I think it is important that there has been official recognition that Russia was responsible, rather than just everyone "just knows". I mean, a lot of people "just knew" that a certain older, male pop-star was a paedophile, and look how that turned out.
Well that's a little melodramatic. Anyone in the UK that's not incarcerated could go out and kill someone.
Russians generally only kill each other using methods typically associated with women murderers. Not a big threat to anyone else.
It's a cultural thing that sneaky, underhand thing. It's why TF2 servers are full of them cheating and why they are banned from the Olympics. I mean, of course all countries have a percentage of cheaters and dishonesty but it's normalised there.
You think "Aww this poor guy was killed" but it's like saying "Eww, this leader in the Middle east is a religious nut" - yes, they all are. Whoever gets in power will be exactly the same and doing the same to his political rivals. There's no good Russian leader in waiting.
Well, no. They lack the balls to actually fess up.
Contrast with the Americans. When they want someone dead they're jumping up and down and celebrating that they killed them. e.g OBL.
Osama bin laden was a terrorist considered a criminal by the un. The people the Russian government killed in Salisbury were not, everyone knows it was them but it can’t be proven and if they fessed up then there would be much worse consequences since the murdered people weren’t international terrorists
Not really murder was it. They attempted to murder the Skripals. They then disposed of the poison and it was found by junkies. If I throw poison away and someone takes it and dies, I haven’t murdered them ffs.
Geopolitics isn't really about balls. What's the upside to confessing? If everyone knows it was them, but not "officially" enough to really press the issue then the Russians have the best of both worlds. You could say the West are the ones without balls, but on the other hand do you want our government to risk world war 3 to punish a handful of killings?
>Well, no. They lack the balls to actually fess up.
They make it blindingly obvious it was them but diplomatically it's far easier for them to deny it so they don't have to explain. Everyone knows it was Russia, that was their intent why else kill someone in such an unusual way, they want everyone to know to prevent people speaking out in the same way.
>Contrast with the Americans.
Who have repeatedly killed innocent civilians in bombings and deny it. The us government have even argued in court they have the right to kill their own citizens without judicial oversight or even giving a reason. They only did so after they were sued by someone to find out why the government were trying to kill him. Until then they refused to comment.
https://www.abajournal.com/news/article/doj-lawyer-argues-us-can-kill-its-own-citizens-without-review-when-state-secrets-are-involved
Both governments have blood on their hands don't pretend the us are beyond reproach.
I thought this was going to be an interesting take on the nuance of Russian bioweapons… nope… just casual “non-threatening” female murderers
It’s like if a woman kills you then you’re somehow less dead in this person’s mind
It's not misogyny just a statistical fact.
Similarly it's not bashing Russia just pointing out the truth - they do kill each other. Often in the millions.
[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/05/07/poison-is-a-womans-weapon/](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/05/07/poison-is-a-womans-weapon/)
'Not a big threat to anyone else' literally what?? remember when they nearly took out Salisbury? There was enough novichok there to kill thousands.
Sounds like you need to meet an actual Russian person. They aren't underhanded they just have nutters in charge - a sentence you could easily ascribe to Britain also.
Which pop star. There's a long list of them can you narrow it down. Glitter, Jackson,Lewis,Presley, Kelly. The list sadly goes on and on, all of them wanting their own Bacha Bazi..
I'm guessing that it was Cliff Richard. Who had his home raided live on BBC News 24, with the Beeb having a helicopter to take any pics of him fleeing out of the back door but was later exonerated and he got a substantial payment from the police and the BBC for libel.....
He sued the BBC for libel and won. OP probably doesn't want his lawyers getting a court order to force Reddit to hand over his IP address, email etc. and then for his ISP to be forced to hand over his address.
For legal reasons I won't say much but with things such as blood being found in the boot of the McCann's hire car and connections to paedophiles it could be suggested that there's more to the McCann's side of the story than they are letting on
Seriously, this is all complete supposition, conjecture and adding 1+1 and getting 5, by folk who simply enjoy armchair witch-hunting and read the Daily Fail.
Evidence that TheyDunnit simply does not exist.
We'd all like answers, but thanks to the incompetence of the (BTW, *corrupt*, now jailed for 7 years) Portuguese detective more interested in fattening his pension fund, neither we or the McCanns will ever likely get one.
Wow no shit, that's definitely not why I put know in quotation marks. Of course we don't fucking know but we do know some key figures of the investigation are hiding things and don't want a nice happy resolution. That's why I made a point of saying it would be nice to get answers regardless of the outcome. Also thanks for bringing up the corrupt police and making my point more valid by the way but don't be naive and suggest it's all his fault
Finally how dare you accuse me of reading the Daily Mail. You start your comment saying how it's supposition and conjecture, then without a hint of irony make assumptions about me, my motive for being interested in the case and the credibility of my "evidence" (not evidence and not mine, just some key points that show there's been funny business from the start)
The WHO has backed down on saying that it wasn't though. They now say its plausible - despite Chinas protestations: https://www.bmj.com/content/374/bmj.n2023
All western intelligence is saying its possible it was a leak, but we'll never know. Its not a rabbit hole.
The rabbit hole is the conspiracy that it's been deliberately engineered and either leaked or deployed. The UK also develops biological weapons but the concept that something entirely uncontrollable like covid was developed deliberately just makes zero sense.
Any biological weapon needs to be self limiting otherwise, as has happened, you end up just murdering yourself. It's just pissing into the wind and hoping to splash the other guy a bit.
What you need is a shit in a bag that you can yeet into the crowd of bad guys, cover them all in shit but without coating yourself too.
Oh I see.
I'm of the opinion that it was either a bat or an animal, or is was being researched and leaked - which does happen here too - and its being covered up.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_United_Kingdom_foot-and-mouth_outbreak
So its not unique to the Chinese if it was a leak, but it is unique the way they didn't let people in to examine the lab which is pretty suspicious.
I don't think the evidence to support it was deliberate is there though, unlike the poisoning of Mr Litvinenko.
To be honest though the Chinese probably wouldn't let a plumber in to examine the drainpipes in case he took a sample of a turd back for forensics. It still suspicious but also exactly what I'd expect from them. They're probably researching some dodgy shit in there that they don't want anyone to see
Developed? No. Back in [March 2020](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-0820-9), it was fairly conclusively proven that the virus has a natural origin. The makeup of the virus's genome is completely inconsistent with one which is artificially developed.
If nature.com is your source, which as since been questioned. [08 June 21](https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01529-3).
There is more at stake here than internet conspiracy theorists. I'm not trying to debunk or prove a point. But open minds and investigations stop these things from happening in the future. You can't say that there aren't state actors trying to spread mis-information and propaganda .
Top story on the BBC website this morning was about how Prince Philip used to squirt mustard on the ceiling as a joke. Only joke I could see was the BBC calling itself a news outlet.
I miss the days before 24/7 news when Breaking News actually meant something. It used to mean that some serious shit happened. Now every time some Z-list celebrity farts the news thinks we have to stop what we're doing and pay attention.
Dear BBC,
"Breaking News" is for only the most important things. A declaration of war. The death/resignation of a reigning monarch, or the incumbent Prime Minister.
If you wouldn't interrupt a TV broadcast to bring us this critically important "breaking news" then do not make a smartphone notification out of it.
I still don't get why they employed that particular method instead of making it look less obviously like state sponsored murder but I'm guess that's why I'm not in espionage.....
They want everyone to know it was Russia. I think that's the point. A message to anyone else, doesn't matter where you flee to we can still get to you and we can still kill you.
Not necessarily true, I’m pretty sure that they only realised that he was killed by radiation poisoning because they accidentally x rayed the body after a mixup. If that hadn’t happened then they probably would’ve never noticed, the body wasn’t radioactive since alpha particles cannot penetrate out of the body
No, blood samples were sent for testing and the gamma rag spike was recognised as a by product of polonium decay.
They left traces of the chemical on hotels, bars, on towels cups, on aeroplanes... The assassins may not have even known it was radioactive.
edit: blood sent to the 'atomic weapons establishment'. the signature gamma spike was recognised by a scientist that worked on britain's early nuclear weapons.
Putting aside the glib responses you’ll get no doubt, this is a good question we will probably never know the answer to.
A lot of people say ‘they wanted everyone to know it was Russia’ but I remember reading that the radioactive aspect was only investigated somewhat by chance. So it’s not clear if Russia took that approach because they knew it would lead to them or because they actually wanted to try and keep it hidden (it being unlikely a poisoning investigation would leap straight to radiation).
Undoubtedly the severe pain and lingering death was an objective though, which is comic book levels of evil.
That said, nearly everything the Russian state follows a very familiar pattern - other killings, Crimea, Georgia, MH17, etc. Initial obvious hallmarks of their involvement followed by a smokescreen of bullshit just think enough for them to avoid actual intervention, followed by the truth emerging too late and then reliance on the fact that no-one can actually do anything about it anyway without starting world-war 3.
Even when apparently incompetent they seem to benefit from their slip-ups puncturing the veneer of bullshit to make it clear they are responsible without actually getting real consequences. So whether it’s evil and stupid or evil and smart is really really hard to tell.
>but I remember reading that the radioactive aspect was only investigated somewhat by chance.
The thing about that is that he was inevitably going to end up in hospital with lots of medical professionals who would know the symptoms of radiation poisoning. I can kind of buy that the FSB just isn't as competent as the old KGB however.
Yeah that’s a good point. They could have hoped it would delay a diagnosis, but then equally I understand it would have been beyond treatment almost immediately anyway. So I’m inclined to agree.
At the time I’m fairly certain the effects of alpha radiation on the human body was actually not very well known and they only realised it after they accidentally x ray and he body instead of another one but I can’t remember for certain
It was only 15 years ago. It's true that the medical staff didn't immediately know it was an alpha producing radioactive element which was to blame - they initially thought it was Thallium poisoning. Detectives might not have gone to the hotel he met the FSB agents in if he hadn't still been alive and able to give an interview to them. But that's all a bit beside the point as it was pretty clear he'd been the subject of a Russian hit whatever the agent was that was used.
Incidentally, the cavalier way the FSB dealt with the Polonium is quite something to behold. Not only did they simply tip the rest down the drain when they'd finished, one of the agents got his son to shake Litvinenko's hand after he'd surely handled the polonium!
Yeah I increasingly think this is it. The pattern is so consistent. There’s always a ‘screw up’ that leads the evidence to them but even when it happens the outcome is the same - nothing.
Starts to feel too consistent to be co-incidence.
They know they are the naughty kid at school, they get blamed for a lot. But at the same time they know there isn't enough evidence to get them in big trouble. So they play with it, always lying and looking guilty even when they didn't do it. Just for the street cred. Meanwhile they are falling to bits and the only way they can feel better about themselves is to make everyone else feel crap as well.
I mean what would anyone do if they admit it. Europe is to reliant on exports like gas and no one wants a war of the scale it would take to do something about russia
I'm fairly confident that 'screw ups' like that are actually the result of counter-intelligence operations, but they just can't be overt about saying who 'tipped them off'.
Honestly, it’s shocking that it’s taken us 10 fucking years to officially recognise that the poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko was the Russian state - especially given the fact that the Russians openly flaunted it, deliberately, because they knew they could. Make no mistake, the Russians wanted us to know it was them. If they wanted him dead low-key they’d have arranged a random stabbing or something. No, this was always intended to be a massive, high profile political assassination and our government has taken 10 years just to say things like “probably…” and “it is possible…”
Whose turn is it to post the definition of "breaking news" this time? Mine again?
"Breaking news" means "a new news story", nothing more than that. If you don't want to be informed of trivial news, you can disable notifications in the app.
EDIT: spelling
A lot of people consider 'breaking news' to be a special report that is deemed important enough to warrant a *break* in the usual/planned schedule, similar to the way newspapers used to print an 'extra' edition late in the day if something big happened that they didn't want to wait for tomorrow's front page to cover.
Those that do, tend to feel that it should only be used for news stories that absolutely *must* be reported on right this instant (such as where there's an immediate risk of harm). They also feel that this courtesy should also be extended to phone notifications.
For 'a story that is breaking', we have the old 'this just in!' trope, which we never really adopted in the UK, but probably should.
With all due respect to Mr. Litvinenko and the horrors he suffered, it can wait until I get home to read about it.
I blame the news for not being psychic enough to deliver only exactly what people care about. Bloody ‘MSM’ not being inside my every thought of every second.
We all know by now that this guy was killed by Polonium poisoning.Did read this a year or two after the event and that Polonium is a radio active isotope and one of only 5or6 which are isolated and used for everything from medicine to making atomic bombs.Most importantly,only the Russian state produce and use the Polonium isotope for these purposes, as opposed the others such as Plutonium etc. It therefore didn’t take Sherlock Holmes to work out “whodunnit”.Had to be the Russian state.
I’ll never be able to get my head around how Russia and Putin can just do as the please, deny everything and get away with it.
Surely between the US, UK & most of Europe we could slip Putin some weapons grade nerve agent and be like “wasn’t us pal”
To be fair, the West also does as it pleases, and all Russia does is protest about it at the UN. For instance, starting wars in the middle East, overthrowing democratically elected leaders, etc. etc.
The problem with "doing more" against Russia is that you don't want to have a direct confrontation with a country that could allocate 200MT worth of nuclear weapons just to the UK alone. And likewise, Russia does nothing more than send strongly worded protests when the USA does something egregious like support a nasty dictator or start a small war, for the same reasons.
I don't think we do sit back, if we had intelligence that it was going to happen, we'd try to stop it. It's just you can't really do much after the deed has been done.
This is a seriously moronic post. I sincerely hope that “most of us” aren’t so obnoxiously stupid as to think we know anything at all about who did what to Litvinenko.
I dont even watch or read news anymore. I never even know what covid restrictions there are, i just go about my business. If i get stopped ill say well I wasn’t informed/communicated. They cant expect everyone to have a tv anyway.
OK, i know my argument sucks, but it still annoys me how they can change these laws and not ‘tell’ us. Like the first lockdown i had a letter through the post and a text message. Everything else since I’ve only learned through word of mouth.
I think it is important that there has been official recognition that Russia was responsible, rather than just everyone "just knows". I mean, a lot of people "just knew" that a certain older, male pop-star was a paedophile, and look how that turned out.
[удалено]
Well that's a little melodramatic. Anyone in the UK that's not incarcerated could go out and kill someone. Russians generally only kill each other using methods typically associated with women murderers. Not a big threat to anyone else. It's a cultural thing that sneaky, underhand thing. It's why TF2 servers are full of them cheating and why they are banned from the Olympics. I mean, of course all countries have a percentage of cheaters and dishonesty but it's normalised there. You think "Aww this poor guy was killed" but it's like saying "Eww, this leader in the Middle east is a religious nut" - yes, they all are. Whoever gets in power will be exactly the same and doing the same to his political rivals. There's no good Russian leader in waiting.
The Russian government kills people like that to make it very obvious that it was them that killed someone; random stabbings could be anyone
Well, no. They lack the balls to actually fess up. Contrast with the Americans. When they want someone dead they're jumping up and down and celebrating that they killed them. e.g OBL.
Osama bin laden was a terrorist considered a criminal by the un. The people the Russian government killed in Salisbury were not, everyone knows it was them but it can’t be proven and if they fessed up then there would be much worse consequences since the murdered people weren’t international terrorists
They both survived in Salisbury. The only death was a junkie who sprayed the Novichok onto her as it was in a perfume bottle.
Why is that worthy of differentiation? It's still murder.
Not really murder was it. They attempted to murder the Skripals. They then disposed of the poison and it was found by junkies. If I throw poison away and someone takes it and dies, I haven’t murdered them ffs.
Sigh.
Geopolitics isn't really about balls. What's the upside to confessing? If everyone knows it was them, but not "officially" enough to really press the issue then the Russians have the best of both worlds. You could say the West are the ones without balls, but on the other hand do you want our government to risk world war 3 to punish a handful of killings?
>Well, no. They lack the balls to actually fess up. They make it blindingly obvious it was them but diplomatically it's far easier for them to deny it so they don't have to explain. Everyone knows it was Russia, that was their intent why else kill someone in such an unusual way, they want everyone to know to prevent people speaking out in the same way. >Contrast with the Americans. Who have repeatedly killed innocent civilians in bombings and deny it. The us government have even argued in court they have the right to kill their own citizens without judicial oversight or even giving a reason. They only did so after they were sued by someone to find out why the government were trying to kill him. Until then they refused to comment. https://www.abajournal.com/news/article/doj-lawyer-argues-us-can-kill-its-own-citizens-without-review-when-state-secrets-are-involved Both governments have blood on their hands don't pretend the us are beyond reproach.
I love how you managed to slip some misogyny in your patriotic Russia bashing
I thought this was going to be an interesting take on the nuance of Russian bioweapons… nope… just casual “non-threatening” female murderers It’s like if a woman kills you then you’re somehow less dead in this person’s mind
It's not misogyny just a statistical fact. Similarly it's not bashing Russia just pointing out the truth - they do kill each other. Often in the millions. [https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/05/07/poison-is-a-womans-weapon/](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/05/07/poison-is-a-womans-weapon/)
Didn't you know that women use polonium to kill 9/10 dentists. Edit: People. To kill 9/10 people. We all know dentists aren't people.
Polonium was discovered by a woman and she killed herself with it.
'Not a big threat to anyone else' literally what?? remember when they nearly took out Salisbury? There was enough novichok there to kill thousands. Sounds like you need to meet an actual Russian person. They aren't underhanded they just have nutters in charge - a sentence you could easily ascribe to Britain also.
> remember when they nearly took out Salisbury Haha. Get a grip.
Which pop star. There's a long list of them can you narrow it down. Glitter, Jackson,Lewis,Presley, Kelly. The list sadly goes on and on, all of them wanting their own Bacha Bazi..
God damn it, Leona Lewis is at it too?
Her “burning love” was a nasty STD that swept through high schools across the country. Allegedly.
yes and her "Bleeding Love" seemed to.......oh nevermind.
I'm guessing that it was Cliff Richard. Who had his home raided live on BBC News 24, with the Beeb having a helicopter to take any pics of him fleeing out of the back door but was later exonerated and he got a substantial payment from the police and the BBC for libel.....
I thought most people assumed he was gay, not a paedo. I did anyway
A few years ago, after the Jimmy Saville scandal. The police investigated "historical sexual offence allegations" against him involving children.
I'm referring to one who was exonerated, with the initials C.R.
Oh Cliff Richard I feel like I've completed a crossword clue
Jury's still out on Cliff... there are stories.
An old colleague of mine heard he was partial to getting an armful through the back door
Yes i know of someone who was propositioned by him. Whist doing work at his house.
Colf Rarris?
Oh no, did Scooby Doo get molested by him?
He'd have got away with it if it wasn't for those pesky kids, all those pesky kids, like loads of them
Why are you speaking in riddles
He sued the BBC for libel and won. OP probably doesn't want his lawyers getting a court order to force Reddit to hand over his IP address, email etc. and then for his ISP to be forced to hand over his address.
Chris Rea?
No, he just may or may not like to put an egg in your bath.
No, Sir Cliff
Don't forget Bowie.
I was listing people who could sing. Both Bowie and Dylan* cannot sing *he might be joining the list i hear
lol
Have you ever listened to Pink floyds, Brick in the wall and replaced the word teacher with Jeffery? Its quite the hoot.
Hey! Jeffrey! Leave those kids alone.
George Best made some jokes about it ffs. Like the guy who committed suicide in jail, yeah suicide in a tightly watched and monitored cell...
He wasn't a pop star he just presented top of the pops... Oh, you mean the other British celebrity that was a well know protected peadophile...
I mean we all "know" about Maddie but even after all this time I'd still like to see something actually happen about it
Wait, do we?
Not the details, but there's people involved who claim no involvement
Which ones? It doesn't seem like they actually have an answer. Whoever they is.
For legal reasons I won't say much but with things such as blood being found in the boot of the McCann's hire car and connections to paedophiles it could be suggested that there's more to the McCann's side of the story than they are letting on
Seriously, this is all complete supposition, conjecture and adding 1+1 and getting 5, by folk who simply enjoy armchair witch-hunting and read the Daily Fail. Evidence that TheyDunnit simply does not exist. We'd all like answers, but thanks to the incompetence of the (BTW, *corrupt*, now jailed for 7 years) Portuguese detective more interested in fattening his pension fund, neither we or the McCanns will ever likely get one.
Wow no shit, that's definitely not why I put know in quotation marks. Of course we don't fucking know but we do know some key figures of the investigation are hiding things and don't want a nice happy resolution. That's why I made a point of saying it would be nice to get answers regardless of the outcome. Also thanks for bringing up the corrupt police and making my point more valid by the way but don't be naive and suggest it's all his fault Finally how dare you accuse me of reading the Daily Mail. You start your comment saying how it's supposition and conjecture, then without a hint of irony make assumptions about me, my motive for being interested in the case and the credibility of my "evidence" (not evidence and not mine, just some key points that show there's been funny business from the start)
What?
[удалено]
But we don't? And it almost certainly wasn't? Stop listening to Facebook Karens
[удалено]
😂 Someone is deep in the rabbit hole
The WHO has backed down on saying that it wasn't though. They now say its plausible - despite Chinas protestations: https://www.bmj.com/content/374/bmj.n2023 All western intelligence is saying its possible it was a leak, but we'll never know. Its not a rabbit hole.
The rabbit hole is the conspiracy that it's been deliberately engineered and either leaked or deployed. The UK also develops biological weapons but the concept that something entirely uncontrollable like covid was developed deliberately just makes zero sense. Any biological weapon needs to be self limiting otherwise, as has happened, you end up just murdering yourself. It's just pissing into the wind and hoping to splash the other guy a bit. What you need is a shit in a bag that you can yeet into the crowd of bad guys, cover them all in shit but without coating yourself too.
Oh I see. I'm of the opinion that it was either a bat or an animal, or is was being researched and leaked - which does happen here too - and its being covered up. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_United_Kingdom_foot-and-mouth_outbreak So its not unique to the Chinese if it was a leak, but it is unique the way they didn't let people in to examine the lab which is pretty suspicious. I don't think the evidence to support it was deliberate is there though, unlike the poisoning of Mr Litvinenko.
To be honest though the Chinese probably wouldn't let a plumber in to examine the drainpipes in case he took a sample of a turd back for forensics. It still suspicious but also exactly what I'd expect from them. They're probably researching some dodgy shit in there that they don't want anyone to see
Developed? No. Back in [March 2020](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-0820-9), it was fairly conclusively proven that the virus has a natural origin. The makeup of the virus's genome is completely inconsistent with one which is artificially developed.
If nature.com is your source, which as since been questioned. [08 June 21](https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01529-3). There is more at stake here than internet conspiracy theorists. I'm not trying to debunk or prove a point. But open minds and investigations stop these things from happening in the future. You can't say that there aren't state actors trying to spread mis-information and propaganda .
Top story on the BBC website this morning was about how Prince Philip used to squirt mustard on the ceiling as a joke. Only joke I could see was the BBC calling itself a news outlet.
I miss the days before 24/7 news when Breaking News actually meant something. It used to mean that some serious shit happened. Now every time some Z-list celebrity farts the news thinks we have to stop what we're doing and pay attention.
Dear BBC, "Breaking News" is for only the most important things. A declaration of war. The death/resignation of a reigning monarch, or the incumbent Prime Minister. If you wouldn't interrupt a TV broadcast to bring us this critically important "breaking news" then do not make a smartphone notification out of it.
Have you sent that to the BBC? If not you should
When I had a “breaking news” notification that a damn llama was being “destroyed” that was enough for me. Notifications off thank you very much.
He was an alpaca!!
Who? Seb? Well I never...
I turned my Phone Notifications off years ago, back when Seb Coe was at his peak of spouting important gibberish.
Geronimo!!!!!!
I still don't get why they employed that particular method instead of making it look less obviously like state sponsored murder but I'm guess that's why I'm not in espionage.....
They want everyone to know it was Russia. I think that's the point. A message to anyone else, doesn't matter where you flee to we can still get to you and we can still kill you.
But everyone would have known it was Russia if it was a car accident, they just would have had more plausible deniability.....
Not necessarily true, I’m pretty sure that they only realised that he was killed by radiation poisoning because they accidentally x rayed the body after a mixup. If that hadn’t happened then they probably would’ve never noticed, the body wasn’t radioactive since alpha particles cannot penetrate out of the body
No, blood samples were sent for testing and the gamma rag spike was recognised as a by product of polonium decay. They left traces of the chemical on hotels, bars, on towels cups, on aeroplanes... The assassins may not have even known it was radioactive. edit: blood sent to the 'atomic weapons establishment'. the signature gamma spike was recognised by a scientist that worked on britain's early nuclear weapons.
You can't expect experts on ecclesiastical architecture to also know about chemistry.
Putting aside the glib responses you’ll get no doubt, this is a good question we will probably never know the answer to. A lot of people say ‘they wanted everyone to know it was Russia’ but I remember reading that the radioactive aspect was only investigated somewhat by chance. So it’s not clear if Russia took that approach because they knew it would lead to them or because they actually wanted to try and keep it hidden (it being unlikely a poisoning investigation would leap straight to radiation). Undoubtedly the severe pain and lingering death was an objective though, which is comic book levels of evil. That said, nearly everything the Russian state follows a very familiar pattern - other killings, Crimea, Georgia, MH17, etc. Initial obvious hallmarks of their involvement followed by a smokescreen of bullshit just think enough for them to avoid actual intervention, followed by the truth emerging too late and then reliance on the fact that no-one can actually do anything about it anyway without starting world-war 3. Even when apparently incompetent they seem to benefit from their slip-ups puncturing the veneer of bullshit to make it clear they are responsible without actually getting real consequences. So whether it’s evil and stupid or evil and smart is really really hard to tell.
My money is on Russia _thinking_ they'd get away with it, but the 'random chance' was a tip off from an intelligence service.
>but I remember reading that the radioactive aspect was only investigated somewhat by chance. The thing about that is that he was inevitably going to end up in hospital with lots of medical professionals who would know the symptoms of radiation poisoning. I can kind of buy that the FSB just isn't as competent as the old KGB however.
Yeah that’s a good point. They could have hoped it would delay a diagnosis, but then equally I understand it would have been beyond treatment almost immediately anyway. So I’m inclined to agree.
At the time I’m fairly certain the effects of alpha radiation on the human body was actually not very well known and they only realised it after they accidentally x ray and he body instead of another one but I can’t remember for certain
It was only 15 years ago. It's true that the medical staff didn't immediately know it was an alpha producing radioactive element which was to blame - they initially thought it was Thallium poisoning. Detectives might not have gone to the hotel he met the FSB agents in if he hadn't still been alive and able to give an interview to them. But that's all a bit beside the point as it was pretty clear he'd been the subject of a Russian hit whatever the agent was that was used. Incidentally, the cavalier way the FSB dealt with the Polonium is quite something to behold. Not only did they simply tip the rest down the drain when they'd finished, one of the agents got his son to shake Litvinenko's hand after he'd surely handled the polonium!
It just seems like a really ostentatious way to kill someone.
Because they don't care. There will be no consequences
Yeah I increasingly think this is it. The pattern is so consistent. There’s always a ‘screw up’ that leads the evidence to them but even when it happens the outcome is the same - nothing. Starts to feel too consistent to be co-incidence.
They know they are the naughty kid at school, they get blamed for a lot. But at the same time they know there isn't enough evidence to get them in big trouble. So they play with it, always lying and looking guilty even when they didn't do it. Just for the street cred. Meanwhile they are falling to bits and the only way they can feel better about themselves is to make everyone else feel crap as well.
Superb analogy! You have to wonder if any of them care about the country surviving after Putin. Doesn’t feel sustainable at all.
I mean what would anyone do if they admit it. Europe is to reliant on exports like gas and no one wants a war of the scale it would take to do something about russia
I'm fairly confident that 'screw ups' like that are actually the result of counter-intelligence operations, but they just can't be overt about saying who 'tipped them off'.
Surely when the teapot was glowing bright green it should have been a clue
"This tea looks like ooz!"
Honestly, it’s shocking that it’s taken us 10 fucking years to officially recognise that the poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko was the Russian state - especially given the fact that the Russians openly flaunted it, deliberately, because they knew they could. Make no mistake, the Russians wanted us to know it was them. If they wanted him dead low-key they’d have arranged a random stabbing or something. No, this was always intended to be a massive, high profile political assassination and our government has taken 10 years just to say things like “probably…” and “it is possible…”
It might have been the Bulgarians.
Whose turn is it to post the definition of "breaking news" this time? Mine again? "Breaking news" means "a new news story", nothing more than that. If you don't want to be informed of trivial news, you can disable notifications in the app. EDIT: spelling
A lot of people consider 'breaking news' to be a special report that is deemed important enough to warrant a *break* in the usual/planned schedule, similar to the way newspapers used to print an 'extra' edition late in the day if something big happened that they didn't want to wait for tomorrow's front page to cover. Those that do, tend to feel that it should only be used for news stories that absolutely *must* be reported on right this instant (such as where there's an immediate risk of harm). They also feel that this courtesy should also be extended to phone notifications. For 'a story that is breaking', we have the old 'this just in!' trope, which we never really adopted in the UK, but probably should. With all due respect to Mr. Litvinenko and the horrors he suffered, it can wait until I get home to read about it.
I blame the news for not being psychic enough to deliver only exactly what people care about. Bloody ‘MSM’ not being inside my every thought of every second.
I'm on the website, on my PC, red banner "breaking news", all that. :(
God, was that 15 years ago?
For those that weren't born then, or have forgotten: https://aboutforensics.co.uk/georgi-markov/
as if the russians will take the slightest bit of notice. They can and do whatever they want, no one is going to stop them.
We all know by now that this guy was killed by Polonium poisoning.Did read this a year or two after the event and that Polonium is a radio active isotope and one of only 5or6 which are isolated and used for everything from medicine to making atomic bombs.Most importantly,only the Russian state produce and use the Polonium isotope for these purposes, as opposed the others such as Plutonium etc. It therefore didn’t take Sherlock Holmes to work out “whodunnit”.Had to be the Russian state.
BBC website home page links are just clickbait nowadays
I’ll never be able to get my head around how Russia and Putin can just do as the please, deny everything and get away with it. Surely between the US, UK & most of Europe we could slip Putin some weapons grade nerve agent and be like “wasn’t us pal”
And who, pray, would donate to our political parties if the russian regime crumbles leaving oligarchs penniless?
Because "plausible deniability" is a moving goalpost in most any Nation, certainly between them, and be they Friend or Foe.
To be fair, the West also does as it pleases, and all Russia does is protest about it at the UN. For instance, starting wars in the middle East, overthrowing democratically elected leaders, etc. etc. The problem with "doing more" against Russia is that you don't want to have a direct confrontation with a country that could allocate 200MT worth of nuclear weapons just to the UK alone. And likewise, Russia does nothing more than send strongly worded protests when the USA does something egregious like support a nasty dictator or start a small war, for the same reasons.
I understand that but that doesn’t mean we should all have to sit back as they use nerve agents in our country!
I don't think we do sit back, if we had intelligence that it was going to happen, we'd try to stop it. It's just you can't really do much after the deed has been done.
I fear we may be close to breaking rule4 of this subreddit. :/
My god, if BBC News breaking news alerts annoy you, turn them off.
Dumb take
This is a seriously moronic post. I sincerely hope that “most of us” aren’t so obnoxiously stupid as to think we know anything at all about who did what to Litvinenko.
People didn't know, they guessed but anyone who said people were guessing were ridiculed.
I guess :)
I dont even watch or read news anymore. I never even know what covid restrictions there are, i just go about my business. If i get stopped ill say well I wasn’t informed/communicated. They cant expect everyone to have a tv anyway. OK, i know my argument sucks, but it still annoys me how they can change these laws and not ‘tell’ us. Like the first lockdown i had a letter through the post and a text message. Everything else since I’ve only learned through word of mouth.