I mean; Russia’s almost my ‘second home’, right? I have a deep-lying love and feeling for all this Russki stuff. I understand them. I’m almost a part of this whole ‘Russian thing’. Right? I mean, a week there in the strictly tourist environs, speaking to no natives unless they were tour guides, walking the streets, travelling on the underground like a native… I’m as Russian as any Somalian pirate.

But Putin, man, he pulls no punches. He’s now said that joining the war with Syria has been the best testing ground for his weapons that any (warlike, aggressive, no-care-for-humanity-whatsoever, murderous) country could have. Since joining Assad in the war in 2015 Moscow reckons its tested more than 200 new weapons. And although all weapons are tested (I’d imagine), there’s no test like a proper militarised battlefield. Particularly someone else’s battlefield, and even more so when the brief from the national leader in Syria doubtless contains several versions (Arabic, Russian, Rhyming slang) of the word ‘indiscriminate’ within its text.

So as Putin gets all his toys out over there for ‘testing’ (“Hey Yuri, try this one! Its a new bomb that destroys people who have names beginning with ‘S’ but no-one else!!!”), human rights activists estimate that the Russians have killed over 6,000 Syrian civilians. Nearly 2,000 of them children. As they lay waste to entire cities that have the misfortune to be labelled as ‘rebel’ in that some people there oppose Assad. Some, not all. Yet all get either killed or displaced.

Funny that there’s 50 times more fuss when 75 Gazans are killed trying to infiltrate the Israeli border, led by Jihadi terrorists. But I make no judgments. Though reserve the right to imply them.

So Putin is really happy with his new weapons. And continues trying new stuff. Nerve agents, tea laced with radioactive shit, umbrellas tipped with poison. Yet Russia is where ‘we’re all headed’ for the upcoming World Cup. England defender (and Spurs ‘legend’, til he leaves) Danny Rose has told his family not to go with him to Russia because of racial abuse he’s encountered there previously and he wants to spare them the pain.

I’m almost getting the feeling that Russians aren’t very nice people. Led by a seriously un-nice leader.

Happy Friday

A xxxx