog, the OPCW, which was sent samples for testing. Not only were aspersions cast on procedures and some actual laboratory findings, but the watchdog hardly enhanced its authority when its head, in a statement that was subsequently corrected, vastly overestimated the quantity of nerve agent supposedly used.

It is not just details so basic as the nature of the substance, its provenance and the quantity that are still in doubt, however, but a great deal else. Either that, or the information is being deliberately withheld.

--snip--

Here are just some of the many other still unanswered questions.

Precisely where and when were the Skripals poisoned? Sowing confusion is often seen as a typically Russian technique to blindside and divert the enemy. But the Russians have hardly needed to sow any chaos here, because the British have helpfully done it for them. Was the nerve agent a substance or a spray? Was it in their car, in Yulia’s suitcase, in a packet of Russian cereal brought by a friend, or smeared on the front door handle? What did a Salisbury hospital consultant mean when he wrote to The Times, saying that “no patients have experienced symptoms of nerve agent poisoning” and only three had suffered “significant poisoning”?

--snip--

Why the on-off searches and decontamination of parts of Salisbury? Why was the policeman, Detective Sergeant Nick Bailey, affected, but not the doctor who administered first aid? Why has nothing been heard from either? Did the policeman, as some have hazarded, belong to Special Branch and was his task to tail the Skripals? Where were they when their GPS was switched off that morning?

--snip--
[/quote]
https://www.independent.co.uk/voice...ochok-salisbury-question-remain-a8367471.html

 

Then your senses need a good dose of reality infused into them.

If you want to discuss the issues and the facts respectfully I'm happy to do that. But once a member begins to indulge in ad homs - as you've just done - presumably because their arguments are failing? they go on my ever growing ignore list and I will no longer respond to their posts. Your choice.

 

Reality? Do you honestly think that the English would use a nerve agent to murder these two with the high risk to all those innocent civilians who came in contact with them and cared for them? plus help from Porton Down, a government institution.
Britain gave Skripal sanctuary eight years ago. He was a Russian spy who was turned by MI6 and gave away the identities of over a hundred Russian spies to the British. Any sensible member will see that the thirst of revenge certainly came from those Russians with long memories.

What possible reason for the English have of killing Skripal after eight years? Even if they had they would never used a nerve agent with all the implications that involved, there are many options for doing the job swiftly and permanently.

 

survives by fundraising and therefore could not possibly be Russian money

 

I used to be able to make one-off donations to PF, but it seems all invited donations are now renewable on a monthly basis. When I click on the bottom 3 one-time donation options, they're 'dead'.

 

Why don't you correct us then? Point out where we've got it wrong?? That would be more productive than one smart-arsed but meaningless phrase, don't you agree?

 

Stop digging Witchy, you're coming across as a bit neurotic.

 

Yes, and if Putin had waited a few days for him to touch down at Moscow airport he could have 'done the job swiftly and permanently' there and then? So the question you have to ask yourself, if you believe that Russia was involved, is . . . why didn't he? Why risk an in international incident and the accompanying false accusation? It's difficult to believe that adults can be so easily brainwashed by known and proven liars such as politicians, especially when so many lies and unarguable facts are revealed and explained to them with such detail, as in post 78. It's illogical!

 

It was reported on the BBC tv news last night that they were ensconced 'in rooms adjacent to ICUs at Salisbury hospital' (the inverted commas mean not verbatim, but my recollection of the narration). And during her part in the piece, the nursing director (I think that was her title) appeared to be hesitant and bit uncomfortable.

 

That logic works for Britain as well though. If they wanted to make Russia look guilty, then what better way than to stage the death in Russia? Conversely, if we assume Russia did it, it makes sense that killing them in Britain would pave the way for the classic Russian conspiracy narrative that is now nearly cliche. Perhaps more importantly, it shows that no one can escape the reach of the Kremlin, and that international laws will not restrain them. It makes sense as an act meant to inspire fear, which is really the only reason to assassinate someone using Novichok instead of something more mundane.

 

Speak of the devil

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.th...journalist-arkady-babchenko-shot-dead-in-kiev

 

Tell me which government did that - I must have missed it.

 

Don't tell me . . . he was Putin's bestest friend, wasn't he. Or 'one of Putin's cronies' blah blah . . . anything to suggest that Putin was involved in it.

 

It's easy to fool the western audience. Now this Skripal thing is not important anymore to the average western citizen, but next time something like this happens everyone will say, look they have done it again. Litvinenko, Skripal etc.

 

As is being proved on this forum day after day, and further afield too?

 

Yes. But not by who you think.

 

Too cryptic.

 

Putin and his droogies are clever men. He saw something that a number of people had observed over the past decade. Namely, that misinformation and conspiracy theories were eroding our society and threatening to pull it backward. It is an ironic drawback to our openness to "information." Any idiot blogger can now set themselves up as equals to reputable sources with genuine information. By the power of paranoia, any two sources can become equal. Even if one went through multiple layers of checking by people with everything to lose, and one was posted by a blogger with no real reputation to lose.

You can never disprove a conspiracy theory; any evidence submitted against it is simply part of the conspiracy. It doesn't matter if it comes from different individuals, different countries, or different institutions which clearly have the ability to reach conclusions independently. I once saw an anti-vax person disregard a study because one author had worked for a company they didn't like 10 years ago... this was their "evidence." The bar for evidence of guilt is so low to the already paranoid, and yet so very high for those who have swindled them. The "skepticism" of a conspiracy theorist is eternally unequal.

This is toxic to a society. Nothing functions if there is no trust. Nothing can move forward, because it's not clear to people which direction that is; voices around them are all accusing each other of being evil. So people just go with what "feels" right, which is another way of saying everyone just continues believing what they want to without any kind of analysis. Of course all of this was already there, the Russians just saw a weak spot and prodded it. That even an outsider could perceive this weakness in our culture should make us pause, however.

 

You strike me as an honest person but one who is unfamiliar with the darker ways of the world. I do not mean to be insulting here, but your perceptions are limited because, I suspect, you - like most people - have been educated by the mainstream media for decade upon decade. This has the impact of blinkering one's perceptions of what is possible or even likely.

Been there, done that, got the T shirt. And some memorable scars too.

The fact is that the British government would, and has, done many ghastly and reprehensible things over the decades. The bottom line is that it always depends on what the stakes are and what the rewards might be. Politicians are not angels. In fact, they lean quite heavily towards the "other place" should one believe in these things (think the current BBC series on Liberal leader Jeremy Thorpe who sought to arrange the murder of his former lover, Norman Scott in order to protect his reputation).

Moving on:

The government narrative is so flawed it cannot be true.

Therefore, one has to conclude there is something to hide, especially as they issued a D Notice to the British media not to report or mention the name of Pablo Miller who recruited Sergei Skripal and who also lived in Salisbury. His involvement was considered to be highly sensitive, hence the Defence Notice. But (besides living in the same vicinity as Skripal) why?

Miller worked closely with Christopher Steele of Orbis on the manufactured and discredited Trump pee dossier. Think about this for a moment. At least two former senior members of MI6/SIS were operating with the Democratic Party in the US to thoroughly discredit the US president. Notwithstanding one's perceptions of Trump (I don't care for him myself), this means that elements in British intelligence were meddling in the political affairs of their closest ally. One could expect Trump to be thoroughly peeved about this interference.

Below is Craig Murray's take on the reasons. A good friend of mine, a former BBC film journalist, concluded the same several weeks ago. For my sins, I concluded even earlier that the affair was primarily directed at creating the Russian bogey-man meme in the mind of the British public.

My reasoning was that Theresa May, along with France and the US had planned a a major decapitation attack on the Syrian military (as revealed by Elijah Magnier) that would de facto destroy their ability to function as a meaningful military force. This would be a first strike against Syria and the British public had to be subdued so as not to see massive protests in the streets (as with Blair in his decision to invade Iraq).

In the event, Trump changed his mind and went for a soft public relations missile attack on targets that Russian had been warned about earlier and from which men and materiel could be removed prior to the strike/s. As Magnier made clear in his article, Trump backed down because Russia told the US in no uncertain terms that they would retaliate and counter-attack the US, British and French platforms (warships, subs, aircraft etc) from which missiles were launched.

Rarely, in my view, do governments undertake sensitive operations such as these for one reason only, but usually two (or more) reasons collide to result in an imperative decision.

https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2018/05/yulia-skripal-and-the-salisbury-wut/

 

How easily you’re illusions dismiss the truth, they must be a comfort to you
So 21 nations are wrong and should have listened to you, the oracle from La La Land

Oh and Alexander Litvinenko murdered with radioactive polonium-210 in 2010 No he wasn’t, it was by eating too much rat poison which I know he liked the taste of.

Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov, an autopsy found a deadly 1.7mm-wide pellet of poisonous ricin in his skin.
Nah, a Peruvian bee stung him, they’ve got a nest in Barclay Square that’s why the Nightingales don’t sing there anymore.

Of course.

 

Bless. You and your Russian fixation is really quite amusing

 

Good summary. I would also add that as a former KGB guy Putin knew good & well that there are always people in Western societies who so deeply hate their own societies or the US that they will ally themselves with practically anyone and say practically anything to attack them.

Lenin knew the value of 'useful idiots'. What Putin has managed to do is draw them from all sides of politics. Vladimir Ilyich was mostly limited to useful idiots on the left, Putin's form of violent, authoritarian conservatism and his support for extreme right wing candidates had drawn him a huge following on the right. You can see this unholy alliance at work on virtually any thread touching on Russia. The worst elements of the anti-Western left & the anti-modern right combining to create a threat of remarkable toxicity.

To see these people lining up to support an authoritarian dictator against their own societies is pretty nauseating.

 

I'll tell you what - I really envy your ability to believe everything you read in the mainstream media - which you quite obviously do? Me? I'm much more sceptical, especially in these days of spin, lies, fake news, alternative facts, and routine dissembling of the truth.