Bit strange?

[M80]

Royal Navy warship sails through the Bosphorus into the Black Sea as Brits give Vladimir Putin a taste of his own medicine over English Channel sabre-rattling

I've been hearing of anti Russian activities via Russian media, but I've been putting much of it down to Russian paranoia. Maybe they aren't so paranoid?

 

[Craiglxviii]

The Russians AREN'T paranoid, they know everyone is out to get them. Seriously!

But again for this, we're just demonstrating the right to free navigation. Political tit for tat.

With a lot of these things it seems the West is having to relearn the old Cold War games. Soviet bombers being intercepted over the North Sea with the fighter crews holding up porno mags for the bomber crews benefit, Soviet spy trawlers following surfsce action groups to test radar and speed capabilities and having a destroyer play cat and mouse, our subs shadowing theirs for days on end, our subs doing many sneaky beaky things in their harbours... all of these were daily occurrences, not newsworthy, and I guess we'll see them all again- not that they ever really went away.

 

[Frontstep]

All completely pointless waste of time and money but it keeps the military occupied chasing shadows.

I have no doubt they self perpetuate these "games".

 

[eman]

I see the Japanese have sent their biggest destroyer to protect the American naval ship and have orders to open fire on any hostile activities against the U.S. How times have changed.

 

[Craiglxviii]

I see the Japanese have sent their biggest destroyer to protect the American naval ship and have orders to open fire on any hostile activities against the U.S. How times have changed.

Well, that's been Japanese policy since about 1955 or so...

Note what their "destroyer" looks like. And it's name. The Japanese are getting back into naval aviation after half a century.

 

[Craiglxviii]

All completely pointless waste of time and money but it keeps the military occupied chasing shadows.

I have no doubt they self perpetuate these "games".

Pointless is as pointless does. These games are nothing new, like I said in the Cold War the rules were well understood by both sides. Now a new generation of serving men & women, and civvystrasse are having to relearn those rules.

Be that as it may, the right to free & open navigation is an important one (commerce tends to grind to a halt otherwise...). The Russians expressed theirs and very graciously did not break down in the middle of the Channel, which was nice of them. We in turn expressed ours similarly in their back yard. Tit, for tat, the rules of the game continue into the next generation.

 

[Frontstep]

It was all so much easier and cheaper when men used to shout at each other from hilltops and bang shields,
progress I suppose.
In the future will we men be posturing from planet to planets ?

 

[LostKiwi]

They have to get off this one without wrecking it first.

 

[Craiglxviii]

It was all so much easier and cheaper when men used to shout at each other from hilltops and bang shields,
progress I suppose.
In the future will we men be posturing from planet to planets ?

Almost certainly. Politics don't change; 2000 years ago it was a political triumph (literally) for a Roman general to be allowed to parade his army through the streets of a major city. The principle is the same as the movements of these warships.