Belarus 'diverts Ryanair flight to arrest journalist', opposition says
bbc.co.uk
bbc.co.uk
The Belarus plane hijack is a small reminder why it's generally not a good idea to let governments know who is going to where. I'm not sure why governments that like to think of themselves as democratic don't see the risks.
-- Alexander Bochmann https://mastodon.infra.de/@galaxis/106285985254850170
I'd made a similar point following the assassination of Kim Jung-nam in 2017:
Travel and hospitality databases are widely accessible and shared amongst a tremendous number of organisations. State intelligence organisations might readily have access through their own state-run airline, or through private operations or plants within same. Similarly for terrorist, narco-criminal, money-laundering, or other organisations. Financial, banking, and payment-processing systems, only slightly less so. A P.I. license or position on a fraud or abuse desk at a major online retailer, or any skip-tracing agency, can have access to such information.
https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/5ud243/data_ar...
What is your threat model?
Note that your own threat model may not include possibilities which put others at risk.
(In fairness, it appear that Protasevich was followed onto the plane itself, suggesting that in-flight availability of manifests played little role. The question of what pre-flight intelligence methods were employed remains open.)
International air travel was possible with paper tickets.
Heck, you could've travel, immigrate, and settle all around Europe without papers prior to a certain mentally challenged emperor deciding to ruin it all.
You might have to be more specific there have been more than a few of those in European history
I would really like to know when exactly was that.
And even less the part "prior to a certain mentally challenged emperor deciding to ruin it all" where I really dont know who the original person means.
Can anyone with FAA / CAA (the UK civil aviation authority) or EU airspace rules knowledge clarify what protocols exist for these situations?
In the US and most everywhere else, when you willfully ignore ATC they scramble fighter jets. Every pilot is trained in what this looks like and how to respond, but the safe next step is always to respond in the affirmative and land. https://www.boldmethod.com/learn-to-fly/regulations/inflight...
In reality it is highly unlikely for a commercial airline to ignore a direct ATC command (unless the pilot believes the plane is in distress) - and in a case like this where ATC reports a hazard onboard and divert it wouldn’t be unexpected to see an escort (even if just so that there is a witness if the plane were to actually explode).
After 9-11 the chance that the interceptors are armed is probably 100%.
Fun fact: the max speed of a normal GA plane (think Cessna) is below the stall speed of many interceptors which can result in amusement.
Somehow I get the inkling that terrorist groups probably aren't going to start trying to crash into office buildings with a Cessna.
And the Apache is way more intimidating than the jet.
The Tamil Tigers did run a campaign of dropping small bombs from planes that were too slow for the Sri Lankan air force to intercept at one point.
1994 - Cessna 150 vs. White House South Lawn https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Eugene_Corder
2002 - Cessna 172 vs. Bank of America Tower https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002_Tampa_Cessna_172_crash
2010 - Piper Dakota vs. IRS office in Austin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Austin_suicide_attack
>on September 11, 1994
Wow.
He speaks of the farmer's community though as a tight nit community. Used planes are sold and bought within the community, farmers themselves would be very suspicious selling to someone "shady", and the FBI knows about this threat vector as well and is monitoring it closely (iirc).
So there's an example of a small plane and its potential use case in terrorism. Not sure how easily a Cessna could be rigged up to do something of that kind.
Another attack vector in the future might be small drones. Due to them not holding tons of gasoline, some form of biochemical weapon or radioactive material could be distributed.
Muller argues that the mass panic of an incident involving biochemical materials or radioactivity would most likely be a greater danger than the "material threat" itself. Many people would be scared of "radioactivity" without much understanding. People are not particularly well educated how radioactive decline works, what half life times really mean (long half life meaning slow release, less imminent danger), why various types of radioactivity can be quite different from another etc.
So don't underestimate terrorists. Luckily, don't underestimate smart people in three letter agencies thinking about this either.
I mean, this was true of a similar incident that didn't involve those factors. The United States' overreaction to 9/11 has cost several orders of magnitude more lives than were actually taken on that day.
Although I suppose things get murkier if you include copycat crimes - not too easy to copy "hijack a commercial airliner", but a whole heap of people could very easily strap a biochemical threat to a drone.
The gasoline attack (liquid fuel in general) vector in relation to agricultural planes (planes used to spray crops) is real though and the relevant part to your comment. Fly it into a full football stadium with 100k people, so small planes are not to be underestimated.
Sounds prudent of them. If a small plane spreads radioactive material over an area they are in as an act of terrorism, even a nuclear expert with 5 PhDs will first panic and try to get the fuck away and only much later care to go into the minituae of the situation.
The imminent reaction of "let's get out of here" in the face of danger was not what I was referring to here.
Authorities and experts want to reduce panic to make their jobs (coordination, damage assessment, policing, rescue, etc.) easier and reduce the results of masses reacting panickly.
But authorities also lie time and again and downplay threats to keep panic low (or to make themselves look better, and also because they don't know shit yet, but must still pretend that they are in control).
The sole individual might be more beneficial to panic and get the hell out (not just directly after immediate blow).
The problem is that everybody else panicking will make things difficult, cause mayhem, stampedes, block the highways, limit petrol availability, etc. But that doesn't mean it's not a good strategy at the individual level.
So there's a friction on what might be best survival strategy for each individual, leading to crappy outcomes when adopted by millions.
What I'm getting at is two subtle additions to your comment:
(a) mass panic/exodus might be a crappy response, but it can still be great at the individual level (if only if it could be kept to that). But even if not, the few succeeding in pursuing it, will probably have an advantage over others that meekisly listen to the experts/gov and "stay calm".
(b) experts often don't know whats going on for a long time, have limited input, give contradicting expert advice, and often just flat out corroborate some story to assist the government political decision about handling a crisis.
You can easily kill more people with a sewage pipe pipe mortar, or ramming a truck.
You don't see many those "smart people" even trying.
The "intelligence community" are a nest of inscrutable incompetence, and idiocy. That's the bottom line.
I was answering in the context of flying from one country to another while crossing over a third. You'll need a flight plan and overflight permits, which generally require ATC contact at least on entry.
Belarus specifically requires a fixed flight path using defined entry and exit points for any aircraft, a Sunday afternoon VFR wander-about is just as likely in Yemen or Iran. :)
Why wouldn't they be? What else can they even do? Especially in the case that the radio is inoperable. Other than seeing what's happening, and reporting back.
And most countries will probably just refuse overflight privileges if they don't get that information.
Edit: for improved discourse as pointed out
it is pretty standard practice in case of a bomb threat around the world as no one knows where the bomber(s) would force the plane to fly to :
https://abcnews.go.com/US/16s-scrambled-escort-jets-bomb-thr...
"An apparent bomb threat against two passenger flights that was tweeted today resulted in two F-16 fighter jets being scrambled to escort the two airliners.
The two flights were both enroute to Hartsfeld-Jackson International Airport in Atlanta, where they landed safely NORAD said."
Information is not power, information is a power multiplier. It enables actions (including attacks and defences) to be specifically focused and targeted.
In the case of Kim Jung-nam, two women (by all accounts innocent accomplices) managed to kill a significant political target in what they thought wasn an entertainment prank by splashing him with liquid, on the ground, at an airport.
Critical to the success of that attack was not access to supersonic military jet fighter aircraft, but simply knowing where and when the target would be in a specified location.
Information that's now broadcast to accuracy of centimetres and seconds on many hundreds of millions if not billions of people worldwide right now.
To give another example I've noted previously, what rights to privacy should a rhinocerous have?
https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/25ll1v/does_a_...
That’s deep and insightful, and now that you’ve written it, perfectly obvious in hindsight.
Various forms of camouflage come to mind. Though the thought occurs that those can also be used by the more- and less-empowered, perhaps asymmetrically.
these are very different capabilities. the former is limited to state actors the latter can be found out by any Amadeus employee without any security clearance. the only way to avoid this is not to fly or use a passport that isn't in your name.
if one were to speculate it is likely not even Belarus that made this happen.
for some reason non Americans always seem to think that SE Asian people won't help the Feds. But as anyone American who has visited the region could tell them, SE Asia is about the last place you should try hiding from the Feds.
edit : Vietnam and the region is very friendly to Americans and even Brits who avoid alcohol (apologies I'm British born with family in both countries and actually casual drinking alcohol is probably the number one error made by British business people when travelling) but the logic behind cooperation with the USA is simply keeping the USA off their regional collective backs. Just consider how much drug trade is at risk if you upset American interests in SE Asia...
edit the 2nd : actually trying to hide anywhere where life itself is cheap is fundamentally the worst error possible to make if you are hiding from existential danger of really motivated people.
But (as a fellow from another region where Brits and alcohol mix) he might be talking about asshole drunk tourists behaving badly. That's a common pest everywhere young British tourists come in masses to "have a good time", and the locals don't like them much (even if some locals working in tourism make a buck off them).
Then again, the parent writes about "the number one error made by British business people when travelling" -- and business people don't fit this profile.
2. Vietnamese people drink like fish. What are you talking about?
3. Vietnam does not assist or extradite to the US AFAIK.
It's not that you should hide where life is cheap. You should hide in countries that are sworn enemies of those you are wanted in.
"The new court filings contend that since HSBC was made aware that Huawei and Skycom were operating in Iran...".
The slides proving that were however removed from the US submission to Canada.
Further to that: "In October 2020, a judge blocked an attempt by Canada's attorney general to dismiss parts of the extradition case,[121] allowing arguments for the misrepresentation of Meng's case to move forward.[122]"
So it appears that earlier ruling in regards to fraud does not hold much water.
This is absolutely true. No mater what, there WILL be abuse.
It's also what worries me most about the normalization of "COVID passports". What's to stop me from putting a bounty on the owner of COVIDpass abcxyz? All you'll have to do is use an alternate scanning app and upload a video of you suckerpunching the owner of COVIDpass abcxyz to receive a 5k prize.
To be clear, I highly despise the Belarusian regime and I'm in full support of opposition. I could only hope that EU will do something in return but it looks like it's a standard way of handling the people politically considered to be terrorists. It's not the way it should be done neither by Belarus nor especially by US/NATO if they want to hold the peacekeepers flag. Otherwise it's just double standards and politics.
What did happen was that countries caved to US pressure to deny even the possibility of snowden passing through their airspace.
While that's absurd and a rather impolite thing to do; the moral issue there small or non-existant; denying a foreign diplomatic delegation the right to enter your territory is... perfectly OK, even when your motivations are at best dubious.
The fact that the plane even landed in Vienna at all might have been a (successful) PR stunt, since: An audio tape was subsequently released which appeared to be a recording of the flight crew requesting to land in Austria on the grounds they "could not get a correct indication" of their remaining fuel levels." - really? How convenient.
In any case it's nothing at all like the current case, except that it involved planes landing where they weren't originally headed for, due to political interference. Of course; superficial resemblances might be enough in the battlefield that is public perception.
Edit: and if you read some of the other perceptions here e.g. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2013/07/03... - this all sounds like a rather convenient storm in a tea-cup. Given the convenience to Evo Morales, it all looks rather suspicious.
The how only matters to questions of legality, not questions of morality.
Yes, or no - should airplanes in flight be forced down so that third-party countries can make political arrests? The EU seems to think that the answer to that question is 'Yes'... As long as it's done by it, not to it.
If in the middle of the flight, you are told that you were surprise - banned from flying over multiple countries in your flight plan, you are forced to abort your flight and land, unless you want the plane to run out of fuel and crash in the middle of nowhere.
And again - this is a pointless semantics game. Yes or no - is messing with airplanes, in flight, in order to make political arrests acceptable behaviour? You seem to think so (As long as its done in some particular way.)
The only difference is that one of the two planes had more options for where it could land. Both had to land at somewhere other than their destination, though, unless the pilots wanted everyone on board to die.
I don't give a rat's ass if France, Spain, Portugal, and Italy can deny an in-flight commercial airplane access to their airspace to make a political arrest. They clearly can, and did. I am asking you if they should do that. Does that seem right to you?
I think GP has done a fabulous job explaining why this isn't true, so your continued assertions that it is are strange.
Perhaps there are differences between these two circumstances after all?
Yeah, Morales's pilot could choose a different path provided there's air refueling available. Otherwise it had to land somewhere, and then airplane was searched. I'm pretty sure there are conventions that forbid that kind behavior against diplomatic personal.
So, in the end, we are again at the same place - when we ignore conventions that's perfectly fine, and when they do the same it's a completely different.
btw read first article of Chicago convention, then check what sovereignty means.
Assuming he intended to fly to the azores to refuel, he should have had enough fuel to fly back to Moscow too. The austrian air traffic control did not induce him to land; he chose to do so when portugal refused refueling rights and a small number of countries did not immediate grant permission to fly over their territory (but according to France, once it became clear it was Morales's plane they did, so... somebody is being economical with the truth there).
In any case, even without air refueling it would have been extremely unlikely that the 900EX only had enough fuel for the around 3000km to Vienna as opposed to the 8000km it could carry when the overall trip is around 15000km. Almost certainly Morales had his pick of airports to land at, including Moscow, Basel, perhaps Turkey or Egypt or who knows where.
There is clear evidence Morales' plane could not follow its original flight plan nor fly without any refueling all the way to La Paz; but there is no evidence he couldn't have chosen to avoid landing in the EU if he had wanted to. But... he didn't want to avoid that; he wanted to make the point that the US is imperialist.
And that's fine! I don't begrudge him that. But it's just an entirely different story to the Belarusian abduction of a journalist by temporarily kidnapping an entire civilian plane. Those aren't at all the same, and claims in this discussion thread to the contrary seem like strained attempts at whataboutism; presenting the US government as not just having its own flaws, but having equivalent flaws to Belarusian dictatorships' flaws. At that point, it seems like people are living in some kind of alternate reality they've imagined to suit their predetermined world view.
I will ask again - do you think it is appropriate for countries to disrupt third party, commercial air travel, in order to force travelers down into a jurisdiction where they can make political arrests? It's a very simple, yes, or no question.
So, again - yes or no - is it appropriate to disrupt a third party flight, in order to make a political arrest of a passenger on that flight? We've been dodging this question for the better part of a day, but nobody seems to be willing to stand up and say "Yes, it damn well is." Instead, everyone seems to be splitting hairs about the definition of 'disrupt'. I don't care about your definition of disrupt. [1] Is it, or is it not the sort of thing that we do?
Is the intent behind this the kind of intent that you're going to sanction? Or the kind of intent that you're going to condemn?
> (because the plane would not have landed if Snowden had been on board)
Unsubstantiated speculation, and completely irrelevant. You have no idea what the pilot would have done if he were.
> Moreover, the European countries would have known in advance that their actions would not force the plane down or create the possibility of an arrest
Also unsubstantiated speculation, and completely irrelevant. You have no idea what the people who made that call were thinking. Your interpretation also fails to account for why four countries did just that. For shits and giggles? Because they were expecting that stunt to fail? Because someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed, and decided to play airspace roulette?
[1] Further up in the thread, people keep saying that the plane was closer to Vilnius than Minsk, as if that is at all relevant. Were it closer to Minsk than Vilnius at the time of the call, would that have made this entire affair kosher for you? You seem to be incredibly concerned about the form, as opposed to the intent.
Why does it matter that the intent is the same? Victim of a crime obviously intends to punish the criminal, but there is much difference between taking the matter in one's own hands and relying on the justice system. Can't you see the difference?
> So, again - yes or no - is it appropriate to disrupt a third party flight, in order to make a political arrest of a passenger on that flight?
You accused the GP of speculation, yet you're doing exactly that here. How do you know that Morales incident was to capture Snowden? It could have been just a political message to deter those who were thinking of harboring Snowden, especially if they weren't sure he was onboard. They weren't forced to land in Vienna. The plane could have come back to Russia. Perhaps they did what they did for their own PR game.
edit: Yep, according to Portugal they initially requested a fuel stop in Lisbon before they were grounded. When they ultimately left Vienna they refueled at the Canary Islands.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/03/edward-snowden...
http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=dme-lis-lpb&DU=km
Or maybe they planned another tech stop in the Americas.
Maybe to Canada or USA, but their presence over Austria was already inoptimal for that. I suspect they were planning on a european tech stop anyway.
The long range Dassault version with the extra winglet option can do 8800km. Moscow to La Paz is 12500. A stop in Lisbon would just barely let them make it direct to Bolivia. Otherwise they'd have to stop in Gander or NYC. Definitely not Miami.
edit: No winglets, so 8300km range (https://www.jetphotos.com/photo/9436252)
What was their flight plan? I can guess why it was necessary to interrupt them while over landlocked Europe if they really wanted to search the plane. If you let them get to Portugal or Spain and then denied them landing/passage, they could always exit to Africa.
http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=dme-lpb&DU=km
>it certainly had enough to make it back to Russia.
We can never really know if they legally could because we don't know if they would receive transit approval back over Austria's neighbours or just remain trapped in an obviously coordinated program to deny passage.
If Evo Morales wanted to fly back to Moscow, they would have requested clearance to return, and that would have been part of the scandal. He did not ask. Also, don't forget that being victimized by imperialist forces is pretty much exactly what Evo Morales wanted; it supports his political persona perfectly. And indeed, he used the incident to his political advantage. Incidentally: just because it's plausible this was a set up by Evo Morales doesn't diminish the impropriety of denying overflight; but it does mean I'm skeptical of all the speculation beyond that; it's just too convenient. Frankly, it's rather convenient that apparently American intelligence agencies thought Snowden was on the plane in the first place - and given Morales statements beforehand on national Russian TV, it's at least conceivable even that was an intentional misdirection.
I mean, make no mistake - the hounding of Snowden for exposing US hypocrisy is a travesty; and the lengths to which the US was willing to go to recapture him too. But just because the US actions were the opposite of noble does not somehow mean Evo Morales was entirely on the level.
I guess then you have 2 options:
- Crash into the ocean
- Enter unauthorized airspace and be shot down
But sure, it was just a "choice".
It was indirectly forced, if the other options were to either be shot down by entering unauthorized airspace or to land.
If it could have returned safely it probably would, but fuel is a very limited resource in a flying plane.
Finally, consider the motivations of its owner - Evo Morales. While I have no objection to his political aims; it is nevertheless wise to consider that he does have political aims. And as it so happens, he's a populist, anti-imperialist, anti-US political leader. For him, seeking this confrontation would have been a pure win; and furthermore being seen as the victim of imperialist oppression would have been the cherry on top. As such, it's just not reasonable to assume that his actions were aimed to defuse the situation; if he could appear to be victimized by imperialist forces, that's to his benefit.
So it's entirely plausible for him to choose to land in Vienna instead of return. It's not very plausible fuel was running low. Additionally, there are about a dozen other countries very close by he could like have chosen to land in, even if fuel was scarce - he wasn't in some inescapable box.
In the end both the US and Belarus grounded a plane for political reasons, and that’s what makes the situation the same in many people’s eyes. It’s just that one of those countries doesn’t have the clout to make its means look harmless and benign so had to resort to a fighter jet escort.
That's a bit silly though. An implicit threat still requires the belief that an act of violence will be carried out. Do you honestly think anyone in Europe believes America will pull back the velvet glove just to find one person? It'd cause the disintegration of NATO.
Which threats were most salient to which parties is an interesting exercise but not the main point.
Notably, it was in Evo Morales political interest to appear to be "sticking it to the man", so undoubtedly he had no problems with making the impact appear greater than it was. Not to mention his TV interview the very day before can be read as a kind of dare to do just this. Had he really been carrying Snowden with intent to protect him, he surely would not have played this brinkmanship game in the first place, but even if he did, he did not need to land where he did.
In other words, the US got played by Evo Morales who successfully demonstrated that the US can be pretty unreasonable at times. But the US did not take his plane hostage, not even via its allies; the situation is entirely unlike the Belarusian case at hand. Seriously: is being offensive to a diplomat that's knowingly playing a game of brinkmanship somehow equivalent to abducting a civilian plane?
I'm glad you've declared this, I was worried that there was a moral component I had to think about.
https://www.reuters.com/article/mundo-bolivia-espanha-descul...
It's almost like a number of countries suddenly refused permission to travel through their airspace, making them need exact fuel measurements rather than relying on preflight planning.
Yes, the fuel was a problem since they were were barred from going their intended route! They chose to land in Vienna??
Which airports could he have landed in?
To be clear; I'm not saying that the US pressure and European action were anything but petty. But you know; not all pettiness is equivalent to kidnapping a civilian plane.
Also, while I'm not willing to assume the best of intentions on the US's part; neither am I willing to assume them on Evo Morales's part. This grounding was in his interest - he had nothing to lose, and everything to gain. I doubt he tried to prevent the confrontation, and he may well have even taken actions to enhance the appearance of victimhood - it's always nice, playing a victim; especially if you're not actually suffering any harm.
I don't see anything wrong with interfering with the travel of fugitives from justice. Even if there are doubts about the "justice" getting applied here, just ignoring the US justice system is probably not the right way to go either.
There are issues with the US justice system, but it is a far cry from anything in Belarus or Russia. And if there is to be any secrecy around national security - most believe there should be - then there must also be consequences for breaking this secrecy, regardless of the justification.
Which means that either you have to review you thoughts and change them, or you are fine with killing journalists and any other dissidents (who obviously "broke the law, with quite serious consequences for their country and individual soldiers"). You just can't bet on two sides of a coin.
If you can't see that, how can you ever defend democracy?
But you probably don't ever need to, because the US system is already quite trustworthy (despite a lot of faults) and on average does quite well.
I believe in the necessary secrecy of some state organisations - but only if they are trustworthy and play by the rules set by the democratic institutions.
And Snowden showed that they don't do this and cannot really be trusted. And he tried the proper way to report and it did not worked.
So he became: a whistleblower
And a hunted man by the law breaking agencies whose cimes he unveiled.
So why is your conclusion, there should be only consequences for him?
And it is not clear that Snowden tried "the proper way". He says so, but he doesn't want to prove that in court. Instead he defects to an enemy state and cooperates with their intelligence services. And yes, he did defect and cooperate, the only question is what exactly he did (and still does) and how much of all of this was his intention.
The crimes Snowden committed, if any (it's not clear he could even be convicted), are absolutely legitimate. Publishing secrets you were sworn to keep secret has to be punishable. If someone decides to break those laws, out of ethical considerations, they must also face the consequences.
Unfortunately, the crimes Snowden revealed may well not have seen the light of day without him, which suggests we don't have enough whistleblowers. And beyond that - even the bits of PRISM, XKeyscore and whatnot that were legal are simply not authorized by a democratically elected government; you cannot claim electoral legitimacy while keeping essential parts of your program not only secret, but even publicly paying lipservice to principles in opposition to your very own secret programs. To the extent various US administrations participated in creating these programs they thus necessarily acted without a democratic mandate; after all, they lied about it in public. That's not democracy; that's conspiracy.
Had the programs been discussed at least in general terms, or the quandaries of trading which freedoms exactly for security been acknowledged by the US government, you could make the argument that the technical details must remain secret, but the principal was supported by the electorate. But as is; the whole thing - up to and including the participating judiciary - is no more legitimate than any other stolen election won by lies, propaganda, and misdirection - the kind of principles the US clearly rejects (e.g. https://www.usaid.gov/democracy/supporting-free-and-fair-ele...).
I mean: I completely agree that likely snowden is a criminal. There's little reason to assume otherwise. However, that's kind of besides the point, isn't it? Much, much more important than any one criminal is the responsibility a government, especially one that claims to uphold the ideals of democracy to actually protect its subjects as it claims to. For a sense of scale - consider the fact that governments routinely accept the legality of war, despite the fact that it's essentially akin to accepting mass murder. And I'm not trying to make the case that extreme pacificm is the way to go; but rather the opposite - if we acknowledge that even some of the most serious of crimes are potentially acceptable in the defense of proper governance, then clearly, clearly mere whistleblowing should be a no-brainer, even if that means overriding normal laws.
So the question isn't whether Snowden is criminal, it's why is he criminal? I'd say the party at fault here is the democratically elected US government, not Snowden. The law on this matter is wrong, and should be fixed.
Manning actually faced a trial, and the system even granted her some leniency. Snowden might have found leniency too, but he probably gave that up by defecting to an enemy state.
An enemy state that routinely commits worse crimes against its citizens, than the US has even been accused of. But in Russia, protection of Whistleblowers isn't even a subject worth talking about...
He doesn't want to have to prove something in a secret court, by powers who are clear about their stance, because he exposed them?
How evil.
" If someone decides to break those laws, out of ethical considerations, they must also face the consequences. "
But not if the "crimes" were necessary, to unveil the larger crimes.
Oh and he did face the consequences - he has o live on the run, outside of US reach. That only leaves Russia and co.
"Instead he defects to an enemy state and cooperates with their intelligence services."
And where is a slight proof, that he did do that, beyound releasing the info to everyone?
He is not stupid - once on the hook, he would always remain on the hook of the FSB.
Do you want to apply the same logic here?
Even with all the problems with the US justice system, I'm pretty sure most citizens actually prefer for it to work the way it does currently, rather than not at all.
And I'd rather see Snowden face the music than defect to the Russian intelligence services. There is no way he can refuse cooperation with them. I'm not even entirely convinced that Russia had no role in his actions prior to his defection, or that he really intended to go some place else.
This is a terrible defense for forcing down the planes of people taking political asylum. The choice is not between disrespecting asylum or not having any justice system whatsoever, and it is ridiculous to suggest so.
> And I'd rather see Snowden face the music than defect to the Russian intelligence services
Ah yes, the classic strategy of defecting to Russian intelligence services by leaving Russia to go to Bolivia.
Snowden said he wanted to go to Bolivia... There is no proof he actually intended to go there or that the Russians wouldn't be waiting to work with him there.
Regardless of Snowden's original intentions, he has no power to refuse cooperation with Russian intelligence services. At the very least, he has been trotted out for propaganda reasons like a trained pony. So in essence, yes, he ultimately defected by not standing trial.
And other nations disagree with. Is this not the same as in the Belarusian situation?
> he has no power to refuse cooperation with Russian intelligence services
I don't think it is true that Snowden has no leverage whatsoever. Moreover, what is the evidence? What is the evidence that he is being trotted out for propaganda reasons? What is the evidence he has leaked all this information to the FSB?
And I remember that fake Q&A session with Putin were Snowden asked a question about surveillance of their own people and Putin basically said that the Russian state would never ever do such a horrible thing. It's almost funny.
> There is no way he can refuse cooperation with them.
There's always a way. They were already in great position just having him there. And regarding the latter, there must be very serious investigation following Snowden's actions and if what you say is true, it's extremely hard to believe the investigation has found nothing about it. But it seems so.
Oh yes, sure Snowden could refuse. And the Russian intelligence services will, out of the goodness of their hearts, just stop asking.
Any connections between Russia and Snowden may have been investigated, but the results would not have been made public. That can wait until a trial, at the very least. But again, Snowden didn't stand trial, he defected to Russia...
That is one BS answer. Where did you see that the choice is between what the US have and "not at all".
>"And I'd rather see Snowden face the music than defect to the Russian intelligence services."
Nobody cares what you'd rather see. He did something that he believes was a right thing to do (many other people believe the same). He does not owe it to anyone to give himself up to rot the rest of his life in prison.
And no, for me it is no legitimate choice to selectively ignore laws if they don't suit someone. In a democracy there are well defined systems, which are of course imperfect, to adjudicate and modify those laws. Manning went through that system, and despite all the outrage at her treatment, she got out quite well. Much better than what Snowden might face if he irks Putin...
And that's the choices they make ( assuming they are in position to make it at all). I am not going to judge either.
>"she got out quite well..."
You do not know what she would do given a choice. Also she's been sentenced to 35 years. The only reason she's out is that Obama had commuted her sentence. Otherwise the life for her will be over.
She wouldn't have gotten the pardon if she didn't have some legitimate claim to being a whistleblower.
Of course, a sentence of 35 years sounded ridiculous in her case, but there are legitimate ways to change those laws or ameliorate the consequences. And there is also an argument why disclosure of secrets should carry hefty prison terms, as it can result in casualties. Probably even did, in her case.
I'm not saying she is a terrible person or even that she deserved to be in prison for seven years. I'm just stating that her actions were clearly illegal and had a lot of unambigiously negative consequences. Same thing for Snowden, though he lost a lot of my sympathy by defecting to an enemy state...
Hence forced to land in Vienna.
If you want to argue that there is no difference between an authoritarian state like Belarusa and Russia and the United States in the way they pursue and prosecute those that threaten the state, then go for it, but I'm not buying it.
Honestly, it was kinda laughable. It was so primitive compared to what the 5 eyes routinely do to their own citizens with the aid of social media. Really, they tapped the phone lines but if you said "we shouldn't talk on the phone" that wasn't an admission of guilt or an indication that they should follow you.
And the normal accusation was "mental illness" if you started behaving in ways that the regime didn't approve of. Glenn Greenwald's latest piece [0] on his struggles with corporate media rang the same bell: "Depicting critics of liberal orthodoxies as mentally ill, rage-driven bullies, and shadows of their former selves, is a long-time tactic of guardians of establishment liberalism to expel dissidents from their in-group circles." Replace liberalism with authoritarian socialism and same same.
I was struck by how far we've gone towards something that even the East Germans considered untenable and intrusive.
[0] https://greenwald.substack.com/p/corporate-medias-double-sta...
And you can't compare liberalism with real threat to your life from being tortured in soviet psychiatric hospitals. In fact to have almost zero chance to get such treatment even if you'll post thousands of posts like this about liberalism per day.
Watch the movie balloon to get a feeling how it was to live there. Not the same, at all.
That is not actually true, and I am saying this as a dual citizen who is culturally American. Under 8 USC section 1185(b) it is unlawful for any Untied States Citizen to depart from or enter or attempt to depart from or enter the United States without a United States Passport. So you need an US passport to leave or enter the US even though you do not show immigration agents your passport when leaving the US. When you return you will need your US passport to be admitted.
While it is true that there is no "passport control" on exit in the US (while there is in Europe), it could be easily implemented and scaled into action by a simple law passing Congress.
On the other hand, this hijacking probably took everyone off-guard. They also didn't divert the plane because of a wanted individual but they made up a fake reason. This is piracy/hijacking plain and simple.
But above all, I don't understand why you think you have any right whatsoever to tell others which governments are good or bad for them.
And to all those who tell "we must react", ask yourself if you are prepared to die for "democracy in Belorussia". Because this is where it might end if you don't uderstand that the only place you do have the right to choose the government for is your "land of the free". So called , that is.
You should be very careful making statements like this. The United States jumped into two world wars that were thousands of miles away from its shores - and those were in periods of history when "isolationism" was considered a popular virtue.
Generally speaking, Americans are judgmental, moralistic, and bloodthisrty. This can be a force for good and/or evil.
It underscored that with the support of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, Mr. Lukashenko is prepared to go to extraordinary lengths to repress dissent....
In Russia — where the state media described last year’s uprising against Mr. Lukashenko as a Western plot — the arrest met with approval among Mr. Putin’s supporters. Margarita Simonyan, editor of the pro-Kremlin RT television network, wrote on Twitter that Mr. Lukashenko “played it beautifully.” And Vyacheslav Lysakov, a member of Parliament allied with Mr. Putin, described Mr. Protasevich’s arrest as a “brilliant special operation.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/23/world/europe/ryanair-bela...
In earlier cases with genuinely surprising events they have refrained from commenting for sometimes quite a long time. The fact that they congratulate Lukashenka so quickly suggests that they were able to get a rapid confirmation from officials that this should be promoted instead of condemned, and it suggests that more likely than not this wasn't a surprise for Kremlin, that they were informed beforehand or perhaps even participated in making that "brilliant special operation" happen.
Russia benefits politically, too - sanctions will be imposed by the West now, driving Belarus closer to Russia.
Now that the plane has arrived at the intended destination (Vilnius), it was missing two Belarusian citizens (Protasevich, and presumably his girlfriend who was on the flight has also been arrested) and four Russian citizens. There are some rumors that those four people were trailing Protasevich before the flight and were involved in the 'bomb threat', so it might as well have been a common Belarussion-Russian operation, but as of now it's all just guesses and speculation, perhaps tomorrow we'll have better info.
Not that it was right, but still quite a difference.
You can "trap" planes by closing airspace all around them? That is effectively what occurred for the Morales flight. I don't think it is effectively distinguishable.
It is very straightforward. Very straightforward.
Just like in Cambodia, or Rwanda, or North Korea, or many, many other examples - as a rule, the world does not intervene with violent regime change just because a regime is abusing their people. Like, nobody in power batted an eye when Saddam gassed Kurds in his territory, intervention happened only when he invaded Kuwait. I'm not even sure if I have seen a single exception in 20th-21st century history; it feels like humanitarian aspects have been only used as a pretext or justification if there were other politic/economic reasons that mattered more than that.
Libya 2011 was a civil war/revolution, the "boots on the ground" were locals, western nations weren't willing to risk their own soldiers in an actual intervention and it's highly debatable whether the civilian abuse was ever a reason for the western support (aerial and otherwise), IMHO it was essentially about oil.
Syria is again a good counterexample - Assad's totalitarian suppression of human rights and torture of opposition was notorious and one of the triggers for the uprising in 2011, but noone considered an intervention before 2011 or at that time for these reasons - Assad's regime is a clear demonstration that no, the world is not going to intervene just because your police is e.g. literally pulling fingernails off highschoolers who have been reported as criticizing the regime. The west was ready to intervene only a few years later in 2014, when the civil war had already raged for years and again it seems to have been done for entirely different reasons e.g. Islamic State, geopolitical tug-of-war with Russia and, again, oil - those things matter for likelihood of intervention, unlike just abusing your civilians.
Afghanistan and Vietnam are obviously irrelevant, IMHO noone is seriously asserting that preventing regime atrocities against their own people was the main driver for these wars, other reasons were clearly dominant there.
So in my view all those are just examples that the world is not going to do anything serious just because a dictator is murdering or torturing internal opposition. They may invade for various other reasons, and they may opportunistically support one side or the other once some conflict or revolt is already happening (war doesn't seem as horrible if it's all done by someone else's people fighting and suffering), but as long as the totalitarian state is in control, nobody is going to come and bust the oppressed out of their prisons just to help them.
I don't think the evidence is there to support that Libya was "essentially about oil." There is evidence for that possibly being a major motivation for France, but that was only one of multiple large players in the intervention. Libya was invaded with UN security council authorization pretty explicitly focused on humanitarian concerns.
Your timeline on Syria is wrong. Sure, much more extensive intervention began against ISIL in 2014, but there was support for early rebel forces in Syria starting in 2012.
I am not claiming that such things should be left with no response. In fact, I suspect this might hasten Lukashenko's downfall (quod licet Iovi, non licet bovi), but he is just taking a page from the "western civilization" playbook. My 2c.
I seem to remember there’s a term for what you’re doing in your post…
There is a huge difference between diverting an international flight and terrorising one’s own citizens. The latter is a humanitarian crisis. The former is a threat to me and my family. That’s a material difference.
At the very least, Belarusian air space and air access rights should be curtailed. It would also be reasonable to scramble NATO assets to protect those airways.
Nobody proposed NATO air dominance over Belarus. What I proposed is restricting international flights through Belarusian ATZ, denying Belarusian flights international overfly, escorting international flights that get close to Belarus with armed NATO platforms and denying neighbouring airspace to Belarusian armed platforms.
Would they actually do anything more than that?
That also makes me worried, because they're a nuclear nation and when someone is cornered or has nothing left to lose they can become seriously dangerous.
So what? Do you remember what had happened to MH17? So what?
You're not going to get a lot of people on your side suggesting we do to Belarus what we did to Japan.
Look at Putin - doesn't matter what he does, his retinue does what they want. They are enjoying super-yachts, parking them without any issues in European ports, their kids are still “almost gods” and do whatever they want.
The western world gratefully takes the money from dictatorship regimes, and they don't give a shit where money comes from.
While it happens, dictators will not stop. As soon as dictators lose their establishment support, they’ll be overthrown.
All of the “sanctions” are so ridiculous, that it looks like these sanctions were made to calm down the own citizens, not to stop this devastating money flow.
Regimes like that change only when forced by violence or credible threats of violence in their territory - actual power, not "soft power", it will change only because of large quantities of people in Belarus/Minsk actually make the change happen (as opposed to just asking for change). Looking around, who might make such a change?
1. Western countries definitely won't do that in Belarus, a boots-on-the-ground invasion like that seems totally implausible and would risk escalation into a military conflict with Russia, it's just not going to happen;
2. The Belarus opposition decided to explicitly avoid trying anything and limit their activities to nonviolent protests - last year there were some moments where perhaps they had a chance to overthrow the regime if they tried, but now the regime has succeeded in repressing the opposition (partly through acts like in this article), they can't rally masses as much anymore, so no chances in the short term;
3. Russia has no need to do that, they seem to be satisfied with the current direction and whatever deals they made;
4. Internally, the regime seems stable. Last year perhaps there were some questions on whether all structures of power would support Lukashenka, but that seems to be over for now - but IMHO this is the only thing that can change the country's direction, if the regime stays unified, Lukashenka will get away with all of this (and, most likely, escalate it) for a decade or more easily, the existing regime is stuck and can't change (since as soon as they loosen the grip, they'll end up like Gaddafi), but if a "court coup" happens, they might change the direction.
So all that's on the table is complaining loudly and sanctions that aren't going to be effective in the short term. I mean, the only way how sanctions can work is if they make the economic situation dire enough so that Belarus people actually do revolt, until that, the regime will make sure that the siloviki get their share of the dwindling funds and it won't change their behavior as that behavior is now required for their self-preservation.
Why so?
NATO completely towers over Belorus army. It has only a single airbase — Minsk, and all its air defence for this city only.
More importantly, it's military is critically short of skilled manpower, just like is Russian army (having more vehicles than pilots for them.)
Belarus triggering a defence treaty with Russia? Pffff, he can trigger it upon his own head, as did Armenia.
Russia will not come when faced with credible force.
> but now the regime has succeeded in repressing the opposition (partly through acts like in this article), they can't rally masses as much anymore, so no chances in the short term;
Any government in the world can be overthrown by a popular revolt. Any.
If you think about things seriously, and reject useless sentimentalism, using power starts make sense.
A very obvious benefit of doing so, is that it is the quickest, and easiest way to discredit defeatist voices.
But when I called US being few years away from the second civil war here 4 years ago, people weren't very kind. Half laughed me out, and another half got me banned.
Maybe, sometimes, people have to be told not to take serious political matters of national importance so dismissively.
It's not like it's a north versus south thing.
And its not what I want for my country
In fact I think the only way to remove Lugabe at this point is to remove Putin first, but since this is not happening before second cold war, my only advice for compatriots fortunate enough is to leave
2. You tell them how to procure, and handle a weapon
3. You teach them squad, and platoon level tactics
4. You get few people with proper military education to run this
5. You call defeatists their names
But if most of them were willing to do that, then the same motivation would apply for the conscripts who currently make up the army and do have all the weapons required, so that would be the scenario of "internal coup" with army turning against Lukashenka; but we as far as we see, neither the army nor the general population are currently eager for violent action, so things would have to get much worse before they might reconsider.
Historically, majority of popular armed revolts were followed by bloodbaths, and years of economic dismay. Falling of Eastern bloc was a major exception, because USSR, the primary sponsor, crumbled itself. And even then there was Yugoslavia.
Dying in the name of freedom is just too much to ask of a normal person. Moving and freeing yourself is a more pragmatic move. Its not that hard to uphold your ethnic identity outside of arbitrarily defined borders, anyway.
Foreign invasion, on the other hand, has a much higher potential to galvanise all sorts of radicalists, as it has done every single time, everywhere.
So, please, be mindful of your call to arms to people in the faraway lands.
Lots of keyboard warriors here. It would do good for them to fix their own proper first.
>"Dying in the name of freedom is just too much to ask of a normal person"
They do not mind as long as it is not their own life.
Everything you say is true. However, what about the people who are left behind, who are too old or too poor or too weak to free themselves?
Sometimes you take one for the team in order to help everyone else. Even in the face of fear, the threat to yourself and your family, pragmatism, and common sense, you must take up arms to fight the oppressor and secure your country's future.
It is this sense of duty and honor that raises us above the animals and allows us to bond together and fight a common foe, yet even animals will fight to defend their house, families, and freedom.
> Historically, majority of popular armed revolts were followed by bloodbaths, and years of economic dismay. Falling of Eastern bloc was a major exception, because USSR, the primary sponsor, crumbled itself. And even then there was Yugoslavia.
Again, all you say is true. However, there are more examples.
The nation of Texas was born from violence and revolution.
Santa Anna attempted absolute rule over the citizens in the Mexican states. He first tried to peaceably seize all arms from the Mexican states. After some initial resistance, Santa Anna was successful in subduing the other two Mexican states, but those obstinate Texians would not be quelled easily.
The Texians, as well as two other Mexican states, didn't give them up, but resisted[1].
In Gonzales, Texas, the Mexican army tried to seize a small cannon and the Texians, armed only with the small cannon and muskets, erected a flag that said "Come and Take It". They were successful that day, but, as you point out, then the bloodbath still came, at the Alamo and other bloody battles. As you know, the Texians fought hard against tyranny and were ultimately successful; they won independence from Mexico to form The Republic of Texas.
Nearly one hundred years earlier, the United States was born from a popular armed revolt.
As with Texas, the U.S. only declared independence as a last resort, and after the colonists attempted to negotiate with their oppressors and resolve their differences. The Declaration of Independence was followed by multiple written warnings and documents.
Even most patriotic Americans are not aware of everything that transpired. There, again, the British army attempted to seize the arms of the citizenry before armed revolt broke out. It took literally years before the Americans took up arms, and multiple documents to King George warning that the situation was untenable, even at grave risk to the authors of those documents.
For example, The Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms[2] preceded The Declaration of Independence. Everyone knows the first line or two of the Declaration of Independence, but the full Declaration reveals in detail why the King's subjects were revolting and the "repeated injuries and usurpations"[3].
Thomas Jefferson put it most eloquently in the Declaration for Independence in 1776, after years of negotiation with the Crown had failed.
"That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends [the pursuit of rights endowed by the Creator, that is: life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness], it is the right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness… it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."
-Thomas Jefferson, The Declaration of Independence: July 4, 1776
A revolution that is grounded in prudence and common sense looks beyond the awful but short-term war to a future of freedom, for generations to come.
1. https://guncite.com/journals/haltex.html
2. https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/congress-issues-...
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Declaration_of_I...
I'm not talking about the ability, I'm talking about the will to spill your soldiers blood for such a purpose. A boots-on-the-ground invasion is off the table because western countries would consider that price far, far too high for such a goal. I mean, muster a large scale invasion, for what? A couple dead journalists? Looking at other potential interventions, even literal mass concentration camps would probably be tolerated without escalating to an invasion. No, the western political will in this case is definitely limited to sanctions only. They might perhaps assist one side in a local conflict (i.e. the locals provide "boots on the grounds" and any blood to be spilled, while outsiders provide money and arms), this has happened in quite some places, but in Belarus there isn't an ongoing violent conflict between two sides, there's just the state applying small scale police action against individuals, there aren't any "rebel organizations" that would be capable of receiving such support.
> Belarus triggering a defence treaty with Russia?
We'd expect Russia to come in with force to prevent a pro-western government forming, treaty or not - e.g. if it seemed that Lukashenka would agree to cede power to a pro-western opposition, I wouldn't be surprised at an intervention from Russia even if Lukashenka would object. Once again, such scenarios were discussed and considered credible last year, but weren't "tested" as it turned out differently.
> Russia will not come when faced with credible force.
Perhaps, but there isn't a credible will to apply force, so any threats of such force would be treated by Russia as obvious bluffs.
> Any government in the world can be overthrown by a popular revolt. Any.
Of course, but a popular revolt isn't happening in Belarus, the opposition chose (and are still choosing) not to revolt and limit their activities to nonviolent protest - if you'd call that defeatist, I might agree, but that was the initial position and they seem to have succeeded in spreading that doctrine, and it would take time to reverse it. And the lack of practical reaction of people to the state abuse of power and the failure of various attempts at general strikes indicates that the conditions aren't even close to a revolt.
For a one big thing, for honour
For not letting a foul CPSU nincompoop spitting in the face of the Whole Western World from the doorstep of Europe.
I mean, you might be able to convince me that the world should work that way, but it definitely does not work that way right now.
Armenia did not trigger anything. It was not under attack.
Not to mention this was a lesson to Pashinyan.
As for Yerevan - they were almost ready to throw him our of the office when they finally realised they have been lied about their military state and success.
Serves them right.
I don't disagree with your conclusion, but I just don't understand why so many trillions of dollars around the world are being spent on military power that just sits by and watches dictatorships kidnap protestors from other countries and execute them.
Having grown up in the early 2000s and seen some offensively transparent excuses to start military invasions, surely this is a far more justifiable reason for conflict. Is everyone just waiting for Lukashenko and Putin to die and hoping that their successors won't be as maniacal?
I can't see how you'd interpret that as anything except an act of war. That doesn't seem like an offensively transparent excuse to me. Certainly in comparison to "My fortune cookie said they might have WMDs" or whatever the line was two decades ago that was apparently good enough for the US.
I'd say "what does it take, a literal invasion?" but that already happened in Crimea.
We make wars to control energy sources, trade routes, etc. The west as happily puts a dictator in place of a democratic government when it's in their interest (or the best interest of the men in power and their supports).
It's very clear how this played out in Libya, for instance, if you read the leaked Hillary Clinton emails. [0]
If you were around during that time, you should know that for most people, the justifications being bandied around were much less "offensively transparent" at the time. Just look at public opinion, headlines, etc. - opposition to intervention was a massive minority opinion. Most people believed about the WMDs, etc.
Now, opinion has shifted quite substantially - so why is it surprising that people are skeptical of intervention?
Personally, as a citizen of the US, I would fight tooth & nail against any deployment of troops over this. In no way am I confident fewer people would die or be harmed with intervention.
https://www.ekathimerini.com/news/1161646/greek-foreign-mini...
https://twitter.com/vonderleyen/status/1396566441370001413
The outrageous and illegal behaviour of the regime in Belarus will have consequences.
Those responsible for the #Ryanair hijacking must be sanctioned.
Journalist Roman Protasevich must be released immediately.
EUCO will discuss tomorrow action to take.
PS: Which also brings to mind the downed Malaysian flight when flying over Russian-friendly Ukraine. I hope that airlines also have these areas in their no-fly lists.
A similar situation from a few weeks ago.
they will send a strongly worded letter, no doubt about it
Of course this is a very convenient coincidence here that a random emergency happens with a wanted man in board...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655
Not that the US was wrong to be on high alert:
Flights already do a big detour around Ukraine because of their conflict with Russia. In fact, middle eastern hubs would love Belarus airspace to be restricted, it makes their routes much more competitive. Flights to SE Asia often fly further south, over the caucuses, Afg/Iran to SNG, or Iraq/Iran to Qatar since the GCC blockade. (Iran charges considerable fees for this btw, a good source of hard currency.)
I'm afraid Russia has everything to do with this incident. There is no way they would do this without Putin's okay. That he is willing to risk Russian airspace rights shows how desperately worried he is about popular uprisings.
The ops.group newsletter [0] is a great resource for understanding flight restrictions.
[0] https://ops.group/blog/assessing-the-risk-operations-over-co...
No refunds for anyone...
Nothing can finish off a corporate announcement better than a Liability Avoidance and Risk Reduction statement :)
The omissive wording is utterly revolting. While the Ryanair PR people were at it they could’ve taken it a small step forward and said that a few passengers decided to stay as they really enjoyed the sights.
I haven't tried to find the actual flight path, but for a transport aircraft at cruise the "closest airport" would not be underneath the flight's position, but rather at some distance away corresponding to the computed distance to reach the surface in an idle power descent.¹
From 30,000+ feet I'd expect that value to lie around 60–80 miles, iirc.
/Acey
¹–ignoring in-flight fires, medical emergencies, etc., that might dictate an unusually steep descent profile.
Even with the benefit of the doubt, it looks very shady. You could probably argue that it's the closest airport within the airspace they're currently occupying (which was Belarus airspace at the time) but the whole Belarus narrative stinks.
What particularly stinks is the Ryanair response/reaction. I can only assume that Ryanair is being coy about the whole situation because they want to continue using Belarus airspace, but there might be more to it.
Unless it’s an inflight emergency pilots will normally follow the recommendations of ATC. “There is a report you have a bomb onboard and divert to Minsk where we have a bomb squad” would likely work.
Over any terrain with appreciable elevation differences, topographic features can easily rule out otherwise eligible airfields because you'll have to cross granite on the glide down.
/Acey
I left that off before but it begged mentioning since it's a question that asks for a real answer/confirmation if starting from jet cruise altitudes. If you are starting at FL410, you could easily head down a box canyon accidentally when the Alps, Pyrenees, Rockies, etc. are nearby.
They couldn't because the fighter jets forced them to land at Minsk.
"The @Ryanair flight took off just now from Minsk bound for Vilnius. Great news for everyone especially the families and friends of people onboard."
https://twitter.com/AdinaValean/status/1396513415007506432
"Everyone"??
>"This was a case of state-sponsored hijacking - state-sponsored piracy," Michael O'Leary told Newstalk radio.
>"It appears the intent of the authorities was to remove a journalist and his travelling companion. We believe there were some KGB (State Security Committee of the Republic of Belarus) agents offloaded at the airport as well,"
I wonder what would have happened if they just delayed until they were in lithuanian airspace.
EDIT: just realized there were fighter jets involved...
The aircraft's registration is SP-RSM, which is Polish:
* https://www.flightradar24.com/data/flights/fr4978#27cce9a2
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_registration_...
Poland is a member of NATO. Also, Lithuania and Greece, the source and destination of the flight, are also both in NATO.
Ireland is not involved in this conversation. All elements are related to NATO countries.
Even the airline, Buzz (aka Ryanair Sun), which is the legal owner of the aircraft, is headquartered in Poland:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buzz_(Ryanair)
* https://www.planespotters.net/airframe/boeing-737-800-sp-rsm...
There seems to be some sort of an orchestrated action behind spreading this distorted version of events - I see it on Twitter as well.
Might be a good way to start a war.
Not quite the same, of course (no third-party country involved and passenger in question was released shortly thereafter), but forcing commercial airliners to land seems to be somewhat more common than I thought.
> They were only 50km from their destination country's airspace
Just in case, Kyiv is like 75km from Belarusian border
The Ryanair diversion is a straight-up airplane hijacking.
Qatar was doing massive detours a couple of years ago to keep flying (of course money wasn't an issue for them)
But detouring Bielorussia might be even cheaper than forced landings, who knows.
Unless Ryanair's reputation takes a big hit, I'm guessing the answer is all of them.
And there flights weren't even officially targeted. This flight was intercepted by an armed military jet. From there it can quickly escalate in the event of a misunderstanding.
Detain every single passenger for rest of the year.
- Flight EU to EU
- fake bomb threat
- possibly forced to divert to minsk airport by a fighter jet (wasn't the nearest airport)
- potential death penalty for targeted journalist
So while we know who “someone” is and that it’s all planned in advance (the journalist reported that he was followed minutes before take-off), technically speaking the safety protocols were followed, and when landed they arrested a wanted man once he was on their soil.
This reminds me of force landing Bolivian president’s plane in the EU flying from Moscow when they thought Edward Snowden was on the plane.
It should be considered and questioned, but it may not be nefarious.
Why are you straining so hard to give this criminal act plausible deniability?
You can easily look up the track of the aircraft. There is no "tailwind" that would have made Minsk the shorter flight.
Im not a pilot, much less a pilot in that part of the world. But I do know that planes are generally only talking to 1 ATC at a time and it takes time to get in touch with another. And that pilots have very specific checklists and procedures when needing to call emergency landings. Listen to the Sully recordings when he ditched in an emergency. NJ was closer but he was still in contact and it would have taken too long.
So if they get called for an emergency and are forced to make a landing, there are protocols in place to swiftly determine the when, where etc of setting down.
Unless you are going to make the accusation that the pilots are political agents/operatives...
Europe consistenly gets the highest ranking in things that test for different aspects of freedom (democracy, press, police violence, etc.)
To be clear: it's not that Europe can't do better, but if you care about 'freedom' it's a better place to be than pretty much any other region on the planet.
He was _talking_ to NY TRACON. That doesn't mean he was somehow required to land in NY, not NJ. His first request to ATC was whether he could land at Teterboro (in NJ). They got on the phone and got permission for him, in order to avoid having to switch frequencies.
> So if they get called for an emergency and are forced to make a landing, there are protocols in place to swiftly determine the when, where etc of setting down.
Indeed there are, and literally none of them have to do with which ATC center the pilot happens to be communicating with at that point.
> Unless you are going to make the accusation that the pilots are political agents/operatives...
The pilots were looking at a MiG-29 out their window. They did not have a choice in the matter.
Other interesting tidbit, the person claimed to be fine about 30 minutes later after talking to 2 doctors. But the ground crew said they required people to go to the hospital now for a full eval.
I see, so if you want an expedited landing you need to convince one of the other passengers on the plane to fake a heart attack.
Only that I have doubts that the pilots did NOT follow the proper protocols or were somehow involved in a conspiracy here. Commercial aviation is one of the few jobs where theres little tolerance for deviation of established protocols and checklists, especially in declared emergencies. And a lot of the routing decisions arent necessarily made by them.
I understand some may find that offensive.. But it doesn't change my view on the matter. Nonetheless, i dont really see what is so controversial about stating it. It doesn't really excuse anything here....
https://onemileatatime.com/bomb-threat-el-al-787-fighter-jet...
Clearly what happened here is that the fake bomb threat was an excuse, and the purpose of the interceptor there was to demonstrate to the crew of the airplane that the use of force was a possibility. This plane was "forced down" by any reasonable use of the term.
> This reminds me of force landing Bolivian president’s plane in the EU flying from Moscow when they thought Edward Snowden was on the plane.
Had to correct this elsewhere: there was no forced landing there at all. They were denied airspace privileges to cross most of western europe, which isn't the same thing at all. They landed in a friendly-ish nation, and were never boarded by anyone hostile or otherwise intercepted by law enforcement.
What happened in the Snowden case was DIPLOMACY ("you may not travel here if you carry this man"), not force.
So repercussions tend to range from nothing, through wagging fingers, slaps on the wrist, to sanctions, UN resolutions, UN-sanctioned wars, or if you really piss someone off, non-sanctioned wars.
I don’t think Belarus will be invaded, and I guess Russia would veto any particularly nasty move in the UN, so really this leaves stern words and some unilateral sanctions against the Lukshenko regime. Doesn’t seem like overwhelming penalty (though well-targeted and enforced sanctions can bite quite badly).
The pilots could report that they are having technical difficulties and are unable to override the current route programmed into the autopilot. They are also have issues disengaging the autopilot. So they are "forced" to continue their flight on their pre-filed flight plan.
Any direction from ATC would be replied with "Unable":
* https://www.boldmethod.com/blog/lists/2021/01/10-times-you-s...
* https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/7915/who-has-th...
* https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/24756/when-can-...
* https://atccommunication.com/cannot-comply-with-an-atc-clear...
Short of shooting down the plane there's nothing anyone can do about it.
And MiG-29 sprinkled same kind of diplomacy here - they weren't shot down, they just were diplomatically notified that in their best interest is to land down. See, no force, pure diplomacy.
Denying Morale's plane permission was an act of diplomacy, albeit a very uncommon one and one in pursuit of an unjust goal.
Forcing down a foreign airplane on an international flight to arrest someone on it is an act of war. Sorry.
A major international incident (the head of state of one nation violating the airspace of another) that completely and utterly dwarfs whatever nonsense was going on with Snowden. I know it's hard for geeks here to understand, but Snowden just isn't that important.
Again: he wasn't even on the plane. And Morales apparently had no intention of putting him on there. He was just pissed off that no one trusted him about that.
The Ryanair plane didn't deliberately violate the airspace of Belarus in violation of withdrawn permission, they filed a flight plan to Vilnius just like they had every day for years and years. It was an airliner on a scheduled flight.
Your counterfactual involving a deliberate invasion of another country seems... extraordinarily weird. I mean, yes, countries defend their airspace when it's invaded by other nations in violation of established treaties. Duh. That is not what happened yesterday at all and you fucking know it. Stop this.
Same thing happened on 9/11 - US chose do land all aircrafts, and in case that anyone disobeyed orders it would be promptly shot down - foreign planes or not, it didn't matter in slightest.
Second: they let the plane in on a flight plan that clearly took it to Vilnius. Again, that's false pretenses.
Per the analogy above: consider a consulate telling someone "sure, you can board this plane without your passport, it's fine" and then arresting the person for a visa violation on landing.
Looks like they learned from the best.
Yeah, this is trolling.
Yep, unsophisticated peasants tend to use more force than experienced urbanites. Dreadful, don't you know.
This is exactly what Belarus just did. The US and it's allies are now strongly objecting that it's illegal and improper to do exactly what they've previously done.
The idea of mutually agreeing to allow commercial transportation aircraft to transit your airspace is supposed to be that this is not done. It is hugely hypocritical for the US to have used this same tactic, even if done through proxies.
No it's not?!
Had Belarus closed their airspace, the ryanair flight would have had to fly around (or divert to Warsaw or Lviv)
Not defending it, especially the alleged search once it landed, but it was very different to a hoax bomb threat on a commercial plane
> It would be illegal for the pilots to ignore such an order while inside a country's airspace.
The pilots could report that they are having technical difficulties and are unable to override the current route programmed into the autopilot. They are also have issues disengaging the autopilot. So they are "forced" to continue their flight on their pre-filed flight plan.
Any direction from ATC would be replied with "Unable":
* https://www.boldmethod.com/blog/lists/2021/01/10-times-you-s...
* https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/7915/who-has-th...
* https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/24756/when-can-...
* https://atccommunication.com/cannot-comply-with-an-atc-clear...
Short of shooting down the plane there's nothing anyone can do about it.
The article doesn't say that the bomb threat claim came from anyone on the plane. Rather, it implies the pilots were informed of the alleged threat by Belarus air traffic control as the pretext for demanding that the plane divert.
Based on the current facts being reported, it seems pretty clear what is going on here.
It's not unheard of for military jets to escort civilian planes to an airport, for example
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/ryanair-flight-escort...
(Of course the situation of how the bomb threat came to be is different in this case, and IMO airlines now need to avoid Belarus overflights)
https://twitter.com/PavelLatushka/status/1396519000830582784
Belarusian Air Force fighter-interceptor manoeuvred to signal to the pilots of a Ryanair airliner:follow me”. The captain of the civilian aircraft was obliged to obey. The captain may have disobeyed the dispatcher's command, but the threat from a military aircraft was obligatory.
No sane or insane pilot is going to risk it, however. Unless the pilot was certain that his and all of passengers fate were in danger, they are going to follow that fighter jet.
https://nationalpost.com/news/world/iran-shot-down-plane-ful...
Don’t forget https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655
The radio words to use are standardised so they even work in case one side doesn't speak English. The signals are also very simple (rock wings, certain turns, gear up/down).
No need to think about being shot down or not, no need to scare, any commercial flight being intercepted would follow directions.
Did he get on their soil though? Usually, you stay in the international zone when between flights, so, here, the passengers should not have entered Belarus. Do we know what happened in the airport?
for example, when US agents capture people outside US and load them on a plane to bring in to US they actually formally arrest and charge them only when the plane enters US airspace.
Nation states exist in a state of nature, and unfortunately might usually makes right. Superpowers can, and often do, simply decide that aspects of international law just don't apply to them. Of course, that doesn't stop them holding weaker powers to those standards.
To be clear, I don’t think pilots should be in a position to judge the truthfulness of ATF or the government they’re flying over and I don’t think pilot judgment is the “solution” to this loophole that has now been abused twice (that we know). I’m just curious about the process and what would happen if a pilot decided to call the bluff. Would Belarus (or whichever country) scramble fighter jets to force a landing? Would the pilot get in trouble? Is the answer different for a private flight vs commercial flight vs diplomatic flight?
So IMO pilot could ignore their requirements and I think that nothing would happen outside of angry transmissions. Especially if the plane was near border. But I don't think that it would be reasonable, especially in an airplane full of innocent people.
Twice?
Plane crew change squawk code to intercepted (7700) not 7500 which would indicate terrorist act.
What happened is clear even before crew and passengers start giving press interviews in Vilnius.
And please do not compare it to Bolivian case, then crew decided (to land) and was not put under duress by fighter plane.
https://www.flightradar24.com/blog/squawking-7700-in-flight-...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evo_Morales_grounding_incident
This one involved KGB agents who coerced the flight to divert by claiming there was a bomb
On this topic, this happened with a flight from a US's air base in Afghanistan, rerouted to Iran because of a "bureaucratic issue":
[0] - https://www.reuters.com/article/usa-iran-aircraft/u-s-says-p...
Quite contrary, I'm asking for the basis and the motive of denying one specific flight with one specific individual on board a routine procedure of air travel, something that was allowed to hundreds of other flights on that same day. "landing" vs "airspace" is a non-essential detail here, and depending on the context of a situation, either could be denied to achieve the desired goal. I'm asking about the motives of the goal.
no doubt, when force is the standard a murderer wins over a pickpocket. And then it escalates.
What do you think would happen if Ryanair's pilot refuse to cooperate with Belarus's request?
In both cases it was to detain somebody doing an act of public service on behalf of their country - an act treated as criminal. This is the important part.
Passengers on the Bolivia's flight were at no point in danger. They could have picked another country, Russia or Russia-friendly one to land. Can you say the same with Ryannair's ones? Did they have the choice?
It's not, your kettle is also black.
How long the democratic nations of Europe permit an autocratic regime in their bosom is an open question…if I was Belarus I’d keep my fucking head down.
The thing about a destabilised world order is that it works both ways.
Which is a good thing, War rarely turns out well.
An appropiate reaction would be to stop overflights of Belarus - which both eliminates the risk of Belarus forcing down civilian planes, and reduces Belarussian income
Not to mention that Russia is no doing very well themselves.
Maybe it took 30 years to become obvious to you but at least you got it - sadly that happened only when you ended being on a receiving end.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/nov/16/eu-hungary-vet...
Belarus is probably as autocratic as Russia. Hungary significantly less so. Poland is significantly less autocratic than Hungary.
As a Pole, I don't support the current Polish government, but putting Belarus, Hungary, and Poland into one basket simply feels wrong.
There have been autocratic regimes in the region throughout recorded history. It's the "democratic nations of Europe" bit which is novel. I guess gentle pressure will be applied and hopefully when Lukashenko and Putin die or otherwise go we'll get someone more reasonable.
Their territory, their rules.
Total export sanctions to the west? They sell some fuel etc. and EU is a large trading partner.
This sort of coexistence has been attempted and patently failed.
It's their population, not ours. An important distinction.
We (rest of the world, but particularly Europe) need to get stricter.
Honestly, I wish the next step would be for NATO to step in and restore the country to a legitimate government. Between this, Syria, Lebanon, Ukraine, China, Israel, the world has been way too conivent with the destruction of democracy.
What a country wants is not in general what those in power want.
Also I think that the more sanctions are put from West to Belarus, the closer it gets to become another Russia state. I'm not sure if that's the outcome West wants to see.
This is plain and simple hijacking of an international flight and not “within bounds” at all. Laws are to be followed in principle, not just technical merit, these are not computer games.
About half of Belarus's trade is with Russia. All this would accomplish is making it 90%+ and deepen ties with Russia. Might as well suggest having Russia annex Belarus as a response to the situation.
The population voted for the opposition candidate, took to the streets when the results were rigged, but had no leaders willing to escalate the confrontation when the state had its pants down. The dictator has buckled his pants and has gradually reduced the opposition to posting memes in Telegram chats. And even this activity is no longer safe.
Are we talking about military leaders who support the current dictator? What could the leaders of the opposition have done to escalate the confrontation further?
Such a move would affect them the most.
Will it work? Very iffy - often the only thing worse than an autocratic regime is whatever fills the power vacuum its fall creates. Disorderly transfers of power are bad business.
I could swear I saw recent research indicating that the fraction of protest movements that lead to regime change has fallen over time, but I can't find it now.
[1] https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2020/03/10/politica...
But when they're up against armed militia and police, they can't do much (this is why so many Americans are adamant about the 1st Amendment).
Targeted sanctions are the only ethical option at this point. Don't make the population suffer like we did for Iraq.
- Recognize Tsikhanouskaya government as interim government in exile. Insist that this government is the official venue for any engagement (exports, imports, sport event participation).
- Ban all regime officials in all branches from entry.
The focus shifts to cyber warfare where you take out infrastructure.
Active non-recognition can be a good option here: since there is no recognized government, in all applicable cases (events, elections in international organizations etc) it shall be decided that Belarus abstained from vote or was absent. Membership and contractual payments from Belarus can be rejected and considered not happening, resulting in suspensions, sanctions and cancellations and so on and so on.
It is a matter of political will, which is the only thing that is practically lacking.
It is hard to see requiring an alternative candidate (whose persecution blew up the country) register a victory in increasingly totalitarian place as anything but deflection. Bailing out on technicality.
Poland is apparently really mad about this, and given that Ukraine is currently at war with Russia you can probably get them on board. Just those two are a pretty good "wall". Maybe add in a few states blocking northern routes (Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia), or not as effectively (Germany, Denmark, Sweden) and they're really isolated from everything apart from Russia.
Anyways, idle speculation, I'm definitely not an expert on this type of politics. I'm sure that in reality a move like this would have all sorts of consequences that I can't predict.
/s
* https://www.wing.com.ua/images/stories/library/ovd/9433.pdf
So I guess the Belarus government would try to claim whatever agreement caused this part:
>1.2.1 Pilots-in-command of civil aircraft should be aware that interception may take place in the event that military,customs or police authorities of a State:
>...
>d) suspect that an aircraft is engaged in illegal flight and/or transportation of illicit goods or persons, inconsistent withthe aims of the Chicago Convention and contrary to the laws of said State.
>...
I note there there is nothing in there about a bomb threat. So the bomb threat was likely a separate gambit that didn't work.
This seems to be quite insane either way. If an interception goes bad the result could be the destruction of the civil aircraft. Not worth the potential risk, no matter who might be on the flight.
If the pilot didn't I doubt they'd actually shoot the plane down, but that's a bet that they took and won. The pilot obviously chose the safer option for himself and almost everyone onboard.
>Ms Tikhanovskaya said Mr Protasevich, 26, had left Belarus in 2019 and covered the events of the 2020 presidential election with Nexta, after which criminal charges were filed against him in Belarus.
>She said he faced the death penalty in Belarus as he has been categorised as a terrorist.
So the charges were pre-concocted. They didn't have to make any up at the last moment.
https://www.ekathimerini.com/news/1161646/greek-foreign-mini...
edit: why is this being downvoted? Certain countries have harsh drug laws and couldn't care less whether the use is legitimate or not. Even if you don't have any medication on you, but you have metabolites you can get yourself in prison. This should be called out, but it seems like people have succumbed to prohibitionist propaganda.
Europe to SE-Asia almost always involves flying over quite a few 'problematic' areas.
It seems nowadays any people acquiring power in a smaller country can only care about keeping this power, and nothing else.
And any revolutionary movement against dictators in these smaller countries can only hope for the replacement of one oppressive regime with another potentially more oppressive regime.
It's a lose-lose situation. And it makes me extremely sad.
I mean it is obviously very bad to make false bomb threats, but its still very different than forcing by threatening to shoot the plane down.
Minsk Control: FR4978 please divert immediately to Minsk due to potential bomb threat.
FR4978: Minsk Control, by our readings we are closer to our destination Vilnius than to Minsk. By the way, can you explain why a Belarusian fighter jet is flying alongside us?
(silence)
FR4978: Minsk Control, do you copy?
(silence)
Minsk Control: We said PLEASE.
(silence)
FR4978: Ohhh-kay then. Minsk it is!
Databases of every person flying internationally with passport numbers in last 10 years, or so years go around on onion websites.
Thank your "antiterrorism" STAZI, and its well wishers.
Interesting framing
The EU has shown no determination to put a brake on Lukashenko's abuses and has been completely passive so far on the matter.
The USA, in my opinion, should show leadership and step in to make it clear that such affront against democracy on a neighbour of its closest allies will not be tolerated. Poland and Hungary (not to mention Turkey a bit further away) are already leaning dangerously close to the kinds of abuse of power only seen in dictatorships, and letting Belarus get away with this international provocation will just make it even more clear that the great powers don't care enough to defend democratic rights anywhere outside their own borders, and they are free to go ahead with their own crackdowns on freedom of expression and disregard of human rights.
[1] https://emerging-europe.com/news/belarus-shuts-down-largest-...
The US is rarely interested in affronts against democracy unless there's a geopolitical advantage to be had by leveraging it.
From a practical standpoint, US interventions almost always make things worse for the people who live there, and in a lot of cases less democratic.
The US is no stranger to strategic military intervention that costs lives and money and achieves nothing very substantial - from Vietnam to Iraq to Afghanistan.
It was the cold war. I'm pretty sure the MIC could have justified so much spending in other ways besides vietnam, but we are venturing into counterfactual territory.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piracy_off_the_coast_of_Soma...
>After the collapse of the Somali government and the dispersal of the Somali Navy, ... groups, using small boats, would sometimes hold vessels and crew for ransom. This grew into a lucrative trade, with large ransom payments. The pirates then began hijacking commercial vessels
The quote I posted is a bit cryptic by itself. What I meant by it was that perhaps the US had plans that would lead to greater benefits for them in the region, but these plans backfired by inadvertently creating the Somali piracy problem.
They did everything right with regards to whatever they were hoping to achieve, but they still failed and then pirates happened.
And it was also clear nobody in Europe cared or was going to do anything, even if it was also in their craven interest.
Probably didn't align with their August vacation schedule plans or something.
& they did.
The US was more concerned with there being instability in Europe than any overriding moral concerns.
Almost all. I can really think of two counterexamples, Japan and Korea (and it took a very long time ~30 years? for korea to figure itself out). Maybe Jugoslavia can be put into that bin too, though it's not clear if the US intervention hurt or helped.
A Mig fighter jet was dispatched to shepherd the airliner. This represents a threat to anyone on a flight through or maybe even near Belarus's airspace.
There have been a lot of catastrophic $&@$ ups and terrible ideas, but it's selective history to claim there have been no positive outcomes for the people who live there.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_in_Iraq_(2013%E2%80%9320...
IMHO, it seems like most Iraqis are better off living under a government than IS, but your opinion may differ.
It's clearly not disingenuous to include the 2014 intervention in the list of the more reasonable ones.
I mean, if you present it as somehow excusing the earlier mistake; that'd be a different issue.
I don't think it's reasonable to argue your intervention in my house fire was successful because you used your bulldozer to clean up the rubble, if you were the arsonist that set fire to it in the first place.
If you'd like a particularly poignant "fly on the wall" style look into how ordinary Iraqi people saw the invasion in 2003, and their predictions for the future, check out Iraq in Fragments. Many of their predictions have come true in the years since. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiu8cXhjpX4
Hard to argue with the second when looking at the past 2 decades, but looking broader in the past century I think there are many more arguments the other way. Most of Europe for one.
Who are the countries who are willing to intercede militarily purely to liberate a country?
> From a practical standpoint, US interventions almost always make things worse for the people who live there, and in a lot of cases less democratic.
I think this is a fair criticism—intercession is hard—but the question isn’t whether things are better or worse than they were, but rather whether they were better or worse than they would have been under Soviet influence. And you can analyze this as “whether or not a specific country is better or worse” as well as “whether or not the world is better or worse for the diminished soviet influence that would have been afforded by that country falling under Soviet influence”.
Putin was KGB mafia boy.
Kravcuk, and Kucma were party bosses of state enterprises.
Aliyevs were KGB men
Shevardnaze was USSR's foreign minister
The whole of Central Asia is basically ruled by exactly the same Moscow's satraps since late eighties, with exception of wild tempered Kyrgyzstan.
Mongolia, "the 16th republic," also had communist comeback, only ended by an extreme, Norko style economic collapse.
The only country of ex-USSR where CPSU did not recapture the power outside of Baltics was Armenia, but only thanks to power going to their nazis. A medicine worse than the poison.
And Georgia
Libya? way way worse, i mean its a place you can buy slaves in open markets now after US intervention...
list is huge, some places they would take out democracy to put in puppet dictatorships all in the interest of the US, they will work with Saudi Arabia and in last 5 years starve 80,000 kids to death in Yemen under 5 years.
i can only list a few countries that US intervention ended actually helping both the US and the country.
so yes USA will claim to come in to give "democracy" or what ever humanitarian excuse but its never for those reasons, its always for the interest of US and US corporations, i mean didn't the US take a country just because corporations wanted it for growing Bananas? and still to this day they are messing with them ?
I'm not sure I got it either. As an argument for interventionism it was poor.
The US and Saudis both have a very large gun to each other's heads... so that's a pretty constrained situation.
It will be curious to see what happens in the next 10+ years as oil-as-energy demand begins to wane.
Thats just not true. Saudi family rule over Arabia is predicated on US support. If all SA oil production stopped it would not topple the US government. If the US decided to back a political opposition like it did in Syria the Saudi regime would implode in days.
Or do you mean to say that USA could easily replace the regime with a different, more-favored one? How did that work in Syria? We're withdrawing from Afghanistan now, and at this time Taliban control more territory than they held in 2001. USA military is a bit of a paper tiger, when it comes to achieving results via military action.
Could they not draw the same conclusion from our very pro trade friendly policies toward for example China?
Is Lukashenko a dictator, for sure, but he is in an impossible situation. The Russians are making sure of that and as long as Western Governments show an indifference to the sovereignty of countries like Belarus, Ukraine, Georgia, etc there is no way forward.
Please show me examples in Poland or Hungary of opposition voices being silenced or arrested.
The worst that has happened is withdrawing government financing or grants to entities that aren’t pro government. That’s not exactly a dictatorship.
In Hungary almost all the online press is anti government. No one gets arrested. Their are 5 opposition parties now uniting against government, no one is silenced.
Yes the state TV is pro government. But this is not unique to Poland or Hungary. In fact I’d argue the pinnacle of state TV, the BBC is very much leaning to one side of the political isle right now too.
Some examples for Poland that I'm aware of:
- August 2020 mass arrest: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/August_2020_LGBT_protests_in_P...
- Poland’s constitutional court not a “tribunal established by law”, rules ECHR: https://notesfrompoland.com/2021/05/07/polands-constitutiona...
Sure, the situation seems not as bad as in Belarus, but still it looks bad.
Népszabadság, the biggest printed newspaper was bought and closed by government/its allies.
origo.hu and index.hu, the biggest Hungarian online portals was also bought, and converted to progovernment outlets.
The USA showed leadership when it contrived a situation where the president of Bolivia's plane was made to land in Austria, to search for someone who leaked to journalists that the US government was monitoring virtually all domestic phone calls, texts, Internet connections etc.
Leadership in an affront against democracy, as you put it.
Edit: just to clarify, some of the USA’s other considerations would be the risk of getting called out for being a hypocrite- it has done a few shady extraditions in the past.
https://jamestown.org/program/the-wagner-affair-in-belarus-a...
https://censor.net/ru/news/3266959/butusov_lukashenko_primen...
https://en.thepage.ua/news/bellingcat-is-making-a-film-about...
Similar to an embassy, the onboard territory is based on which country the aircraft is registered to.
In the previous cases, the aircrew assured those people they’re in charge of them.
So this seems to be a diplomatic incident with Ireland?
Two differences though. - low cost company, maybe aircrew are less knowledgeable. - bomb alert.
https://www.belta.by/president/view/komandu-prinjat-v-minske...
* https://www.icao.int/pages/freedomsair.aspx
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedoms_of_the_air
Note that Belarus is not a signatory to the International Air Services Transit Agreement (IASTA):
* https://www.icao.int/secretariat/legal/list%20of%20parties/t...
Neither is Lithuania, but Greece is.
However, this most likely only furthers the goals of the current Belarusian administration for the population there. Enforced strictly, to include diplomatic flights, it may cause measurable change.
Of course, it could be much more straightforward than that (it could just be that Belarus did this for their own reasons). But it’s interesting to think about.
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/1954/12/13/archives/syrian-airliner-... [2] https://www.wrmea.org/1994-november-december/israel-was-firs... [3] https://msuweb.montclair.edu/~furrg/essays/rokach.html
This more mild strategy worked perfectly: Lukashenko gets to execute a political threat on trumped up charges, and there's essentially zero risk of a reprisal other than further sanctions, which were going to happen anyhow.
This is one of the reasons why I wish US/NATO had taken a stronger stand vs Russia's hybrid warfare tactics.
[0] - https://www.britannica.com/topic/law-of-war/Legally-defining...
Of course Lukashenko has the backing of Putin, so it is a slippery slope. I wonder how the EU will react. This is a major transgression.
Note that the EU did something similar: The forced Evo Morales to land in Vienna (on a flight from Moskow to Bolivia) because they suspected Snowden on the flight.
Since it was heading for Bolivia it obviously had enough fuel to go back to Moscow, if needed - for instance if Snowden had actually been onboard.
The thing that happened today (faked bomb alert and landing order accompanied with a fighter jet escort) is not on the same level.
Also lying (fake bomb threat) is a big difference.
It's like the difference between someone stealing your wallet, vs. letting you play some kind of street game where you don't actually have a chance of winning.
The method employed matters, it's not just about the final result.
Today's hijacking: the result was that the journalist was arrested and now may be facing the death penalty.
The denial of flyover rights to Morales' jet: there was no risk of capture to Snowden - worst case, he'd just have to back to Moscow. If he had been on the flight.
Yes, there was obvious BS from Morales' pilots about uncertain fuel readings - if that had been true the actions of those EU countries saved the life of Morales and others onboard.
Both situations are crap.
I see it like: egomaniacs running those 2 governments, bad.
They forced the plane to land by locking all airspace around it. And yes, they would also have started fighter jets if the plane would enter the forbidden airspace.
If they really want to get this guy released and set a deterring precedent they would start playing hardball, which could include things like:
* Deny Belarus aircraft the right transit anywhere in the EU.
* Do so while some Belarus aircraft are on the ground in the EU and don't allow them to leave. This effectively holds those planes hostage as a bargaining chip, though it's really leverage on the Belarus airlines (and the planes themselves are probably leased). But it still creates problems for the regime.
* Refuse to allow the transit of any Belarus top officials anywhere in the EU. Start expanding this list daily to include more people and their direct families and make the directive permanent until the guy is released. Once you get the spouses of a couple dozen of the top people in the regime contemplating spending the rest of their lives without Italian vacations or Parisian shopping - much less just being able to go anywhere other than Russia - you're starting to cause some hard conversations about how much making an example of this guy is really worth.
Sadly, I doubt the EU will do any of this type of stuff but barring that, there's really no incremental cost to Belarus, nothing will happen and this guy is screwed.
Yes, nothing happened after another rigged elections, Apparently around 30000 people are still detained since August, since brutally stopped protests. Nothing will happen again, but Belarus should be declared as space not safe for air transit.
They've poisoned people with radioactive substances on NATO soil, without serious consequences. Just denials issued.
Putin keeps calling the west's bluff. Having a nuclear arsenal seems to let you do that.
Are the good guys allowed to do anything? Are we going to take a terrorist's family hostage to use them as as bargaining chip against the terrorist?
Hasn't this already been the case since November?
https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2020...
Restrictive measures include a travel ban and an asset freeze. The travel ban impedes those listed from entering or transiting through EU territories, while the asset freeze is used against the funds or economic resources of the listed persons. In addition, EU citizens and companies are forbidden from making funds available to the listed individuals and entities... Today's decision follows up on the agreement reached by the EU foreign affairs ministers at their video conference meeting on 19 November 2020. The sanctions will now apply with immediate effect... A second set of sanctions targeting Alexandr Lukashenko and 14 other officials was imposed on 6 November 2020.
I mean we can quibble about what constitutes "top officials" and the expansion is not daily - but it does exist and it is expanding.
The EU can severely damage the economy of Belarus by cutting off all trade and financial ties. And then work with the US to essentially destroy the country economically by cutting it off to nearly all global trade and financing. The only thing left to prop it up would be Russia and some Chinese imports; it would make Belarus a hermit state economically.
All the US has to do is say: we'll sanction any bank, corporation or person that does business with Belarus. Most will instantly capitulate, just as they did with Iran.
If the US asks Britain, Poland and Ukraine to suspend all trade ties to Belarus, they'll do it. Combine that with the EU members, and Belarus no longer functions in terms of having access to the global economy.
The downside to smashing Belarus in such a way, which would be very easy to do, is that it'll just throw Belarus into the hands of Russia entirely. Lukashenko knows that context with the West and has been playing the angles for a long time accordingly.
I'm sure that Belarus is in the same boat.
Sherlock Holmes's house in London is owned by Nazarbayev's daughter. It's so ironic.
Literally yesterday prime minister went on record to say they will outright ignore the ruling of the highest EU court on an ecological / energy case (lignite mining close to the Czech border.
That’s how he explained the popularity of Silvio Berlusconi too - “of course the guy is a cheat and a fraud, but he is cheating for us now”.
I’m unsure if these views were in any way representative but I found them interesting.
It wasn't only Germany, though; also France stopped shipments of masks to Sweden. And there were other cases in the big key member states.
https://www.svd.se/frankrike-beslagtar-masker-fran-svenskt-f...
Normally such freight would go via hubs in Germany, for instance; to avoid Germany confiscating masks, my country (Finland) hired planes to import masks directly from China, without using the hubs in Germany.
“Screw you and your rules. Also, help!”
As a result, the EU tries to sanction Poland, but Hungary won't agree and so the sanction fails. Try to sanction Hungary? Poland is out, sanction fails. I have to admit that it's clever on Poland and Hungary's part, as it lets them selectively ignore some of the EU's more (from their perspective) overbearing rulings.
The current EU plan is to hope that Hungary or Poland's governments get replaced with one that won't support the other, and then consider doing the sanctions.
The other EU plan is to pursue other punishments that don't require a full sanction and basically cause as much hurt as possible even if they can't do the ideal remedy.
Unless you want the EU to be a super state that can bully it‘s members with a mere 51% of the vote? The EU would fall apart then.
What's even the point of issuing rulings that can be ignored by the collusion of two out of 27 members?
No it isn't. Some 30% of decisions are made unanimously in scotus, and this is hardly an outlier. Requiring unanimous consent makes things way slower, yes, but it doesn't prevent them. Not all organizational changes need to be controversial. Several conservative programming languages did well by requiring unanimity in initial years - only adding what all could agree was good. It only requires those members to exercise good judgement.
Once you start looking for tenuous connections, every human activity can be subsumed under trade. It's a wildcard.
On the other hand, EU states retain their national sovereignty, and could leave the EU if they disagreed with the EU that deeply, which the UK has currently done. The ability for states to group together and buck rulings, in a sense, makes it less likely for states to leave the union entirely. This ability may also have helped convince states to join the EU in the first place.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberum_veto
The fact that one state can reject anything, is going to be the end of the EU if they don't fix it.
Also, if the political tensions in our nation continue to increase and don't stop, I would not be surprised in a decade from now if we start talking about replacing the Federal Government with a more EU-like arrangement.
Unlike the USA—which has a really strong executive branch—there is hardly any executive branch in the EU. Instead the executive powers are held almost entirely by the member states. The EU does have a legislative branch (just like the USA) with around 650,000 people per representative. USA has around 750,000 but that number is further devalued by the USA senate (3,500,000 people per representative) which can hold a lot of power over the congress. I’m not aware that the EU has any equivalent.
The scope of the two systems is also vastly different. The USA federal government represents the foreign policy of each of the state, funds a military which answers to the government, finances much of the infrastructure within the USA, etc. In the EU foreign policy is largely held by the member states, there is no EU military, and funding for infrastructure projects is more likely to come mostly from the member state it self, then from the EU. The USA collects federal taxes, while the EU gets their funding from the member states.
Both have a federated court system. The USA have federal criminal courts which I’m not sure that the EU has, or at least not in the same way the USA does.
To summarize: The US federal government and the EU have in common that they both have a democratically elected legislator (both with relatively low representation) and they both have a federal court system. But this is where the similarities end.
> The Articles of Confederation created a loose union of states. The confederation's central government consisted of a unicameral Congress with legislative and executive function, and was composed of delegates from each state in the union. Congress received only those powers which the states had previously recognized as belonging to king and parliament.[15] Each state had one vote in Congress, regardless of its size or population, and any act of Congress required the votes of nine of the 13 states to pass;[16] any decision to amend the Articles required the unanimous consent of the states. Each state's legislature appointed multiple members to its delegation, allowing delegates to return to their homes without leaving their state unrepresented.[17] Under the Articles, states were forbidden from negotiating with other nations or maintaining a military without Congress's consent, but almost all other powers were reserved for the states.[18] Congress lacked the power to raise revenue, and was incapable of enforcing its own legislation and instructions. As such, Congress was heavily reliant on the compliance and support of the states.[19]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confederation_Period#National_...
Of course, the EU functions better since it has its funding sorted out, whereas the executive under the Confederation more or less begged for money every year and did not usually get its requested allocation.
It’s not even like the EU has big expectations of Poland. The sticking point now is an independent judiciary and free press. Seriously, it’s embarrassing that Poland has to be strong armed into these!
In any case, Poland freely signed up to these commitments, it’s just bad form to eke out of them like this. Not to mention the actual damage politically-corrupted courts do to the people and economy in Poland.
Who voted them in? If you say that the people voted them in, it's painful, but it is the politics of the region. One of the terrifying parts of democracy is that the people have the right to vote for their leaders, including leaders who will actively undermine their own democracy, and they can be content with that because that's what they wanted. In which case, democracy has done what the people wanted, by ruining democracy.
It's kind of like Jury Nullification, where Juries do not strictly need to vote on the merits of whether a person is guilty or innocent, but can vote against the law and know the law can't punish jurors for a "wrong judgement". Judges hate that loophole but know it's a necessary part of democracy. Similarly, the ability of a democratic people to vote to end democracy is democracy working even though it is also an awful necessary loophole.
And if you say that we must take effort to prevent a democratic people, legally speaking, from democratically voting to end democracy, you are now technically anti-democratic. That's a weird place to be.
Democracy depends on a strong free press and independent courts. A strong free press is not just one part of a country’s businesses, it is quite literally the fourth pillar of democracy.
Juries are not a thing in most countries that are generally considered democracies, so jury nullification can't be all that neccesary.
But they don't want that hassle, and they want to keep the EU benefits, so this mutual veto of sanctions is definitely a loophole to keep as many benefits without meeting the requirements.
The EU is not the UN, while the UN's goal is to have every country in membership, and so it doesn't expel dictatorships just for being dictatorships, the EU is pretty explicit about democracy and human rights being requirements, which is why e.g. Turkey has not been allowed in so long.
Had Orban had the level of control when Hungary joined that he has now, Hungary would not have been allowed in. PiS is probably not yet at that level, but it's clear they would like to be.
The constructive equilibria in political systems appear to be unstable, and need active work to keep them there. The EU is in fact born out of that very realisation - its earliest seeds are in binding France and Germany in an economic union so they stop going to war with each other!
The system supports autocratic state capture in Poland and Hungary through massive EU subsidies - my tax money. No, it's not working.
In reality, what Germany and France buy with that „bribe“ is being able to freely export their goods (cars and retail items via international supermarket chains in particular) to Eastern European markets, while making sure the profits go back to the motherland (and are taxed there by the German/French government, leaving nothing in Eastern Europe).
You get your tax monies more than back.
Poor excuse, but I'll make it for the record's sake.
https://twitter.com/TadeuszGiczan/status/1396446650718117890
Was the plane over Belarus, though?
Yes: https://www.flightradar24.com/data/flights/fr4978#27cce9a2
To be precise that’s if you’re rejected for a visa - just to transit you don’t need one so it’s best not to apply.
I had a formative experience regarding the game of chicken years ago. It might look very much off topic at first sight, but please read on and decide for yourself.
When I was in secondary school, bored teenagers repeatedly threatened local school bombings, causing the repeated evacuation of several schools. Never the one I went to school at. I later learned why from my father, a teacher at the school. The school did receive bomb threats just like the others. The school head did warn the police. After a short discussion with them, he firmly and politely informed them that our school would not be evacuated, and that was that. He was - and is, at 87- a quiet and soft spoken man, a well respected member of society, but definitely not afraid of a game of chicken.
My guess would be that the gentleman running the school in your example was widely respected and had a solid relationship with his appointing authority (school board, upstream executive, etc) -- they had his back.
Does Ryanair offer that type of confidence to pilots as commanders of their aircraft?
Korean Air Lines Flight 007 (also known as KAL007 and KE007)[note 2] was a scheduled Korean Air Lines flight from New York City to Seoul via Anchorage, Alaska. On September 1, 1983, the South Korean airliner servicing the flight was shot down by a Soviet Su-15 interceptor. The Boeing 747 airliner was en route from Anchorage to Seoul, but due to a navigational mistake made by the KAL crew the airliner deviated from its original planned route and flew through Soviet prohibited airspace about the time of a U.S. aerial reconnaissance mission. The Soviet Air Forces treated the unidentified aircraft as an intruding U.S. spy plane, and destroyed it with air-to-air missiles, after firing warning shots which were likely not seen by the KAL pilots.[2] The Korean airliner eventually crashed in the sea near Moneron Island west of Sakhalin in the Sea of Japan. All 269 passengers and crew aboard were killed, including Larry McDonald, a United States Representative from Georgia. The Soviets found the wreckage under the sea on September 15, and found the flight recorders in October, but this information was kept secret until 1993.
(They kept the name KGB in Belarus.)
But if you put that aside for a moment and look at things from a higher level perspective: the president of a whole country is SO AFRAID OF A SINGLE YOUNG BLOGGER that he redirects a whole plane, thereby doing a "full Barbara" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect).
Never say one person cannot change the world!
It might be concurrent with the Streisand effect, but it is usually fairly painful for the target.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kill_the_chicken_to_scare_the_...
This was an attack on Lithuania, Greece and Ireland.
How many more times will western governments bend over as Putin and other tin pot soviet dicktators shoot down or hijack flights?
In turn, this will further embolden putin / lukashenko gang to bigger and more outrageous acts. This gang understands only force. Something like a rocket killing a top government official, or seizure of assets.
(I say this as a Russian citizen who was recently detained by the police at an anti-Putin protest)
If this event doesn't lead to something significant, it would once more fail at points 2,3,5, and 6 of its core values[0]. As a EU citizen I'm hoping for the long-term success of the EU but not always very confident in it..
All the best to you, particularly courage and luck in the face of what you have to deal with locally..
[0] https://europa.eu/european-union/about-eu/eu-in-brief_en
Worst possible choice. Even without taking international costs, it will be best day for propaganda and thus elite. And perfect feed for ultra-nationalistic movements - so even if manages to produce change in government, it will be second Iran, not second Poland.
>seizure of assets
Best one. After enough mansions are seized and comfortable retirements destroyed, couple of skulls will get caved by a snuffbox and all the geopolitics garbage will be thrown out of the window. With following power struggle, that might even be second chance to form sane government.
> Worst possible
Reconsider this. This is a 1 man regime, possibly 2-3-4 men regime.
Do you want to keep running after gazillions of their bank accounts in Switzerland, and hope they run out of money, or kill the man who holds passwords for, probably, at least half of money for the regime?
And look at Norko... There are latest RolceRoyces on streets of Pyongyang.
It is gross oversimplification. It's basically political/special service elite (bound with personal loyalty) and thick layer of rent seekers (from oil & gas billionaires to countless bureaucratic sinecures).
Even if we assume that all power is indeed in hands of one person, who will gain power once he is killed and current system collapses? Ones who can act fast and are not hindered by too much reflection or morals: junta, blackshirts and organized crime.
>run out of money
No. Point is making desired behaviour more profitable than current behaviour for regime stakeholders. When risk coming from asset freeze becomes larger than risk from change in government - system will start to transform.
>holds passwords
That doesn't work that way. It's actually opposite - wealth is often spread among many loyal figureheads, with actual beneficiary holding nothing on his name.
>Norko
Russian regime is as far from classic totalitarian one as it is from european democracy. Probably even further, as it's basically democracy corrupted to the point of switching to new aggregate state.
It is not an oversimplification, it is how it is.
When even secret police officers have to make a soup of their boots, it is.
> When risk coming from asset freeze becomes larger than risk from change in government - system will start to transform.
When the system will start to transform, he will get a bayonet in his pooper.
> That doesn't work that way. It's actually opposite - wealth is often spread among many loyal figureheads, with actual beneficiary holding nothing on his name.
This works this way. All corrupt heads of Ex-Union countries hold personal accounts on a very tight leash. Maybe with few figurehead titleholders, but not how you tell us.
Internet banking has made things much simpler for them.
> Probably even further, as it's basically democracy corrupted to the point of switching to new aggregate state.
It is not a democracy, plainly and simple.
If you think you have an "alternative vision," tell us how you will call this: https://gdb.rferl.org/47AAAE02-01C2-46FF-87F6-5607ECF3427C_w...
No alternative "visions," and interpretations from high nosed "political scientists" needed.
Call things their their names.
So what are Usmanov, Prokhorov, Potanin, etc? Are they oppressed opposition, or are they eating boots too?
>bayonet in his pooper
While executions of government officials would be extremely entertaining and spirit raising sight, such revolutionary events will lead to much worse outcome in long term than reformation.
>All corrupt heads of Ex-Union countries hold personal accounts on a very tight leash
Ex-Union countries are very different. Claim that corrupt heads of 6M people/43G$ GDP Turkmenistan and 145M/4328G$ Russia are identical is a strong one. Other than size of economy, they are different in that most of them became authoritarian states right after gaining independence, while Russia had about decade of mostly working democracy.
>this
Elections. Corrupted to the point of uselessness, but they are still run, as government derives it's legitimacy from them, rather than from leader's charisma or ideology.
>Call things their their names
Sometimes it makes sense to distinguish between kinds of shit. Especially if shit is only material you have.
If Democracy is to survive, we have to do better analysis.
Denying entry into airspace is not the same as forcing a plane to land and kidnapping a political opponent.
Isn't it common that flights to Canada need to make an emergency landing which conveniently allows US customs to filter passengers?
Diverting planes seems something that states just do.
This time it's a smaller state that uses big boy tools.
Link?
The tech community is brilliant in some things but hopelessly naive in others.
Also, people everywhere on television seem to agree with your views, confirms your godlike logical thinking powers. All hail moneys!
To be clear, I highly despise the Belarusian regime and I'm in full support of opposition. I could only hope that EU will do something in return but it looks like it's a standard way of handling the people politically considered to be terrorists. It's not the way it should be done neither by Belarus nor especially by US/NATO if they want to hold the peacekeepers flag. Otherwise it's just double standards and politics.