Frowning takes 68 muscles.
Smiling takes 6.
Pulling this trigger takes 2.
I'm lazy.
Posted on 02/10/2010 5:58:05 PM PST by ErnstStavroBlofeld
Fears are spreading from the Baltic to the Black Sea that Russia may be on the move again.
According to experts, Moscow has put out feelers to some half a dozen Western European nations in bids to acquire advanced military hardware. If it bears results, the potential multibillion-dollar Russian shopping spree would be the first of its kind since the end of the Cold War.
By far the biggest splash has been made by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin when he used a visit to Paris last November to publicly place an order for a state-of-the-art French warship. But Russia has not lavished its attention on France alone. Advances have also been made to the Scandinavian nations, Spain, Italy, and the Netherlands for what experts say are a variety of advanced weapons platforms.
Predictably, all this has alarmed Russia's neighbors -- particularly those with coastlines. Although experts discount the likelihood of an immediate Russian military threat, the Baltic States feel vulnerable. So does Georgia, which Russia invaded in August 2008 and whose relations with its large northern neighbor remain extremely precarious.
More worryingly, the limits of NATO solidarity and the alliance's commitment to its new Eastern European members are being sorely tested behind the scenes. Ex-communist allies are pondering the full implications of French Prime Minister Francois Fillon's remark in November that selling a French Mistral-class ship to Russia would be "good for Europe."
(Excerpt) Read more at rferl.org ...
I was just thinking about that.
What else you can expect from oil pipe manager.
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