Russia threatens Britain with retaliation if involvement in Ukraine war deepens

Russia on Monday threatened to strike British military facilities and said it would hold drills simulating the use of battlefield nuclear weapons amid sharply rising tensions over comments by senior Western officials about possibly deeper involvement in the war in Ukraine.

After summoning the British ambassador to the Foreign Ministry, Moscow warned that Ukrainian strikes on Russian territory with U.K.-supplied weapons could bring retaliatory strikes against British military facilities and equipment on Ukrainian soil or elsewhere.

The remarks came on the eve of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s inauguration to a fifth term in office and in a week when Moscow on Thursday will celebrate Victory Day, its most important secular holiday, marking its defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II.

Lladra,

Russia sure talks a lot. They’ve already lost credibility as a major power. All they have left is “blow everything up”, including themselves.

bitwaba,

said it would hold drills simulating the use of battlefield nuclear weapons

That explains why they had everyone dig into the radioactive soil around Chernobyl and get radiation poisoning. Gotta simulate that nuclear fallout environment “for practice”

SkaveRat,

Build up immunity

jabjoe,
@jabjoe@feddit.uk avatar

They believed their own misinformation that it was all western lies. Bet that misinformation is still being pushed.

AngryCommieKender,

Russia stop! Poland can only get so erect!

slurpinderpin,

Send more Stormshadows!

For real though, attack the UK and you’re gonna have the USAF and RAF flying sorties over Moscow within a week

MonkderDritte, (edited )

We call this behavior “Säbelrasseln” in german.

samus12345,
@samus12345@lemmy.world avatar

The term exists in English, too, with the exact same meaning - “saber rattling”.

tal,
@tal@lemmy.today avatar

Hmm. I wonder where it came from. Might have been German.

goes to check etymonline

Gives the date of first-known use, but not where. I assume that that means that this was in English, since normally they list the origin language.

www.etymonline.com/search?q=saber+rattling

saber (n.)

type of heavy, single-edged sword, usually slightly curved, 1670s, from French sabre “heavy, curved sword” (17c.), alteration of sable (1630s), from German Sabel, Säbel, which probably is ultimately from Hungarian szablya “saber,” literally “tool to cut with,” from szabni “to cut.” The Balto-Slavic words (Russian sablya, Polish szabla “sword, saber,” Lithuanian šoblė) perhaps also are via German, but Italian sciabla seems to be directly from Hungarian. Saber-rattling “militarism” is attested from 1922. Saber-toothed cat (originally tiger) is attested from 1849, so named for the long upper canine teeth.

EDIT: Oooh, etymonline is wrong (or at least not complete). Mirriam-Webster has earlier known uses, says that it was used in the UK first, around the late 1870s.

merriam-webster.com/…/saber-rattling-word-history

There is no unanimity of opinion on why we came to refer to this kind of behavior as saber-rattling. Some think that it comes from the practice of 18th-century Hungarian cavalry units had of brandishing their sabers at opponents prior to charging. Others have said that it comes from the habit that military officers had in the early 20th century of ominously shaking their scabbard when issuing orders to subordinates. Our records indicate that the two words began seeing use in fixed fashion around 1880, making it unlikely that it was directly related to either of the causes given above.

Of late it has been in some quarters impossible to mention the word patriotism without having the taunt of being a sabre-rattling BOBADIL thrown in one’s face.

— The Standard (London, Eng.), 19 Feb. 1879

The “Sabre Rattling” of M. Coumoundouros, especially his assertion that by the coming spring he will have 86,000 men in the field, and that this number of troops will have been got together by the 10th of December.

— The Leeds Mercury (Leeds, Eng.), 3 Nov. 1880

The word appears to have begun in the press in the United Kingdom first, and by the early 20th century had spread to newspapers in the United States.

samus12345,
@samus12345@lemmy.world avatar

I wondered who was first, too, and looked it up before. The date seems to be in dispute, but English is apparently the original language to coin the term.

reverendsteveii,

in this case, more like nudelwackeln

KillingTimeItself,

they wont. They’re too cowardly.

samus12345,
@samus12345@lemmy.world avatar

I hope they’re more cowardly than they are stupid.

KillingTimeItself,

they’ve already exhausted the stupid. There is only cowardly left. Russia bombing the UK, and inadvertently, technically the EU would almost certainly result in US retaliation, let alone the nuclear submarines that britain has. And probably the rest of the EU.

JohnDClay,

Like they’ve been threatening for the last two years? They’re out of escalation options that are useful for them.

Honytawk,

No no no!

. * holding back tears *

This time we will launch a nuke for real!

Sam_Bass,

Kinda doubt hes in much condition to mouth off too much

yournamehere,

are you winning vlad? are you?

coz doesnt look like that if you need to threat the world with nuclear weapons.

Buddahriffic,

He didn’t threaten to use nukes. He threatened to run drills where his soldiers pretend to use nukes. Probably so that he can actually follow through on an ignored threat.

But that still doesn’t change the fact that any actual nuke use would result in an escalation regretted by both sides, even if it doesn’t result in an alpha strike.

NotMyOldRedditName,

If Russia attacks the UK can Ukraine attack China and Iran?

Probably a bad idea but that’s what they’re saying isn’t it?

Edit: and given russias use of China and Iran weaponry, if it happens to be from them, the UK can attack them too now!

alekwithak,

If Russia attacks the UK they’ve attacked NATO and all bets are off…

UnderpantsWeevil,
@UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world avatar

Edit: and given russias use of China and Iran weaponry

The US and Russia have historically been the world’s two largest arms dealers. You can begrudge China and Iran for getting a slice of the action, but I have to imagine pulling them directly into the conflict would not improve matters for any Ukrainian.

NotMyOldRedditName,

It wouldn’t, but Russia is basically saying that’s a perfectly valid reason to do it.

UnderpantsWeevil,
@UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world avatar

There’s one big difference.

China’s doing the proper capitalist thing and selling weapons onto the market.

The UK is doing the unforgivable socialist thing and just giving them away.

NotMyOldRedditName,

Ah gotcha. Definitely times to pull out the nukes for that unforgivable act then.

UnderpantsWeevil,
@UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world avatar

Or just bust up the payroll system for UK ground troops, as happened a few days ago

zephyreks,

What Chinese missiles, bombs, and guns have the Russians used that the Ukrainians haven’t? Please cite a source.

A DJI drone available on Amazon/Alibaba is not a “weapon.” A Shahed is.

NotMyOldRedditName,

US assessment is that China is providing the majority of what Russia needs to make those weapons, which is critical to russias ability to maintain their offensive.

theguardian.com/…/china-supporting-russia-in-mass…

They’re using loopholes to bypass sanctions by posing as civilian gear.

Ukraine is also finding critical Chinese parts on captured gear that used to be from other countries honoring those sanctions.

“Our view is that one of the most gamechanging moves available to us at this time to support Ukraine is to persuade the PRC [People’s Republic of China] to stop helping Russia reconstitute its military industrial base,” the official said.

zephyreks,

UK eyes Chinese drone parts for Ukraine

American drones are glitching and getting lost in Ukraine, giving way to a flood of Chinese drones

Ukraine continues to snap up Chinese DJI drones for its defense

And the Russian assessment would be that China is providing much of what’s keeping Ukraine’s defense alive.

caboose2006,

Is this a rerun? Sounds really familiar

fox2263,

Come on then if you think you’re hard enough

dizzy,
@dizzy@lemmy.ml avatar

We are millwall! Super millwall! We are millwall, from the den!

Enkrod,

What’s Russia gonna do? Lose on two fronts instead of just the one?

trslim,

This comment is perfect, thank you for making my day.

fadhl3y,

There’s nothing the UK likes more than messing with Russia… at least it will distract us from Brexit-style self-owns in the near future.

psycho_driver,

Aren’t they really just threatening to move them up in the queue?

FlyingSquid,
@FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

There’s something weird in Putin’s hand… it’s super blurry… I think he’s shaking it really, really fast… hang on, I have a high-speed camera. Let’s see what it is.

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/ccd49a74-f11a-4cae-b137-101362f759ae.png

Oh, well that makes sense. Pray, continue.

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