[chinhodado]

Maybe I'm too skeptical, but this seems a bit too obvious to me. Why would you try to poison someone with no real threat to you and risk him becoming a martyr, using a method that immediately brings you to mind, with a nerve agent that is also strongly linked to you?

[ardy42]

> Maybe I'm too skeptical, but this feels like a false flag thing to me. Why would you try to poison someone with no real threat to you and risk him becoming a martyr, using a method that immediately brings you to mind, with a nerve agent that is also strongly linked to you?

Russia assassinates even unimportant people for revenge and intimidation. For instance: they hired assassins to kill a bunch of nobodies in Ukraine in 2016 because they'd helped supply Georgia with Ukraine-made antiaircraft weapons that had been used against Russia when they invaded in 2008.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/31/world/europe/russian-assa...:

> Russia Ordered a Killing That Made No Sense. Then the Assassin Started Talking.

> ...The war lasted only five days and ended with a crushing victory for Moscow. But in many ways, the conflict was an embarrassment for Russia’s intelligence services. Years earlier, Ukraine had secretly sold sophisticated antiaircraft systems to Georgia, allowing for the effective defense that I had seen....

> For Mr. Putin — who has described Russians and Ukrainians as “one people” — it was an act of bloody treachery.

> “We don’t know who decided to deliver equipment and weapons from Ukraine during the conflict, but whoever it was, that person made a huge mistake,” Mr. Putin said at a news conference shortly after the war.

[drran]

They started to assassinate people in Ukraine much earlier. They tried to kill me from 2008 to 2019. It was not clear why they're trying to kill me (I'm nobody, low rank officer, was not in service), until they killed Mamchur, so nobody believed me at the time, until the war. With few other officers, we started informal counter-intelligence group. In 2012, I intercepted plans to destabilize situation in Ukraine. In 2013-2014, we noticed presence of Russian agents at Maidan, so I was deployed at Maidan to find Russian and drain information from them. Because of multiple attempts to kill me, I had 5 years of war-time experience in 2013, so it was easy job for me.

[gruez]

Didn't they poison some guy with radioactive isotopes a few years back? I don't think they care about it being attributed to them, or think that being attributed to them has positive value.

[austinjp]

That was Alexander Litvinenko.

https://www.google.com/search?q=alexander+litvinenko

[brippalcharrid]

I recall that the [very small] quantity of Polonium-210 involved had a market value of $20 Million and was tied directly back to the state atomic agency requiring the personal authorisation of the Commander-in-Chief. So a rather extravagant and blatant way of dispatching someone (with curiously bungling assassins).

[mc32]

Russia knows no one is going to do anything about it.

This method lets people know what tools they are willing to use on an adversary. And it’s also a signature “we did it” so you don’t have to guess who’s after you. It serves as a warning to any upstarts as well.

It’s not all that different from the Ndraghetta bombings up and down Italy in the late XX cent.

[andai]

I'm thinking, if they wanted to do it quietly, we wouldn't all be reading about it now.

[avmich]

Or they couldn't do it as quiet as they wanted. They're known for relative incompetence.

[acephal]

Man, organized crime in Italy and Mexico... Cosa Nostra were being extremely polite next to them.

[agent008t]

If it was, you would expect the Russians to be doing all they can to find who actually did it, people getting fired, etc. Navalny almost certainly was under 24/7 surveillance. You also would expect the best doctors to be made available for him in Russia.

We haven't seen any of that. Your version of events seems highly unlikely.

[hexfaker]

Not real threat, huh?

There is at least "Smart vote" (aka умное голосование) initiative, that helped to beat government on some regional elections earlier.

Oh, and it's big election day in less than two weeks, so there is definetely a motivation for poisoning.

[occamrazor]

Probably the same reason for poisoning someone with Polinium: leaving a clear signature, but being still able to deny any involvement.

[Paradigma11]

I do think it's two fold. If nobody specifically looks for it, it clears as natural causes. If it comes out, it sends a clear message.

Sometimes you get steak and sometimes you get chocolate.

[auganov]

He's not even trying to be a threat. He supports the annexation of Crimea. Generally isn't too critical of Russia on any big geopolitical issues. Doesn't even poll that well. Only his anti-corruption activism might have made him some enemies. But politically he only makes Putin look moderate.

Not fair to call it a "false flag" though as there's no obvious "flag" attached to this event. It's not like anybody has claimed the attack. There's a whole world of possibilities beyond "Putin ordered it" and "false flag". But whoever did it, it does seem like Kremlin is covering for them so at least partially morally responsible.

[sam_lowry_]

Navalny did not support the annexation of Crimea. He merely pointed to the fact that it is not that easy now to give it back to Ukraine and that ultimately after years of stabilisation and negotiation, Crimean popolation will have to decide in a trustable and open referendum.

[drran]

It's easy to return Crimea back: Russian army goes out, Ukrainian army goes in. What the problem?

[aphextron]

>Why would you try to poison someone with no real threat to you and risk him becoming a martyr, using a method that immediately brings you to mind, with a nerve agent that is also strongly linked to you?

They want everyone to know they did it. That's Putin's MO. Everyone knows he did it, and he knows everyone knows he did it. But there's still enough plausible deniability that it would be hard to conclusively prove. And ultimately he has his finger on the world's largest arsenal of nuclear ICBMs, so he knows there's absolutely nothing anyone can do about it. It's the same as the mafia leaving a severed horse head in your bed. It sends a message.

[JoeAltmaier]

They're Russian. They work differently...

[tanyatik]

We are a lot less different from you than you think.

[JoeAltmaier]

Sure. But Russians are notorious for various things - being blunt and serious; depressive, black humor; risk-takers. Not everybody, but the stereotype can inform the discussion, which was Why would anybody do this?

[tanyatik]

It seems that this stereotype is too generic and sweeping to be useful even if it was true.

Instead we could use facts that are already known about e.g. Putin -- that he's an individual for whom sowing fear is more important than not being blamed, as the other similar poisonings have shown.

[drran]

To install puppet as "opposition leader". It's typical scenario, which works extremely well in many situations. "Look, Putin hate him so badly. He is true leader of opposition!"

[sschueller]

It seems very odd and again perfect timing for the administration to show up in Germany and complain about the planned pipeline to Russia.

And no, I am not a Russian troll nor do I have any connections to Russia. Check my comment history. I am just sceptical that one would do this and not just shot someone they wanted to get rid of them.

Is Putin really that stupid or was it someone else?

[BrianOnHN]

Put some thought into the word "reasonable." As in "beyond reasonable doubt."

The uncertainty you're trying to sow is in no way reasonable.

In other words, just apply occam's razor to the problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor

[krick]

FWIW, I agree, even though it seems to be an unpopular opinion. I don't have a strong opinion on that, and honestly I don't really care, but it looks way too weird. I mean, people mention Litvinenko and Skripal. With Litvinenko there really was no doubt with regards to both if he was assassinated and why he was assassinated. Whole story with Skripal was weird, it was a huge scandal which very much served UK (or anybody who would like to blame Russia for anything), and wasn't any use to Russia, all the "investigation" was really shady and nothing was really proven. But ok, given the fact Skripal was ex-GRU, and all such agencies have a specific "culture" (i.e. people there really don't like traitors), I'm willing to believe getting revenge was a personal thing for his ex-coworkers, possibly quite high in the government as well.

But I cannot imagine why would anyone do that to Navalny. First of (and this is very much arguable, but I'm just saying what is my opinion), I don't think he is any threat to Putin&friends. He has some supporters, but "opposition leader" is waay too generous, he isn't even treated very seriously by people who are against Putin, much less by Putin. So, some mundane harassment like police raids to his office... sure, why not? But assassinating him very publicly like that, when he wasn't even "in the news" (figuratively speaking) for some time? I have no idea, why would "the government" want it. He isn't anything new, he has no real power. And unlike Litvinenko or Skripal he isn't ex-GRU/FSB, so he isn't a "traitor" to any "interesting" agencies. Basically, I don't see why would his "enemies" (i.e. Putin&friends) even care about him.

[mikeyouse]

> Basically, I don't see why would his "enemies" (i.e. Putin&friends) even care about him.

His constantly embarrassing exposes where he demonstrates how much money they've fleeced from the Russian people don't count? e.g.:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE1iw4seYt0&list=PLuBu40P6jU...

Or his videos demonstrating widespread voting fraud that's keeping "Putin and Friends" in power?

[krick]

Oh, come on. I don't know if you are Russian: if so, I would ask you to honestly think if you believe this is a threat. I personally don't. If you are not, I'd say that it probably would be a notable thing in USA, but Russia has a specific culture in a sense that nothing of this sort is perceived by anybody as a big news. Everyone always assumes that any rich person is a thief and a crook (even if they are not), and that everybody in a government is extremely rich (and a thief, and a crook squared) (even if they are not). Nobody gets surprised by anything of the sort.

I like watching these videos, BTW, because I like how they are made, it's pretty fun. But are they "hurting" anybody? I doubt so.

A single assassination of Navalny gives much more bad publicity, than 100 years of Navalny & ФБК making "Он вам не Димон" kind of movies. If they care about the latter, they surely don't want the former.

[toxik]

You have presented doubt about the given hypothesis without offering an alternative.

Putin & co. is the simplest explanation. Why question it? Who else would stand to gain from this? Because they do gain from it: intimidating the opposition is the name of the game in a dictatorship.

[krick]

Alternative was given by the poster I was answering to: a false flag. Who has anything to gain? Basically anybody, who needs any reason to blame Russia for everything, which is a very popular thing to do for the last 10 years at least, and getting more and more popular lately. Intimidating the opposition? I already said why I don't buy it. There is no real opposition to intimidate. Navalny does what he does for the last 10 years, he didn't become any more dangerous — less dangerous, in fact, since novelty wore off and he isn't perceived very seriously anymore. BBC may call him "opposition leader", but most of the Russian people who don't like Putin (and there is a lot of them) don't really see him as a leader, more like "yet another clown".

Let me put it this way. There is a "perceived value" and a "real value" of assassination. So, if you want to send a message, "real value" is metric of people you want to get a message getting this particular message. Like if you are GRU/CIA/Medellin cartel (basically the same things) and you want every cartel member to know that traitors will be punished, you want it to be relatable for the other cartel members and gruesome. You don't really want it to be very much high-profile (which it must be to some degree if you want it to be gruesome, but only as a side effect).

"Perceived value" is what is "real" to complete outsiders unaware of situation. It is what will cause the resonance in BBC and among the people you really don't give a fuck about getting the message (and in case of Russia govt. — don't want to get the message: Russia absolutely isn't trying to tell the world there is a dictatorship, it wants for the outsiders to get exactly the opposite message, that there is "real competition", i.e. people like Navalny that are against the regime, but just don't have that much of a support).

So, to summarize, if you are Medellin cartel sending message to its members: maximize "real" minimizing "perceived". If you want to set up Medellin cartel: you maximize "perceived" and don't give a fuck about "real".

Now, what is real/perceived ratio in the case of Navalny? As I already said, this is my personal (pretty humble in this case, and not particularly strong) opinion, but my estimation is: very, very low. I don't know of any "people just like Navalny" (so it will be relatable), that are actually dangerous to the regime and need to get "a message". On the other hand, "perceived value" is very high: in fact, the moment Navalny gets to a hospital, everyone automatically assumes it is an assassination by the Russian govt, since he is such a prominent "opposition leader".

So, if I was GRU, I wouldn't want Navalny to be killed in an obvious way. If I was a CIA, I most likely would.

[toxik]

Yes and then Occam’s razor.

Your explanation requires too many assumptions, and fails to explain other facts of history - such as other people having been poisoned, or Putin et al doing other wildly unpopular things just for the sake of it.

Russia habitually invades the Norwegian, Danish and Swedish waters _just to show that they can_.

Your reasoning boils down to “if you can think of an explanation, it’s wrong”. The CIA furthermore has very little need for making Russia look bad right now. Russia is doing that all in its own.

[krick]

I didn't really make any wild assumptions. Your explanation on the other hand is basically "it's Russia, because I don't like Russia" (without really acknowledging that there is no single "Russia" that kills ex-spies and invades Danish waters: there are multiple different people and agencies, with different intentions and modes of operation) which is exactly what would anybody trying to set up "Russia" (or anybody) would want. So, I don't think "Occam's razor" applies to either yours or my reasoning, it rather seems to me that people who are exceedingly eager to take at face value stories like that exhibit what is called "magical thinking".

P.S. I want to clarify, that I don't really blame CIA, it was just a way of simplifying the essence of what I'm trying to convey. I don't try to make any theories of what's happening, I'm acknowledging that I have no clue, because what I'm seeing is 2 political sides pointing at each other, shouting and swinging arms. All that I'm saying is that accepting "the simplest explanation because of Occam'z razon" here is stupid, because (unlike when setting up a physics experiment) the simplest explanation here is just words and pointing sides, the same as the more complex explanation, and I can think of dozens of "possible explanations" that all will be lies. So I don't pretend to know who poisoned Navalny (or even if he was poisoned, for that matter), but it would be baffling to me if it indeed was done under direct or indirect Putin's orders. So, I was only telling the GP that he is not alone in thinking this seems very suspicious. Indeed it does.

[thrwway34]

And your explanation on the other hand is basically "it's not Russia, because I like Putin".

There were dozens of illogical things Russian government did for decades, and killing opponents (or just innocent people) is among them.