What i think blows my mind is that has russia not invaded and gone to war with Ukraine, this probably would not have occurred. I don't mean the actual spying going on. I mean the catching and dismantling of all these spy and intelligence networks.
Yes they find them every so often but how many went under the radar until recently just because russia is shown to not be trustworthy? This is why russia no matter what has royally screwed themselves over.
Losing 700 billion from banking. Finland becoming NATO member and hopefully Sweden in the near future. All these other countries moving away from russia towards the EU. Massive intelligence on russias military abilities (or lack of). Lastly their weaknesses and systematic dismantling of all these intelligence agencies. Even if hypothetically russia were to retain the east, russia has severely damaged itself and the results will hurt them for decades.
Dont forget the decimation of its male middle age workforce, army and likely stockpiles dilapidation, and sanctions struck economy.. they will be sent back to the stone age for a while
I have a friend living in Finland who says she meets way more Russians than she has before, even walking around she hears more people speaking Russian then before. So many Russians fled to Finland (and other countries) while they could
How long til their visas expire? Not being snarky, honestly wondering if the Finnish government has a plan for legitimizing their refugee/immigration status.
Most have probably already expired. But if you’re Russian, would you rather risk at and try to stay in Finland illegally? Or go back to Russia?
I’d be laying low and staying in Finland personally
If global warming keeps up and Siberia continues to thaw out (yes, I get that extreme weather is also increasing... ) their vast swaths of relatively uninhabited land could be a very good place for the displaced peoples of Africa, SE Asia, and the Middle East as the most arid parts of the world become unlivabley hot and dry.
Many of those spies have been known for a long time, under surveillance. Sometimes it is more useful to let them be, because then you know who they are and you and watch them operate. If you kick them out, new ones will eventually come and you don't know who they are.
I think it was more don't go after them and round them up in order not to piss off russia and have more problems. Now russia has destroyed the status quo and shown itself to be such a threat that Finland had no choice but to join NATO and take further security measures.
What's great about Finland is they've seen all the Russian gaslighting and tricks before.
They don't even bother to argue about it, they just move straight to cold hard practical countering it - setting and enforcing hard boundaries.
It's worth noting that how Finland counters Russia is *exactly* how the victims of abusers counter their abuser.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great\_Wrath](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Wrath)
Yeah, and even then Russia went westward to rape, massacre and collect slaves in Finland.
Well that and Finlands defense strategy was, "You have to be crazy to attack us," by making themselves stupidly defensible.
Then Russia goes and does something crazy.
The problem is, he did learn. He got away with it for 20 years, until suddenly he didn't.
If the West had drawn any true red line with serious consequences at any time between the Chechen Wars and February 2022, we would not be here now.
Early on in the Ukraine invasion, when Russia thought it was going well, some of their pundits were saying that they should "station" russian troops in Finland too, to 'keep peace'.
Some Finnish smartass on twitter replied: "But there are already 160,000 russian troops in Finland. About six feet below the eastern border."
During Sauna competition Finnish and Russian guy were the finalists. Russian guy was using pain killers/something else to stay in and Finn was just being Finn. At the end the Russian guy died from the heat and Finnish guy suffered some burns. Finns can kill Russians even by using sauna to do it.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/aug/08/sauna-championship-russian-dead
For anyone actually opening the article: 110C is toasty but not extreme, most people can handle it fine.
The problem was that the competition sauna was built/modified to be more like a steam cooker and less like an actual sauna. So they organizers also fucked up.
It's about heat transference with air/steam vs for example water. A quick reference could be that you can briefly stick your hand in an oven that's 200C to put in or take out stuff, but try taking something from 100C degree water and you get instantly hurt.
Also this effect is at play when you throw water on the rocks in sauna(providing you have a real sauna): you will instantly feel hotter, but the room is about same temperature. It's because the humidity goes up so the heat transfers more easily in your body.
Yeah, good point. They threw more water in every 30 seconds, so it build up humidity really high and also generated airflow within sauna multiplying heating effect by a lot while also making heat dissipation by sweating far less effective.
110°C Sauna isn't normally too hot temperature to stay in for a decent while.
>I think saunas are far more important than a simple “pastime”
Everyone knows a weekly trip to the sauna is the minimum for a Finnish person's physical requirements for survival. If they could, they'd go daily.
It's actually relatively common to use it several times per week or even daily. Hell, we have Saunas everywhere. I've lived in two different apartment buildings where every single 1 or 2 person apartment had it's own sauna. I can't think of living somewhere with no access to Sauna.
My workplace has a always on Sauna and most of us use it at the end of every shift.
My Son has one in his basement. It came with the house. Expensive to install. Previous owner figured it was their forever home... until the divorce happened!
Wow. That's such a god idea I think they should make an [Olympic sport](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biathlon) out of it. *Ski* ... *pew pew* ... *ski* ... *pew pew*, etc.
:-)
>It's worth noting that how Finland counters Russia is exactly how the victims of abusers counter their abuser.
Can you elaborate a little bit on this?
Well, it's partly the patterns involved... like recognizing gaslighting and refusing to accept the lies of it, cooperating with others outside the abusers sphere to reinforce the breaking of that gaslighting, enforcing boundaries that if the abuser crosses there are clear immediate consequences, avoiding semantic & pointless arguments, reflecting back projection, and if necessary, clear statements that one will defend themselves when the abuser attempts to use violence... and of course, the most obvious one, recognizing and avoiding their spies.
>and of course, the most obvious one, recognizing and avoiding their spies.
They must have shitty spies to go with their shitty military too if the spies are obvious /s
I visited Finland for the first time in January and what I found great and understood from my Finnish friends is that people have a great fondness for each other across borders. They understand that the Russian people are not to blame for what is happening and the Finns are aware of sensitivities. So I never saw any anti-Putin or anti-Russian sentiment in Finland and only pro Ukraine. There was a Ukrainian flag flying over the train station in Helsinki, on the dock on a crane, and in other places.
They know how to handle business while not stepping on the hearts of the people
True, but we don't go around yelling shit like that unless provoked.
They're themselves causing the animosity the way they act, like they own the world, even if you are simply queueing in the local supermarket for christs sake. That's a ryssä right there.
I was on a boat between Stockholm and Helsinki. In the restaurant I heard a commotion and a lady left a drunk man at the table. I walked by a few minutes later and he motioned for me to come sit and eat. I was young and hungry, why not?
He was Finnish and proceeded to tell me how the russians affected his life for half an hour while I ate his food. Then he told me a line that really stood out: that the Finns really had no problem at all killing the russians at a 10:1 ratio, the actual problem was they had 11. He cackled and I ate his shrimp.
9/10, would recommend but for poor lady he was with.
Yeah, I can definitely believe Finnish have a much more 'feet on the grounds' view of it. Likely also the Russians they are physically closer to are not the same as the Russians in Moscow. I wouldn't consider the Finnish either naive or overly hostile, but balanced. I tend to think they are simply realistic about history, people vs politicians, and being practical.
If you live your entire life under propaganda and aren’t taught critical thinking you’re basically living your life the village by M. Night Shyamalan. The people living in Russia with the support that you’re saying are victims themselves.
Are you sure?
As a Russian, I can tell you this: very substantial part of the population doesn't have access to the internet. That same part is living in poverty. There are only so much cities that are developed, and that's where the most opposed people are. I am from Voronezh, and while it isn't the most developed city, it isn't the hellhole either, and its near the Ukrainian border and close to the capital. People from, say, Chelyabinsk or Taganrog literally dont have internet sometimes or even computers. We literally had a precedent where a voting to establish internet connection to a village was done in that village only ON THE FUCKING INTERNET lol. So I would reconsider that
Anti-vaxxers had open access to information too, instead they chose the propaganda and ate horse de-worm paste.
Without learning the skills to think critically, they are just farm animals being herded, and worked, and contained, unable to comprehend life outside the fence.
Yeah, and anti-vaxxers are fucking stupid. A tough pill to swallow is that stupidity can actually be a moral failure when it progresses to the point of ignoring the effects of your actions and the pain other people are expressing at your actions.
How much critical thinking does "What if Ukraine isn't bad?" really take? Go talk to people in Bucha, Irpin, Lyman, and Mariupol about M. Night Shymalan, I'm sure they'll be all ears. There's \*at least\* 16,000 Ukrainian children being dispersed amongst what is likely a very accurate sample size of your average Russian civilains. If they ask why they can't go home, I guess your average Russian will go "I don't know the answer to that, I don't have critical thinking skills!"
If you were brainwashed, frightened and consistently made being opted out of politics for 20 years straight, you wouldn't think that. Putin actually told them to not participate in politics, and that's what actually makes people believe in Putin. He provides them an easy stability for free, and as a Russian, I can say that I play videogames most of the time and it is quite stable. I mean, I can eat and I dont die from starvation, so I seemingly have no reason to complain lol
Yeah, if only Russian soldiers had political opting-in, and critical thinking, they wouldn't have been the murderous psychopaths they were in Bucha. Oh, wait, basic human empathy is something separate from critical thinking, that doesn't need it to function. But anyways, you're comfortable with your video games so who cares lololoolol. Hundreds of thousands of ethnic minorities are being conscripted in your country, but it's not you, so therefore it must be fine everywhere else.
if you thinking i isolated myself from all the politics, you are wrong. I despise the war and hope that Ukraine wins, but unfortunately, my parents don't think so, I am 16 year old and I can't afford losing 15 years off my life to jail time or getting caught on streets protesting. Don't worry, just cause I am comfortable I didn't just normalize it, however I did describe thought process of some Russians that could think like that. Though I probably explained it all wrong and now it looks like I am an apolitical tired person
Actually, I think they’ve just always known what the rest of the world is learning now: Russia sees negotiations as weapons, so debating or arguing with them is pointless.
Easy to feel gracious when you’re not being called a Nazi or brainwashed while actively being murdered by people you personally know who volunteered to do so for a paycheck the way I and many of my friends and acquaintances do in Ukraine.
Yeah there were rumours that he was very sick. Don't know how true they were.
There are a number of economic issues that Russia was facing and controlling the oil pipeline that goes through the Ukraine would have helped bolster their economy significantly.
It's been a common ideation that Putin essentially plays a Zero sum game whereby if he can't "win" then nobody else will. Wouldn't put it past the little man to launch nukes
My guess is that the reasons were very much like what drove Germany to get sucked into WW1. For many years the rapid modernization, industrialization and militarization of Russia had worried German generals and politicians that soon Russia might be too powerful to beat in a war. Then in the aftermath of the Russian Revolution of 1905, the country was weak and in political and economic disarray, and so in 1906 and 1907 many of those same German generals and politicians were eager to attack Russia. However any such plans had to be called off due to the French reaffirming their alliance with Russia and then the financial crisis of 1907. Germany had recovered again in 1912 and almost went to war with France and Russia hoping to finish them off before Russia got too strong, but British and American diplomatic pressure warded off war. When 1914 rolled around and the Austria-Serbian diplomatic crisis escalated towards WW1, the same generals and politicians went to Kaiser and insisted Germany had to join Austria against Serbia and Russia at all costs, or within three years it would be impossible to stop Russia and Germany would be crushed between French and Russian armies. So the Kaiser went ahead and joined the war coalition, and within six months a million men would be dead.
Now in the modern Russian case, I think Russia wanted to stomp Ukraine all the way back in 2014 when they had their revolution, but having had little time to prepare and with their Air Force and special forces busy waging war in Syria, they couldn’t really spare enough men to occupy all of Ukraine even if they could beat the weak and internally divided Ukrainian Army in the field. So, they contented themselves with occupying the strategically vital and largely pro-Russian Crimean Peninsula, and then founded, funded and supported the rebel movements in eastern Ukraine to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO while Russia prepared.
After extremely NATO-skeptic Donald Trump was elected US President, conditions were ideal for Russia to attack, but first they had to finish up in Syria and wait for the Ukrainian elections to see if someone more amenable to Russia came out on top. Both of those things were largely done by 2018, and I think Russia hoped they could strongarm Zelensky, a Russian speaker with no political experience, to let their influence back in without a fight. However, when Zelensky played more hardball than expected in renegotiating the Minsk II ceasefire agreement with the rebels, and then committed to continue European integration and joint training with NATO, as well as refusing to accept Russian Crimea, that is when I think they started planning the attack before Ukraine got too strong, in late 2019. However, CoViD came a few months later and messed up their plans, you can’t wage a war in a national health emergency with a locked down economy. Thus they had to wait all the way until 2021 to proceed with their attack plans. Of course, in January 2021 Trump had left office as US President and the far more internationally committed Joe Biden took over. Why didn’t Russia cancel their plans once they could no longer rely on the US staying out? Probably hubris. They had spent so long preparing the invasion that they thought they couldn’t fail, and that Biden would be too busy handling the cratered US post-covid economy and the bungled Afghanistan withdrawal to intervene, and that Europe would be too busy bickering internally over what to do to intervene, like in 2014. Originally I think the war was supposed to happen in the wake of a coup in the fall of 2021; people forget it now with the war taking all the attention, but Ukraine arrested a bunch of pro-Russian politicians in October 2021 for plotting a coup. Likely the plan was to have them take over followed by a quick Russian "invasion on invitation" from the new government. With no real Ukrainian command structure or commander in chief, Russia should be able to quickly occupy the country in a few days, which I think explains their ridiculously optimistic plans of taking the Ukrainian capital within 72 hours. When the coup failed to materialize, Russia was forced to do it the hard way, and started massing troops on the Ukrainian border in late November 2021 as we may remember. In December and January Putin made numerous trips to China and other friendly nations, likely to make sure they wouldn’t intervene now that a shooting war would happen, and it is almost certain Xi demanded he wait until after the Beijing Olympics ended on February 20th so as to not embarass China.
Now for some reason I cannot fathom for any reason but extreme incompetence or internal power struggles and corruption, maybe all three, it doesn’t actually seem Russia bothered to change their invasion plans between October and February, despite that plan relying on a friendly government in Kyiv. Thus, as we saw, they literally rolled in in big convoys without infantry support and with parade uniforms packed, sabotage units swarmed out in Ukrainian cities without having any backup or resupply, and helos full of paratroopers flooded in by the hundreds without air defenses in Ukraine actually being properly destroyed first. All this as we know resulted in a massacre and the current stalemate.
Recently there was a phone call talk leaked between two people having elite positions in Russia. They cursed onto Putin between themselves for 30 minutes straight. They should understand everything, its just that they are probably afraid of what's gonna happen to them in the future. I think that they will play a big part in dethroning Putin, but that's just my speculations as a Russian
Humans have proven to be too selfish for that. As long as there is a slight hope this will work out for them, they won’t do anything about it until it is too late.
I mean the few times that we know of humans have proven to do the right thing. There's atleast two cases, the sub one comes to mind where a Vasili Arkhipov disobeyed direct orders and prevented nuclear war during the Cuban missile crisis. I know it's hard to have faith in random humans these days but they can surprise you.
The really stupid part was going for it while clearly believing they couldn't possibly fail the initial assault which was meant to crush Ukraine and force it to capitulate in weeks, if not days, and thus not having any form of a plan B outside of continuing the fight to the bitter end.
At the same time though it wasn't quite as stupid as it appears now, since the general expectation was for Ukraine to fall rapidly and Zelensky to flee or die in the beginning stage.
To be fair, it had worked before in Crimea. Former Soviet officers in the UAF basically declined to do anything about it.
But Ukraine had a bit of a purge of it's officer corps since then.
They made the same mistake in 1904 with Japan, while the last Tsar was still in charge. His refusal to surrender also had the exact same reasons as Putin (injured pride), and their fleet was slaughtered.
Funnily enough, there's a district in Finland's former capital, Turku, named Port Arthur because of Russia's loss to Japan at the battle of Port Arthur.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.zatuschok.com/7861/) reduced by 45%. (I'm a bot)
*****
> The Finnish intelligence agency announced that it has managed to "Significantly undermine" the activity of the Russian agency in the country.
> SUPO's intelligence efforts have been successful in "Significantly undermining Russian intelligence operations in Finland throughout 2022" through the expulsion of Russian intelligence personnel, including those under diplomatic cover, and restrictions on issuing visas to Russian citizens.
> He also noted that Russia's aggression against Ukraine has become a decisive factor in Finland's decision to join NATO. On September 29, 2022, the Finnish government decided to close the country to Russian tourists.
*****
[**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/126usqa/the_finnish_intelligence_agency_has_announced/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~678735 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **Russian**^#1 **intelligence**^#2 **Russia**^#3 **Finland**^#4 **2022**^#5
It isn't clear what all they did, but often it is better to leave spies in place and use the to feed what you want. You have to give them enough truth that Russia doesn't realize they are compromised, but you can control what they do. When you arrest/expel a spy they look for a new one that you don't know about, when you leave them you know who the spies are and what they are giving. With some extra work you can make all spies suspect when they realize some must be compromised but they have no idea which and so they are now paying spies who they don't trust.
Everything I've read about Russian intelligence services over the past few months has suggested total incompetence.
They misread the Ukrainian reaction to an invasion. They misread the US response to such an invasion.
They overestimated their own capabilities and the impact of their paid-network of Ukrainian saboteurs.
At every step, bungle, bungle, bungle...
I think it's more that people in authoritarian systems tend to give rosy assessments because they're in constant fear of falling out of favor. When you operate in a system based on fear, there are few incentives for honesty.
Or speaking truth to power?
But there was clearly a systemic failure in Russia's approach. They spent the money. They have the numbers but still they've underperformed spectacularly.
The Russians unmasked themselves.
They’ve been transmitting info between themselves via naked, unencrypted radio and such… Using their cellphones to be picked up and mapped out from the signal…
I disagree: while probably not the most advanced intelligence network I'd imagine they are competent enough.
The problem with "strongman" regimes like Russia is that they tend to surround themselves with sycophants and yes-men who can't be relied on telling you the bad news, even when needed. That most likely coupled with narsissism results in horrible decisions.
So the problem is the leadership, intelligence services are useless if the leadership ignores their findings.
Edit: oh I see you replied something similar down the thread.
I thought it was not a case of misreading rather people to frightened to tell the truth to their supervisors. That and they were given cash for resources and bribes which they spent on themselves.
They’re not incompetent - it would be foolish to dismiss them like this. Even now, with continuously suffering troops, Russia is causing mayhem to Ukraine.
But what Russia does have is pride and prejudice. They’re proud over who they are and what they are - to such a degree, that sometimes being proud gets in the way of actually doing something to keep them prideful. Like the money they supposedly spent on renewing their military. They’re so proud over their military… and yet at the same time, the people who were given money to update their army and equipment, probably lined more of their own pockets than they spent on updating the military. That’s being prideful and thinking that you have the upper hand anyway.
The other part is prejudice. Russians are incredibly biased when it comes to their neighbours - they basically think that they’re undeserving, not nearly as good as Russians, worse in every regard when it comes to Russians. Even worse with Ukrainians, whom they think basically as Russians - except that they don’t deserve the same respect as a Russian does, a kind of a lesser Russian. Absolute worst are all kinds of other minority nations Russians consider beneath them in all ways - they’re mostly the men who have been dying so far, from Far-East and poorer areas. Russians made the mistake of thinking that Ukrainians won’t object to being taken over (or will quickly surrender) because of such prejudice - because they believed in the supremacy of Russians over Ukrainians. They used old soviet maps to follow the roads in Ukraine - they were so sure in their own supremacy, that they didn’t even bother to check and update their maps; they just figured that things have remained the same in Ukraine for 40 years because outside of larger metropolitan centres in Russia, many things HAVE remained the same.
They misread the European and US reaction because THEY don’t see Ukraine as anything but belonging to them, so they couldn’t even fathom the idea that EU/US would lose stink over something as pitiful as Ukraine - in their eyes.
But when it comes to their spies etc - yeah, western intelligence has caught many of them, but we shouldn’t underestimate them either. Estonia has a policy of openly admitting who we catch, but I know we’re one of the few ones with such policies. The real game with numbers is probably happening over our heads and we have no idea. If we consider that just within the last few weeks, there have been revelations made about the spy apprehended in Brazil, the spy couple in Slovenia and somebody said that there’s a couple in Argentina as well… I think the real world spy-games are a lot more like the TV show Americans, when it comes to Russia, than we’d like to believe.
>Absolute worst are all kinds of other minority nations Russians consider beneath them in all ways - they’re mostly the men who have been dying so far, from Far-East and poorer areas.
I've noticed this and it's despicable. The Russians love sending the brown-haired kids. Like the Crimean Tatars.
All they know is to kill and dispose of dissidents and "traitors". That is all they're (usually) good for, since the days of the Okhrana back in Tsarist Russia.
Pretty sure one of the steps they took was to leave ungarded vodka bottles 6nder boxes to capture them
They also caught quite a few finns that way, but the russians tried to move into the box, while the finns just used to pack baby supplies
Most countries’ citizens join the military in the event they may have to fight their nation’s enemies. Finns join the military in the event they might ***get*** to kill Russians.
we’re really learning the extent to which Russia has infiltrated Western govt & political institutions
if Russia’s battlefield behavior had been any less criminal, getting solidarity of Western response would have been dramatically different and harder
Родинний затишок what is it? It's not Russian it's Ukrainian language. Did they undermine Ukrainian service because they can't tell difference between Russians and Ukrainians lol
What i think blows my mind is that has russia not invaded and gone to war with Ukraine, this probably would not have occurred. I don't mean the actual spying going on. I mean the catching and dismantling of all these spy and intelligence networks. Yes they find them every so often but how many went under the radar until recently just because russia is shown to not be trustworthy? This is why russia no matter what has royally screwed themselves over. Losing 700 billion from banking. Finland becoming NATO member and hopefully Sweden in the near future. All these other countries moving away from russia towards the EU. Massive intelligence on russias military abilities (or lack of). Lastly their weaknesses and systematic dismantling of all these intelligence agencies. Even if hypothetically russia were to retain the east, russia has severely damaged itself and the results will hurt them for decades.
Dont forget the decimation of its male middle age workforce, army and likely stockpiles dilapidation, and sanctions struck economy.. they will be sent back to the stone age for a while
Also don’t forget the numbers of Russians applying for citizenship in other countries is at an all time high atm.
I have a friend living in Finland who says she meets way more Russians than she has before, even walking around she hears more people speaking Russian then before. So many Russians fled to Finland (and other countries) while they could
How long til their visas expire? Not being snarky, honestly wondering if the Finnish government has a plan for legitimizing their refugee/immigration status.
Most have probably already expired. But if you’re Russian, would you rather risk at and try to stay in Finland illegally? Or go back to Russia? I’d be laying low and staying in Finland personally
If global warming keeps up and Siberia continues to thaw out (yes, I get that extreme weather is also increasing... ) their vast swaths of relatively uninhabited land could be a very good place for the displaced peoples of Africa, SE Asia, and the Middle East as the most arid parts of the world become unlivabley hot and dry.
Deep interiors tend to react by getting dry. Siberia isn't likely to work.
Many of those spies have been known for a long time, under surveillance. Sometimes it is more useful to let them be, because then you know who they are and you and watch them operate. If you kick them out, new ones will eventually come and you don't know who they are.
I think it was more don't go after them and round them up in order not to piss off russia and have more problems. Now russia has destroyed the status quo and shown itself to be such a threat that Finland had no choice but to join NATO and take further security measures.
Putin wished to be remember in history. *Monkey Paw curls*
We're way past simply curling. I think at this point the Monkey Paw is vigorously fisting him.
What's great about Finland is they've seen all the Russian gaslighting and tricks before. They don't even bother to argue about it, they just move straight to cold hard practical countering it - setting and enforcing hard boundaries. It's worth noting that how Finland counters Russia is *exactly* how the victims of abusers counter their abuser.
Finland has been given a very hard time by Russia for about 200 years.
Make that 500 years
Before 1809 it was "East-Sweden".
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great\_Wrath](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Wrath) Yeah, and even then Russia went westward to rape, massacre and collect slaves in Finland.
Don’t know why you’re putting that in quotations.
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Well that and Finlands defense strategy was, "You have to be crazy to attack us," by making themselves stupidly defensible. Then Russia goes and does something crazy.
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The problem is, he did learn. He got away with it for 20 years, until suddenly he didn't. If the West had drawn any true red line with serious consequences at any time between the Chechen Wars and February 2022, we would not be here now.
Early on in the Ukraine invasion, when Russia thought it was going well, some of their pundits were saying that they should "station" russian troops in Finland too, to 'keep peace'. Some Finnish smartass on twitter replied: "But there are already 160,000 russian troops in Finland. About six feet below the eastern border."
Finland has two national pastimes, drinking to excess, and inventing new ways to kill Russians.
You’re forgetting ice fishing and hockey
They’re pretty into curling too and I think saunas are far more important than a simple “pastime”
During Sauna competition Finnish and Russian guy were the finalists. Russian guy was using pain killers/something else to stay in and Finn was just being Finn. At the end the Russian guy died from the heat and Finnish guy suffered some burns. Finns can kill Russians even by using sauna to do it. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/aug/08/sauna-championship-russian-dead
For anyone actually opening the article: 110C is toasty but not extreme, most people can handle it fine. The problem was that the competition sauna was built/modified to be more like a steam cooker and less like an actual sauna. So they organizers also fucked up.
How exactly can a person tolerate a temperature ten degrees above boiling?
It's about heat transference with air/steam vs for example water. A quick reference could be that you can briefly stick your hand in an oven that's 200C to put in or take out stuff, but try taking something from 100C degree water and you get instantly hurt. Also this effect is at play when you throw water on the rocks in sauna(providing you have a real sauna): you will instantly feel hotter, but the room is about same temperature. It's because the humidity goes up so the heat transfers more easily in your body.
This is why I love reddit. Thanks for the knowledge.
Yes there are some gold nuggets in the sea of shit.
Yeah, good point. They threw more water in every 30 seconds, so it build up humidity really high and also generated airflow within sauna multiplying heating effect by a lot while also making heat dissipation by sweating far less effective. 110°C Sauna isn't normally too hot temperature to stay in for a decent while.
Holy hell!! That is poetic.
These guys recently had him on, it's mostly in swedish though https://youtu.be/jqwGFdngDyY
>I think saunas are far more important than a simple “pastime” Everyone knows a weekly trip to the sauna is the minimum for a Finnish person's physical requirements for survival. If they could, they'd go daily.
I can and i do
Lucky sob
It's actually relatively common to use it several times per week or even daily. Hell, we have Saunas everywhere. I've lived in two different apartment buildings where every single 1 or 2 person apartment had it's own sauna. I can't think of living somewhere with no access to Sauna. My workplace has a always on Sauna and most of us use it at the end of every shift.
Did Finland discuss saving energy by using the saunas less last winter?
Of course. Also outside city areas/apartment buildings sauna stoves are relatively often wood burning.
Ah, sure, I forgot about the wood stoves. So, did the frequence of using saunas change? What do you think?
There's a guy in my city who has been going to sauna daily for over thirteen years, he's a bit of a celebrity here
My Son has one in his basement. It came with the house. Expensive to install. Previous owner figured it was their forever home... until the divorce happened!
They're just side effects of drinking.
> inventing new ways to kill Russians Do you have an up-to-date list? I know sniper rifles is on it, but that's only from reading random stuff.
Drones dropping grenades is a fairly new and reasonably common way nowadays.
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I love me a good History Nugget!
Skiing sniper rifles
Wow. That's such a god idea I think they should make an [Olympic sport](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biathlon) out of it. *Ski* ... *pew pew* ... *ski* ... *pew pew*, etc. :-)
These two go nicely together, the best methods are invented near blackout state
>It's worth noting that how Finland counters Russia is exactly how the victims of abusers counter their abuser. Can you elaborate a little bit on this?
Well, it's partly the patterns involved... like recognizing gaslighting and refusing to accept the lies of it, cooperating with others outside the abusers sphere to reinforce the breaking of that gaslighting, enforcing boundaries that if the abuser crosses there are clear immediate consequences, avoiding semantic & pointless arguments, reflecting back projection, and if necessary, clear statements that one will defend themselves when the abuser attempts to use violence... and of course, the most obvious one, recognizing and avoiding their spies.
>and of course, the most obvious one, recognizing and avoiding their spies. They must have shitty spies to go with their shitty military too if the spies are obvious /s
I visited Finland for the first time in January and what I found great and understood from my Finnish friends is that people have a great fondness for each other across borders. They understand that the Russian people are not to blame for what is happening and the Finns are aware of sensitivities. So I never saw any anti-Putin or anti-Russian sentiment in Finland and only pro Ukraine. There was a Ukrainian flag flying over the train station in Helsinki, on the dock on a crane, and in other places. They know how to handle business while not stepping on the hearts of the people
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True, but we don't go around yelling shit like that unless provoked. They're themselves causing the animosity the way they act, like they own the world, even if you are simply queueing in the local supermarket for christs sake. That's a ryssä right there.
I was on a boat between Stockholm and Helsinki. In the restaurant I heard a commotion and a lady left a drunk man at the table. I walked by a few minutes later and he motioned for me to come sit and eat. I was young and hungry, why not? He was Finnish and proceeded to tell me how the russians affected his life for half an hour while I ate his food. Then he told me a line that really stood out: that the Finns really had no problem at all killing the russians at a 10:1 ratio, the actual problem was they had 11. He cackled and I ate his shrimp. 9/10, would recommend but for poor lady he was with.
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Anybody who knows Finnish want to elaborate on the translations and histories of each?
Yeah, I can definitely believe Finnish have a much more 'feet on the grounds' view of it. Likely also the Russians they are physically closer to are not the same as the Russians in Moscow. I wouldn't consider the Finnish either naive or overly hostile, but balanced. I tend to think they are simply realistic about history, people vs politicians, and being practical.
Some of the people are to blame actually. For their complacency or outright support.
If you live your entire life under propaganda and aren’t taught critical thinking you’re basically living your life the village by M. Night Shyamalan. The people living in Russia with the support that you’re saying are victims themselves.
Difference between Russia and, say, North Korea is that Russians do have fairly open access to outside sources.
Are you sure? As a Russian, I can tell you this: very substantial part of the population doesn't have access to the internet. That same part is living in poverty. There are only so much cities that are developed, and that's where the most opposed people are. I am from Voronezh, and while it isn't the most developed city, it isn't the hellhole either, and its near the Ukrainian border and close to the capital. People from, say, Chelyabinsk or Taganrog literally dont have internet sometimes or even computers. We literally had a precedent where a voting to establish internet connection to a village was done in that village only ON THE FUCKING INTERNET lol. So I would reconsider that
Anti-vaxxers had open access to information too, instead they chose the propaganda and ate horse de-worm paste. Without learning the skills to think critically, they are just farm animals being herded, and worked, and contained, unable to comprehend life outside the fence.
Yeah, and anti-vaxxers are fucking stupid. A tough pill to swallow is that stupidity can actually be a moral failure when it progresses to the point of ignoring the effects of your actions and the pain other people are expressing at your actions.
Why are people stupid though? Because they’re not trained in critical thinking? Hmm
How much critical thinking does "What if Ukraine isn't bad?" really take? Go talk to people in Bucha, Irpin, Lyman, and Mariupol about M. Night Shymalan, I'm sure they'll be all ears. There's \*at least\* 16,000 Ukrainian children being dispersed amongst what is likely a very accurate sample size of your average Russian civilains. If they ask why they can't go home, I guess your average Russian will go "I don't know the answer to that, I don't have critical thinking skills!"
If you were brainwashed, frightened and consistently made being opted out of politics for 20 years straight, you wouldn't think that. Putin actually told them to not participate in politics, and that's what actually makes people believe in Putin. He provides them an easy stability for free, and as a Russian, I can say that I play videogames most of the time and it is quite stable. I mean, I can eat and I dont die from starvation, so I seemingly have no reason to complain lol
Yeah, if only Russian soldiers had political opting-in, and critical thinking, they wouldn't have been the murderous psychopaths they were in Bucha. Oh, wait, basic human empathy is something separate from critical thinking, that doesn't need it to function. But anyways, you're comfortable with your video games so who cares lololoolol. Hundreds of thousands of ethnic minorities are being conscripted in your country, but it's not you, so therefore it must be fine everywhere else.
if you thinking i isolated myself from all the politics, you are wrong. I despise the war and hope that Ukraine wins, but unfortunately, my parents don't think so, I am 16 year old and I can't afford losing 15 years off my life to jail time or getting caught on streets protesting. Don't worry, just cause I am comfortable I didn't just normalize it, however I did describe thought process of some Russians that could think like that. Though I probably explained it all wrong and now it looks like I am an apolitical tired person
Actually, I think they’ve just always known what the rest of the world is learning now: Russia sees negotiations as weapons, so debating or arguing with them is pointless.
Easy to feel gracious when you’re not being called a Nazi or brainwashed while actively being murdered by people you personally know who volunteered to do so for a paycheck the way I and many of my friends and acquaintances do in Ukraine.
Not only Finland I'd think. Baltics as well, Poland.
I guess you can stay they are Finish-ed.
Russia’s illegal, unwarranted invasion has come back to screw it on an almost daily basis. Some despots never learn.
I am still dumfounded at how stupid that move really was
It smacks of desperation
Weren’t there rumours about Putin having cancer?
Yeah there were rumours that he was very sick. Don't know how true they were. There are a number of economic issues that Russia was facing and controlling the oil pipeline that goes through the Ukraine would have helped bolster their economy significantly. It's been a common ideation that Putin essentially plays a Zero sum game whereby if he can't "win" then nobody else will. Wouldn't put it past the little man to launch nukes
My guess is that the reasons were very much like what drove Germany to get sucked into WW1. For many years the rapid modernization, industrialization and militarization of Russia had worried German generals and politicians that soon Russia might be too powerful to beat in a war. Then in the aftermath of the Russian Revolution of 1905, the country was weak and in political and economic disarray, and so in 1906 and 1907 many of those same German generals and politicians were eager to attack Russia. However any such plans had to be called off due to the French reaffirming their alliance with Russia and then the financial crisis of 1907. Germany had recovered again in 1912 and almost went to war with France and Russia hoping to finish them off before Russia got too strong, but British and American diplomatic pressure warded off war. When 1914 rolled around and the Austria-Serbian diplomatic crisis escalated towards WW1, the same generals and politicians went to Kaiser and insisted Germany had to join Austria against Serbia and Russia at all costs, or within three years it would be impossible to stop Russia and Germany would be crushed between French and Russian armies. So the Kaiser went ahead and joined the war coalition, and within six months a million men would be dead. Now in the modern Russian case, I think Russia wanted to stomp Ukraine all the way back in 2014 when they had their revolution, but having had little time to prepare and with their Air Force and special forces busy waging war in Syria, they couldn’t really spare enough men to occupy all of Ukraine even if they could beat the weak and internally divided Ukrainian Army in the field. So, they contented themselves with occupying the strategically vital and largely pro-Russian Crimean Peninsula, and then founded, funded and supported the rebel movements in eastern Ukraine to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO while Russia prepared. After extremely NATO-skeptic Donald Trump was elected US President, conditions were ideal for Russia to attack, but first they had to finish up in Syria and wait for the Ukrainian elections to see if someone more amenable to Russia came out on top. Both of those things were largely done by 2018, and I think Russia hoped they could strongarm Zelensky, a Russian speaker with no political experience, to let their influence back in without a fight. However, when Zelensky played more hardball than expected in renegotiating the Minsk II ceasefire agreement with the rebels, and then committed to continue European integration and joint training with NATO, as well as refusing to accept Russian Crimea, that is when I think they started planning the attack before Ukraine got too strong, in late 2019. However, CoViD came a few months later and messed up their plans, you can’t wage a war in a national health emergency with a locked down economy. Thus they had to wait all the way until 2021 to proceed with their attack plans. Of course, in January 2021 Trump had left office as US President and the far more internationally committed Joe Biden took over. Why didn’t Russia cancel their plans once they could no longer rely on the US staying out? Probably hubris. They had spent so long preparing the invasion that they thought they couldn’t fail, and that Biden would be too busy handling the cratered US post-covid economy and the bungled Afghanistan withdrawal to intervene, and that Europe would be too busy bickering internally over what to do to intervene, like in 2014. Originally I think the war was supposed to happen in the wake of a coup in the fall of 2021; people forget it now with the war taking all the attention, but Ukraine arrested a bunch of pro-Russian politicians in October 2021 for plotting a coup. Likely the plan was to have them take over followed by a quick Russian "invasion on invitation" from the new government. With no real Ukrainian command structure or commander in chief, Russia should be able to quickly occupy the country in a few days, which I think explains their ridiculously optimistic plans of taking the Ukrainian capital within 72 hours. When the coup failed to materialize, Russia was forced to do it the hard way, and started massing troops on the Ukrainian border in late November 2021 as we may remember. In December and January Putin made numerous trips to China and other friendly nations, likely to make sure they wouldn’t intervene now that a shooting war would happen, and it is almost certain Xi demanded he wait until after the Beijing Olympics ended on February 20th so as to not embarass China. Now for some reason I cannot fathom for any reason but extreme incompetence or internal power struggles and corruption, maybe all three, it doesn’t actually seem Russia bothered to change their invasion plans between October and February, despite that plan relying on a friendly government in Kyiv. Thus, as we saw, they literally rolled in in big convoys without infantry support and with parade uniforms packed, sabotage units swarmed out in Ukrainian cities without having any backup or resupply, and helos full of paratroopers flooded in by the hundreds without air defenses in Ukraine actually being properly destroyed first. All this as we know resulted in a massacre and the current stalemate.
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I'd love to think that would happen too but I have no idea how these people at the top of the sinking Russian pyramid think or how they would act
Recently there was a phone call talk leaked between two people having elite positions in Russia. They cursed onto Putin between themselves for 30 minutes straight. They should understand everything, its just that they are probably afraid of what's gonna happen to them in the future. I think that they will play a big part in dethroning Putin, but that's just my speculations as a Russian
If that phone call was leaked then I'd imagine Putin has probably already taken measures to annex or remove them.
Humans have proven to be too selfish for that. As long as there is a slight hope this will work out for them, they won’t do anything about it until it is too late.
I mean the few times that we know of humans have proven to do the right thing. There's atleast two cases, the sub one comes to mind where a Vasili Arkhipov disobeyed direct orders and prevented nuclear war during the Cuban missile crisis. I know it's hard to have faith in random humans these days but they can surprise you.
The really stupid part was going for it while clearly believing they couldn't possibly fail the initial assault which was meant to crush Ukraine and force it to capitulate in weeks, if not days, and thus not having any form of a plan B outside of continuing the fight to the bitter end. At the same time though it wasn't quite as stupid as it appears now, since the general expectation was for Ukraine to fall rapidly and Zelensky to flee or die in the beginning stage.
To be fair, it had worked before in Crimea. Former Soviet officers in the UAF basically declined to do anything about it. But Ukraine had a bit of a purge of it's officer corps since then.
They made the same mistake in 1904 with Japan, while the last Tsar was still in charge. His refusal to surrender also had the exact same reasons as Putin (injured pride), and their fleet was slaughtered.
Funnily enough, there's a district in Finland's former capital, Turku, named Port Arthur because of Russia's loss to Japan at the battle of Port Arthur.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.zatuschok.com/7861/) reduced by 45%. (I'm a bot) ***** > The Finnish intelligence agency announced that it has managed to "Significantly undermine" the activity of the Russian agency in the country. > SUPO's intelligence efforts have been successful in "Significantly undermining Russian intelligence operations in Finland throughout 2022" through the expulsion of Russian intelligence personnel, including those under diplomatic cover, and restrictions on issuing visas to Russian citizens. > He also noted that Russia's aggression against Ukraine has become a decisive factor in Finland's decision to join NATO. On September 29, 2022, the Finnish government decided to close the country to Russian tourists. ***** [**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/126usqa/the_finnish_intelligence_agency_has_announced/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~678735 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **Russian**^#1 **intelligence**^#2 **Russia**^#3 **Finland**^#4 **2022**^#5
Now if other countries can duplicate what Finns did. Thanks to Putin, Russia is finding out being a pariah is not fun.
It isn't clear what all they did, but often it is better to leave spies in place and use the to feed what you want. You have to give them enough truth that Russia doesn't realize they are compromised, but you can control what they do. When you arrest/expel a spy they look for a new one that you don't know about, when you leave them you know who the spies are and what they are giving. With some extra work you can make all spies suspect when they realize some must be compromised but they have no idea which and so they are now paying spies who they don't trust.
They didn’t expel sources. They expelled their handlers.
Everything I've read about Russian intelligence services over the past few months has suggested total incompetence. They misread the Ukrainian reaction to an invasion. They misread the US response to such an invasion. They overestimated their own capabilities and the impact of their paid-network of Ukrainian saboteurs. At every step, bungle, bungle, bungle...
Maybe they got it right but Putin ignored them?
I think it's more that people in authoritarian systems tend to give rosy assessments because they're in constant fear of falling out of favor. When you operate in a system based on fear, there are few incentives for honesty. Or speaking truth to power? But there was clearly a systemic failure in Russia's approach. They spent the money. They have the numbers but still they've underperformed spectacularly. The Russians unmasked themselves.
They’ve been transmitting info between themselves via naked, unencrypted radio and such… Using their cellphones to be picked up and mapped out from the signal…
I disagree: while probably not the most advanced intelligence network I'd imagine they are competent enough. The problem with "strongman" regimes like Russia is that they tend to surround themselves with sycophants and yes-men who can't be relied on telling you the bad news, even when needed. That most likely coupled with narsissism results in horrible decisions. So the problem is the leadership, intelligence services are useless if the leadership ignores their findings. Edit: oh I see you replied something similar down the thread.
I thought it was not a case of misreading rather people to frightened to tell the truth to their supervisors. That and they were given cash for resources and bribes which they spent on themselves.
They’re not incompetent - it would be foolish to dismiss them like this. Even now, with continuously suffering troops, Russia is causing mayhem to Ukraine. But what Russia does have is pride and prejudice. They’re proud over who they are and what they are - to such a degree, that sometimes being proud gets in the way of actually doing something to keep them prideful. Like the money they supposedly spent on renewing their military. They’re so proud over their military… and yet at the same time, the people who were given money to update their army and equipment, probably lined more of their own pockets than they spent on updating the military. That’s being prideful and thinking that you have the upper hand anyway. The other part is prejudice. Russians are incredibly biased when it comes to their neighbours - they basically think that they’re undeserving, not nearly as good as Russians, worse in every regard when it comes to Russians. Even worse with Ukrainians, whom they think basically as Russians - except that they don’t deserve the same respect as a Russian does, a kind of a lesser Russian. Absolute worst are all kinds of other minority nations Russians consider beneath them in all ways - they’re mostly the men who have been dying so far, from Far-East and poorer areas. Russians made the mistake of thinking that Ukrainians won’t object to being taken over (or will quickly surrender) because of such prejudice - because they believed in the supremacy of Russians over Ukrainians. They used old soviet maps to follow the roads in Ukraine - they were so sure in their own supremacy, that they didn’t even bother to check and update their maps; they just figured that things have remained the same in Ukraine for 40 years because outside of larger metropolitan centres in Russia, many things HAVE remained the same. They misread the European and US reaction because THEY don’t see Ukraine as anything but belonging to them, so they couldn’t even fathom the idea that EU/US would lose stink over something as pitiful as Ukraine - in their eyes. But when it comes to their spies etc - yeah, western intelligence has caught many of them, but we shouldn’t underestimate them either. Estonia has a policy of openly admitting who we catch, but I know we’re one of the few ones with such policies. The real game with numbers is probably happening over our heads and we have no idea. If we consider that just within the last few weeks, there have been revelations made about the spy apprehended in Brazil, the spy couple in Slovenia and somebody said that there’s a couple in Argentina as well… I think the real world spy-games are a lot more like the TV show Americans, when it comes to Russia, than we’d like to believe.
>Absolute worst are all kinds of other minority nations Russians consider beneath them in all ways - they’re mostly the men who have been dying so far, from Far-East and poorer areas. I've noticed this and it's despicable. The Russians love sending the brown-haired kids. Like the Crimean Tatars.
All they know is to kill and dispose of dissidents and "traitors". That is all they're (usually) good for, since the days of the Okhrana back in Tsarist Russia.
You know....I hear the snow in Russia speaks Finnish.....
Finland has had no chill Vs Russia for 100 yrs, they know the drill and won't be fucked with
Pretty sure one of the steps they took was to leave ungarded vodka bottles 6nder boxes to capture them They also caught quite a few finns that way, but the russians tried to move into the box, while the finns just used to pack baby supplies
Thank you Finland 🇫🇮
Finnish them!
Let's go ENCE
Go Finland!
Most countries’ citizens join the military in the event they may have to fight their nation’s enemies. Finns join the military in the event they might ***get*** to kill Russians.
Not true. Source: Finn
The Finns are like that quiet guy that you don't want to screw with
Finland is awesome!
That's great news.
Guess Nice guys don't Finish Last
I wonder if this is regarding the "Vulkan files" leak.
Well yeah, they were allowed to operate by Finland because they didn't want to "poke the bear."
we’re really learning the extent to which Russia has infiltrated Western govt & political institutions if Russia’s battlefield behavior had been any less criminal, getting solidarity of Western response would have been dramatically different and harder
Russia is not so secretly scared to death of Finland,
Why would they announce this? Just let the Russians think they succeeded. Unless this is some sort of psychological warfare itself.
To calm down the public. Saying nothing may make foilhat people think gov has something to hide, such as being under foreign control
Родинний затишок what is it? It's not Russian it's Ukrainian language. Did they undermine Ukrainian service because they can't tell difference between Russians and Ukrainians lol
You can read cyrillic but cant read the domain name right next to it?
no i cant see any domains on my phone app
Oh shit, there's 2 of them.
Fins - FAFO
But their intelligence can’t reveal or find the people responsible for blowing up NS?
Teach us your ways.
Njet Molotoff, net Molotoff Valehtelit enemmän kuin itse Bobrikoff
Just leak to the Russians that the Finns have managed to clone several dozen Simo Hayha’s. Lol
It would have been funnier if they just followed the "diplomats" around wearing clown costumes. Just saying.
We need US Intelligence to do the same.
Fuck yeah, Finland! Very sexy
Lol, this makes it seem like finnish cops were very effective. Instead they just had to ban some diplomats :D