George Kennan, diplomat, wary of military alliances

"At the end of World War II, the majority of American leadership was in agreement that the most viable approach against the political and militaristic expansion of the Soviet Union was to implement a containment strategy that would help keep the Soviet expansion in check and protect Western democratic values. American diplomat, George Kennan, described this strategy as “a political force committed fanatically to the belief that with the United States, there can be no permanent modus vivendi [agreement between parties that disagree]”; concluding that America had only one option to proceed, “long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies.” In 1947, President Harry Truman made the containment of the Soviet Union a top priority, laying the groundwork for the Cold War by introducing domestic policies that centered on undermining communism in the United States. Such action helped set the tone for the next four decades of United States foreign policy."

FROM:  https://online.norwich.edu/online/about/resource-library/5-key-cold-war-events

We can expand because we are a beacon on the hill, have a manifest destiny, we are the ever so Righteous Ones, have God on our side!  The Communists are the very embodiment of Evil and must be fought at every turn.

Lunar Society historian, Richard Vinen

For the first time, for a Lunar Society meeting yesterday, I visited the luxury, extravagant, grandiose Edgbaston Park Hotel that is owned, managed and is on the campus of the University of Birmingham.

This, after reports of the most distressing conditions having to be endured by patients in our government run NHS hospitals.

It seems that the authorities have the money for the most wonderful university and college buildings to be built but not for simply decent hospitals and prisons.  The authorities should be putting the sick and the poor as their top priority and NOT our top academics.

My meeting was with the Lunar Society that in the 18th century had Brummie leading lights - Boulton, Murdoch and Watt - led the world in exploiting finite fossil fuels to bring us the industrial revolution for three hundred years and this century's frightening Climate Catastrophe.

The widespread declarations of the Climate Emergency has meant much of Los Angeles being destroyed in wildfires, unprecedented floods for the UK and Holyhead port, the UK's second busiest port closed for six weeks.

The speaker, yesterday was the historian of Birmingham, Prof Richard Vinen whose key word for me, in his talk, was "destruction".  Destruction of buildings and transport infrastructure.  Two Birmingham major city centre libraries have been demolished and the city is on its third library.

We are now on our second brand new major New Street railway station.  Two demolished!  The latest building cost three-quarters of a billion pounds.  The fine Victorian Snow Hill station also destroyed.  For decades, that station's platform Four has been out of use for commuter and regional trains.

All of this is a scandal, in my opinion.  Yet, knowing all of this, the UoB fully supported the biggest office building I have ever seen for a university and hospital railway station.  All that was essential was a platform that DID need to be three times longer than the old one and more ticket machines and staff at peak times.

It seems that the University Station had to look pretentious and prestigious to fit in with the other brand new university buildings. Yet, all the academics are unanimous in warning of the danger in burning up our remaining fossil fuel reserves.  Indeed, the Vice Chancellor of the UoB is Prof Adam Tickell who is, I believe, a nephew of Sir Crispin Tickell who wrote Margaret Thatcher's major speech on Climate in 1988 to the UN.

In 1977, while taking a sabbatical at Harvard he wrote Climatic Change and World Affairs. This was one of the first, and for at least a decade, the only book on the coming climate crisis, and what governments should do to prevent it. He argued for mandatory international pollution control, something that is finally taking shape. Margaret Thatcher credited him with convincing her of the science of global warming and the danger that it posed for the planet, which resulted in her speech on the subject to the Royal Society in September 1988. This brought climate change into the mainstream of British politics.

Fight the Climate Emergency by ...

... by saving greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) in the medium to long term by spending on insulation and energy efficiency measures in the short term!

Dear Gentlemen - the three leaders and the Independent to reply, PLEASE.  Others are welcome to give their views, too.

SUGGESTION 1

Floor 3 at Halesowen Library, I think, can have a false ceiling with new lighting to shut off a large wasted space that is simply the top of floor 3 at the floor 4 level.  It would save the massive energy bill.  Am I right?  Can this be done?

 Halesowen Library floor 3.jpg

SUGGESTION 2

Would the private sector, eg David Lloyd Sports Centres, be interested in taking over the three borough leisure centres?  Then use the money to properly insulate and solar power the remaining council properties to cut GHG emissions.

SUGGESTION 3

Can you sell off Halesowen Town Hall and make use of existing halls and rooms in, for example the Halesowen churches and hotels, etc?  Halesowen Community Church in Albert Road, Halesowen is a popular venue for many varied activities.

Use the money to retrofit, update your antiquated, inefficient heating in too many council owned properties - and to do SOLAR PV.

SUGGESTION 4

Use the billions you want for Metro and Sprint expansion to be used instead to fight the Climate Crisis in these ways:

 Action Points - 2024 version.pdf

You must lobby HMG to redirect funds from wasteful, nice but unnecessary projects and the staff now being employed into doing them, to vigorously fight the rise in GHG emissions.  Staff must be retrained for retrofitting/insulation/solar powering work.

SUGGESTION 5

Fight clogged, polluted roads by both rewarding and penalising car commuters who do not need cars for their jobs, so that the road network is freed up to benefit essential users like bus drivers and community nurses/tradesmen/lorry drivers.  Do/get:

 Bus and businesses at the centre of a virtuous circle

SUGGESTION 6

Stick to the Excellent Enhanced Bus Partnership with bus operators and STOP franchising that is very expensive to only bring greater business risks for the councils that are not good at doing commercial ventures in the dog eat dog world of sharp capitalism.  Learn from the Brooks Bar and Bistro venture.  NO MORE SINKING MONEY INTO RISKY COMMERCIAL VENTURES.

SUGGESTION 7

Scrap Dudley Tram Phase 2 that is shockingly expensive and wasteful.  Reinstating the commuter trains and the 1990s monorail would be cheaper and, be more responsible, with fewer risks for Dudley town traders seeing more of their customers and profits going to Merry Hill.

TIM WELLER

My experience of WMCA committees and boards

Many thanks, Beate.  How did I come by your name and email address, please?!

The councillors and MPs are meant to pick up on these things but they have not done so, many are very poorly informed, change so often and have to rely and believe the full-time, professional officers - the senior officers who are always so eloquent and polished in their delivery to committee.  I attend as a member of the public from time to time but I'm never allowed to say anything or even to hang around afterwards to speak to members or to speak to officers.  Dan Essex quickly rounds me up and ushers me out onto the street!

Councillors and MPs are lobby fodder, are rarely asked to vote, have to toe the party line and dare not challenge, scrutiny and be as outspoken as I am, as a complete nobody and responsible to absolutely no-one!!  I don't have to watch my back as the politicians have to do to keep getting voted back in.  The committees and boards are talking shops for members to chip in with their thoughts.  Very largely a waste of time, I feel.  I try and influence them via email but I rarely get a response.  THANKS SO MUCH for yours!

I have been following the sorry saga of transport since 1967 when I first came as a student for an interview at Westhill College in Selly Oak.  Then, it was to be a mighty flyover for Bristol Road, not a bypass as we now have.

It is extremely serious ...

Dear Helen and Dan

Yet again, Helen told me this morning (Friday) that my concerns are not relevant to Governance - of how well or badly the CA is governed and, Dan is not the slightest interested, either.  In my opinion, it is purely political and most foolish that you and your colleagues are spending three times more per Km in building tram extensions in the W Midlands when compared with similar schemes around the world - a dataset of 46 in your consultant's report.

This is rather like our side dismissing concerns reported today (Friday), with our Gazan killings being much higher than the Hamas run Health Ministry has thought, as being "inflated for political purposes", as was reported on BBC News.

You both do not wish to be acquainted with uncomfortable, true facts because it is none of your business.  In effect, you are saying my concerns are political - rather like different political parties have different manifestos.  It is all subjective and a matter of opinion.  However, when the Emperor has no clothes... you have a duty to say something!

It is totally irresponsible and complete idiocy to rebuild a railway "of national strategic significance", according to Network Rail and the DfT and then to use it as a dog walkers' paradise of a cycle-walkway for 14 Kms, to use it as a 2 Kms VLR test track and to have the most expensive tramway of 10.7 Kms that the world has ever seen - even when most of it is built on an existing and, for 100 years, a principal mainline railway!  And this for over a billion pounds when finally finished!  Fully in line with your consultant's conclusions that is so astounding he is recommending a further study by an independent regulated body.

Sticking your fingers in your ears is the height of irresponsibility and is a political decision, as all decisions are - even the most petty.

Please end your political indifference and acquiescence in wrong-doing and say something.  Action is needed to end the totally unnecessary £15 BILLION, 150 miles tram extension programme which is deepening, not lessening, your own declared Climate Emergency and is an existential threat for all of us, as the eminent Oxford Professor of History, the author Margaret MacMillan said on Radio 4 'Sideways' on Monday 6 January. 

Your denial of the Climate Crisis is in line with the University of Brum that has their most prestigious coffee shop and conference centre at Centenary Square with wide open external and internal doors throughout opening times!!  The evidence is there that you are all Climate deniers, despite your hypocritical declaration in 2019.  A stunning absence of integrity from people who should know better.    

Have you seen the report from 

 CNNCT Costs Comment September 2024.pdf

EXTRACTS:

"Upon first inspection the costs of the Midland Metro projects are astronomical

but, in truth it is extremely difficult to provide completely accurate data for one
telling reason, the actual costs are kept very much under wraps, even to the point

where Freedom of Information requests are refused ... "

AND AGAIN:

When you scratch the surface, data suggest that the Midland Metro extensions
represent some of the highest costs per kilometre ever seen, anywhere in the
World for tram schemes. As a sense of scale, the current average for infrastructure
costs per kilometre of light rail corridors or route, is under £30 million. Midland
Metro Alliance projects report an average of over £100 million per route kilometre
as shown in the results: -

Dataset Average Cost per
Route Km (£M)
Infrastructure Only Schemes 27.93
All Inclusive Schemes 84.91
Midland Metro Alliance Infrastructure Only Schemes 116.01

• Regardless of how the money has been spent, Midland Metro Alliance projects
should be comprehensively reviewed by an independent regulated body, to
understand exactly why these costs are reportedly three times the global average.

With best wishes for sensible action - URGENTLY.

Franchising: What you gain on the swings you lose on the roundabouts

TfWM said eight in ten public transport journeys in the West Midlands were by bus which accounted for more than 240 million passenger journeys during 2024. It is estimated the network contributes £4.4 billion a year to the regional economy.

Currently, TfWM pays £50 million a year in top up funding to keep commercial bus services on the road but control of routes, timetables and some fares still rests with the operators such as National Express which runs the majority of services in the West Midlands.

If approved, it is estimated the transition will cost the authority £22 million with the roll of franchised bus services starting in 2027.

In addition, it will be necessary to buy buses and depots, funded through borrowing and paid back with future fare income.

to Libby at Brum FoE

Please can you also campaign for my nearly 40-year-old insistence that there is no need for tramways to take over railways and bus routes.  Use the staff and the, literally, billions in price and in weight of GHG emissions for Metro and Sprint extensions, to get car commuters onto buses, trains and trams, to free up road space for essential vehicle users.

IN ADDITION:

• Use the Metro and Sprint money and the staff at WMCA to address instead of accelerating the Climate Emergency.
• Use the money and the staff to get the homes of the poorest insulated.  Even the private landlords must be given loans to get their properties made Climate compliant.
• Use the money and the staff to build small and medium sized homes for those on state benefits and other low incomes.  And solar powered with batteries.  I think, batteries in homes to balance the grid and to store solar electricity are more important than for private cars.
• The TfWM/WMCA HQ must also be made Climate compliant - to eliminate the charge of hypocrisy.
• Buses, trains and trams are far more important than private cars.  Their use must be boosted, not cars. 
• Midland Metro extensions are three times more expensive per Km to construct than any other place in the world!  See:
   CNNCT Costs Comment September 2024.pdf
  Summarised here:

• Sunday, 15 December 2024

  SHOCKING DATA re Midland Metro costs from CNNCT Ltd - consultants

  Confirms my own research in Like for like comparison of infrastructure building costs

  "In total, 79 Light Rail projects from across the world have been researched when gathering data."

  " ... data suggest that the Midland Metro extensions represent some of the highest costs per kilometre ever seen anywhere in the World for tram schemes."

  "Midland Metro Alliance projects report an average of over £100 million per route kilometre as shown in the results: -

  Dataset Average Cost per Route Km (£M) for 47 LR projects, here:

  Infrastructure Only Schemes 27.93   (Infrastructure costs only, extensions to existing tram projects for example.)

  All Inclusive Schemes 84.91  (All-In – Total project costs including the Tram Lines, Vehicles, Depots etc.)

  Midland Metro Alliance Schemes 116.01   (Infrastructure costs only, extensions to existing tram projects for example.)

  • Regardless of how the money has been spent, Midland Metro Alliance projects should be comprehensively reviewed by an independent regulated body, to understand exactly why these costs are reportedly three times the global average." (my, Tim Weller's emphasis)

Is there anything you can go along with here, Libby?  Please explain your point of view over what I have written.

Runaway expense and runaway greenhouse effect!

But started by Labour - Andrew Adonis and Gordon Brown.  Oh dear, the folly of our betters and masters.  High Scam 2 is not much use when there is only one station between the two termini - and that is an airport!  Let High Scam 2 passengers fly in a plane.  Next decade they'll be able to fly on land, too on a train.  Runaway spend, spend, spend to accelerate away the runaway greenhouse effect!

Brutal GAZA scenes worthy of Stalingrad or medieval or ancient warfare

Sideways on Radio 4, 6 Jan 2025:  25 Years of the 21st Century: 1. The Age of Digital Warfare

PANEL of historian and writer Margaret MacMillan, former Chief of the Defence Staff Sir Nick Carter and author, Professor Anthony King.

The invasion of first Afghanistan, understandable and then the invasion of Iraq, lost a lot of moral authority for the West, said Margaret MacMillan.  "A lot of countries in the Global South no longer believed, if they ever did, that the West knows best."

Nick Carter describing the events after 9/11 said that rather than the response being the global war on terror, "it was a political problem that needs to be dealt with in a sympathetic fashion rather than meting out revenge which happened in Afghanistan. ... Western activity in Afghanistan and Iraq alienated much of the world and it didn't solve the problem of terrorism for that is not how you solve the problem of terrorism. ... And it means that the countries we alienated are questionning our Western narrative.

ON GAZA:

Professor Anthony King: "The increased urbanisation of the battlefield.  In the ethno-political wars we have seen and in the inter state wars and in Ukraine. ...  Look at the conditions in Gaza.  What we see is brutal scenes worthy of Stalingrad or worthy of medieval or ancient warfare where soldiers are fighting in ruins, civilians are in dreadful conditions.  That is more the future under AI enabled militaries rather than some beautiful surgical death by precision."

MACMILLAN:

"We have to come to terms with our own mortality as a species.  Climate change is the big existential threat out there.  We don't always behave reasonably and we haven't been behaving reasonably lately but we are capable of looking at adversity when it comes to us and seeing that we have to do something about it."

On Mon, 6 Jan 2025 at 21:44, Tim Weller <timweller1@gmail.com> wrote:

"Gone rogue" is a very good way of putting it.  Very true.  And Israel is our friend, ally, our big arms purchaser especially from the USA and Germany that are important members of NATO.

Google search:-

"Israel, being located in the Levant, is outside the geographical scope of the alliance. While it has had close security cooperation with the US and other Western countries, Israel has not sought formal membership in defense alliances like NATO."

Israel is firmly on our side.  WE have slaughtered over 40,000 Gazans and 6 million Jews in the 1930s/40s.  We have gone rogue since our religion went rogue and immoral in betraying its founder's teaching in 300 CE.  Christendom and Christians have done war, violence, killings ever since.  A disgraceful, despicable, violent world faith!

A Google search has, "As of 2024, there are approximately 292,000 Jewish people in the United Kingdom, making up 0.48% of the population."

"The 2021 census recorded 3.9 million Muslims in the United Kingdom, which is 6.5% of the total population."

Yet another transport blunder when they should, instead, have reopened the Black Country Railway, bypassing Brum, and on to the North and Scotland

 Nannie2 - commenting on a piece in the 'Worcester News'

4th January 11:17 am

User ID: 863582

Worcestershire Parkway was a very ill-thought-out project which cost the council tax payer £20 million just to provide 500 parking spaces principally for commuters to London. The only Cross Country service which stops there is the hourly Nottingham to Cardiff and travel to Bristol and the southwest is not possible. Passengers travelling to the northeast, northwest and Scotland still have to change at Birmingham New Street. The useless hourly X50 bus service from the city to Parkway does not provide worthwhile connection times. Although the journey time from Parkway to Birmingham is 31 minutes whereas fromForegate Street it is 45 minutes the overall travel time is still much quicker from Foregate Street. No other city of circa 100,000 population has three mainline stations and there were other options which should have been considered but the council simply ploughed ahead with Parkway which was first mooted in the 1980s based on a bogus Public Consultation exercise. No other solutions were rigourously submitted to technical and economic analysis and representations from Network Rail and Great Western Railway were simply ignored. There was no reason why the idle industrial land at Shrub Hill could not have been developed to provide 500 parking spaces and with a bus station at Shrub Hill a multi-modal transport hub could have been created. Worcester's problems are exacerbated by the hideous separation of the National network preventing some Cross Country services traveling via Shrub Hill as this would provide the much-needed connection to the southwest. Integration of bus, rail and active transport modes is what's required and yet our hapless County Council seem determined to fragment transport and frustrate passenger mobility which blights the local economy.TO NANNIE2:-You write authoritatively and with so much good sense. Can you explain why our 120 Kms former principal mainline railway "of national strategic significance", according to NR and DfT, is being broken up into a tramway, a Very Light Rail test track and a cycle-walkway between Walsall and Lichfield? And, that there are STILL no passenger trains on that SAME line between Lichfield and Burton on Trent.

Lay down your life for your friends ...

Lay down your life for your friends, NOT take the life of your enemies, at the say-so of the Lord's appointed "powers that be" in Romans 13 v 1-7.

And when you are meant to lay down your life for friend and foe.

And love your enemy, too.

Why all the killing by the Onward Christian Soldiers with their grossly OTT obedience to the godless and secular and most unchristian authorities?

It is all because of Paul in Romans 12 and not because of Christ in Matthew 5, 6 and 7. And elsewhere. 

HE laid down his life to show Western Jews and Christians that we are NOT meant to slaughter our fellow children of Abraham nor one another as we have been doing so enthusiastically since the beginning of the last century. Actually, since the tragic conversion of Emperor Constantine in 300 AD/CE.

Christian societies brought Western empires, chattel Slavery and never an end to all the much-loved slaughter in our frequent wars.

Something is desperately wrong with our 'Christian' discipleship.  And with our Western morality.  And with our conscience.

SCANDALS UNCOVERED, HERE:

As regards equal pay, I've had no adequate explanation why some council employees received generous payments and others of equal status did not.  At the time, the opportunity to apply for payments was hushed up and not openly promoted as something both union members and non-union members should do.  WHY WAS THIS?

I've had no explanation why Brum CC, after 40 years, remains promoting what appears to be the most expensive public transport mode to build after HS2.  Brum's tram schemes are three times per Km more expensive to construct than all other tram extensions throughout the world.  Trams are used to replace or duplicate bus services and two mainline railways - one in Brum and the other between Worcester and Derby via the Black Country.  The third, down for trams, was saved for TRAINS but the three stations are taking an age to build!

The latest tram scheme in Sandwell and Dudley is promoted as having to be done to get the mainline railway reinstated with passenger and freight trains!  Very costly trams first to get the TRAINS BACK.  Unheard of anywhere else in the world.  How bizarre!

Billions wasted, misused, wrongly allocated that, in my opinion, is tantamount to theft.  Certainly, the corrupt use of public money.  Money that could be used to help the poorest Brummies with food, energy and housing bills.  Instead, they suffer.

Staff are working on wrong, mistaken and Climate-accelerating priorities, all of whom could, as one example, be employed to upgrade and insulate the homes of the poorest in the city.

Andy Street did nothing to stop the rot and is rewarded with a knighthood.  Another scandal!

Mirrored by our friend and ally, darling beauty, Bibi!

The cruelties of the Soviet Union as you’ve never read them before https://www.telegraph.co.uk/books/non-fiction/review-the-soviet-century-karl-schlogel/

How we love to rejoice in the evils of our enemies and gloss over our own, as we are perpetrating in Gaza and in the West Bank for 15 months, so far!

Everything can be put back

Reassure Jayne that I was hugging him as we went down the tunnel. My arms were around him. It was the 3 or 4 seconds of darkness he didn't like.

To reassure you both, everything is in place and working perfectly for gas central heating and hot water to be reinstated once the gas meter is put back. My adult life has been dedicated to non-violence and simple living in the spirit of the Jesus of the Gospels. But I'm not living like a hermit. My occasional cruises and hotels are my well earned reward for a fairly low impact eco footprint over these 77 years - nearly.

Mum is welcome to put everything back as to how it was once I'm gone. I've told her that. And, that she has been and remains a most remarkable woman for remaining here, despite of Gareth's suicide soon after we married and bringing up you and Becky. 

Love to you and Jayne

Who is Today's Villain and Who is Today's Saint?!

The Two Crooks on a killing spree slaughtering the avowed non-violent, active pacifists like ME!

Today, Punitive yet, also, Impunitive Putrid apologised for "a tragic incident that took place in Russian airspace", viz the downing of a passenger plane, while not admitting it was his military who did it.  It killed 38 people when it crash-landed in Kazakhstan.  Radio 4 News at 6 pm today.

Barbaric, brutal Bibi, whom our side fully supports and arms with every kind of weapon imaginable (except WMD), closed Gaza's very last hospital.  The forcible evacuation of patients could be a death sentence for those needing treatment, said Radio 4 News.  Patients were stripped, beaten and left in the cold for 24 hours.  240 people apprehended as terrorists, said the IDF.  Images of weapons found in the hospital (Radio 4 News).  14 months of killing and they STILL haven't killed all the Hamas terrorists!!!  Wot a lot of them there must be!  So far, not even 50,000 mainly women and children out of the 2 million population.

I'm the worst terrorist of the lot (after all, I'm a guerrilla gardener)!  When will the Incompetent Defence Force get around to wiping me off the face of the earth?

The Very Leaky 'Boat'

True to form, I was horrified by the outdoor restaurant!  Rather leaky, very draughty walls, highly energy inefficient, needing lots and lots of lovely finite fossil fuels to keep everyone warm, as we were.  But not in tune with Climate science and realities that we have known about for 200 years!

It reminded me of the University of Brum's 'The Exchange' at Centenary Sq.  That also proves how intelligent academics, knowing the research still cannot move from brain to hand to implement and give a lead over Climate Action.  Only action to accelerate the Climate Emergency.  Astonishing!

The seeds of confrontation. Have we got too big for our boots? Always, we lot rule the world and disregard the UN (eg our man Bibi)

THE PROBLEM - a reluctance to walk in Putrid's boots, to see things from his angle.

Mixture of Russian nationalism, Russian pride in its history of fighting and beating off invaders like France with Napoleon and Germany with Hitler ... 

Now, perhaps, Russia wants to see off further former satellite states
being taken over by American/European influence.  So we come to Ukraine falling out of love with Putrid and deserting him for America/Europe.  Ukraine is a very, very big country to fall into the Western Camp.  Not surprisingly, our Revolution of Dignity in Feb 2014 was the last straw for Putrid.  Hence, he took back Crimea and started eating away at eastern Ukraine.

IN ADDITION:

Russian Pride in refusing to launch an all-out nuclear attack on America when it's subs were being depth charged during the Cuban Missile confrontation - spoken about by both Michael Portillo and Bruce Kent.  Russia was simply following our lead when we put Jupiter missiles near the Russian border - in Turkey.

Putrid remains incensed by American/Western eastwards expansionism (Corbyn's concern). Our side failed to keep its verbal, only undertakings over E Germany not being allowed Into NATO. But difficult to avoid with German unification!  Did that come too soon, as Margaret Thatcher thought and did not want?

Once E Germany was lost to NATO and the West, all the other former Warsaw Pact members were lost to Russia.  This must have niggled inside Purtrid's brain for years.  Finally, he snapped over Checknya and Georgia.

Our NATO/all things Western/American enthusiasts in Ukraine should have waited for the next General Election to oust their opponent Yanukovych.  Peaceful protest in some countries quickly turn to violence, as happened here.  Our side calls it the Revolution of Dignity in Feb 2014.  It led to all-out war in February 2022 after the BBC reported 14,000 dead since the Maidan Sq revolution.  Ukraine needed to walk a tightrope in not upsetting their neighbour Putrid but, this is probably impossible, I know.  Wikipedia reported:

In November 2013, a wave of large-scale protests known as "Euromaidan" began in response to President Yanukovych's decision not to sign a political association and free trade agreement with the European Union (EU), instead choosing closer ties to Russia. Euromaidan soon developed into the largest democratic mass movement in Europe since 1989.^[29] Earlier that year the Verkhovna Rada (Ukrainian parliament) had overwhelmingly approved finalizing the agreement;^[30] Russia had pressured Ukraine to reject it.^[31]

Maybe, enormous military alliances, like NATO are more of a hindrance than a help.  Gorbachev was replaced in 1991.  We should have disbanded NATO when the Warsaw Pact was disbanded in the 90s but American/Western power and arrogance meant that was out of the question.  We must always be the Top Dominating Dog, rather than working for equality and balance and peaceful co-existence, as we had with MAD.  Top Dog in the Persian Gulf since the World War, part One but disrupted ... see:

"the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979, (SELF: US/UK invasion and occupation in 2001-2021) but SALT 2 terms were honoured by both sides, although the US Senate did not ratify it.  In response to the Soviet invasion, the president announced what came to be known as the Carter Doctrine (President from 1977-81) -- that the United States would defend its interests in the Persian Gulf with military force if necessary."  Wikipedia   SELF: Hence, Top Dog, too in the Persian Gulf.

TOP DOG, the American-led Westerners, defeated in Iran in 1979.  From Wikipedia:-

"The Islamic Revolution in 1979 toppled the U.S.-backed shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and brought to power a group of clerics led by exiled Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Carter granted the ailing shah political asylum, to the anger of many Iranians.

"In late 1979, a group of hardline Iranian students who were believed to have had the tacit support of Khomeini stormed the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and took 52 Americans hostage. They demanded the return of the shah and an apology for past actions by the United States in Iran."

FURTHER READING:  Martin Sixsmith's new book, 'Putin and the Return of History: How the Kremlin Rekindled the Cold War'

QUESTIONS for us all

Should our Mayor now be speaking out against West Midlands armaments industry fueling the slaughter of wholly innocent Gazans (and West Bank Palestinians) who simply wish to LIVE and to live in peaceful co-existence with Israel?

Should our Mayor be resisting the hundreds of millions going into multi-modal public transport that actually means regular trains and buses being swapped with Metro trams and Sprint buses?

Should the Mayor be acquainted with the uncomfortable fact that these kinds of extremely expensive expenditure (armaments and multi-modal public transport) simply accelerate the climate emergency and divert private and public funds from helping low incomes with, for example, regional Fare-Free Public Transport for every citizen?

QUESTIONS for Mayor Andy and his rival, Richard

1. Whether or not you are elected, will you work for our (WMCC) Climate Action Points​​​
   Nine Action Points from W Mids Climate Coalition to lobby the West Mids CA in support of a zero-c...
   ​to be urgently implemented?

2. Which one are you able to name and will you work for its implementation asap, regardless of the election outcome?

3. Why do you approve the spending of £6.1 BILLION between 2017 and 2032 on swapping buses and trains for mainly trams and Sprint buses?

4. How come this has been reduced from £15 billion between 2020 and 2040?

5. Can you explain how there is a lethal connection between money spent and accelerating climate disaster?

6. Can you make clear the difference between bus franchising and the present Enhanced Bus Partnership scheme?

7. Which do you prefer and why?

8. Have you worked out the cost of bus franchising compared with extending the regional Fare-Free Public Transport for older citizens to everyone?

9. As money is tight what is your order of priority for spending:-

tram extensions  -  Sprint bus extensions  -  putting trains back on urban railway lines not yet destroyed  -  bus franchising  -  Fare-Free Public Transport extended  -  bus/business lanes to free up road space in rush hours for essential vehicle users and to reward bus, train, tram users?

10  Within the United Nations, what does IPCC stand for and can you summarise the danger that human activity and behaviour is putting us all in?

11  Should the Dudley Tram, when it is extended from Dudley town centre on the mainline railway​
"of national strategic significance".pdf
​ via that railway, should it come off the railway to divert into Merry Hill or stay on the railway to connect with the national railway network at Stourbridge Jct?

Independent Transport Review Update

Independent Transport Review Update

The Director of Law and Governance provided a verbal update of the Independent Transport Review to note that preliminary findings were currently being discussed and that the recommendations would be made public in due course.

https://governance.wmca.org.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=137&MID=1466

Shown up by a Muslim terrorist group!

Should we have attacked Syria in 2013 after their chemical attack on civilians, since it was obviously so easy to overthrow Assad? We could have got the fame and glory for our Mighty Military Machine instead of a Muslim terrorist group.

What a wonderful opportunity we missed to get our first ever foreign policy success since vanquishing Russia and its Warsaw Pact with our success in winning the Cold War in 1989!