Re:Russian spies detained in The Hague were planning cyber b...
by jstanley on Friday September 14, 2018 @08:45AM
(#17986777)
> The problem is that to be disbelieving the Russian spies requires believing the British spies.
No it doesn't. It is quite possible that they both lie.
Re:Russian spies detained in The Hague were planning cyber b...
by dpwm on Friday September 14, 2018 @09:04AM
(#17986878)
The Russians did it and the Russians didn't do it?
The British narrative is the Russians did it.
The Russian narrative is they had no part in it.
If you disbelieve the Russian narrative, you believe they did have a part in it.
It's possible to not believe the British narrative and not care about the Russian narrative because you don't believe they have anything to answer for, but that is altogether different from disbelieving both.
For what it's worth I don't believe the British narrative on this because of it is inconsistent with previous versions of itself and the evidence I have personally seen is circumstantial.
To believe the Russian spies (we didn't do it, somebody in the UK is killing Russians, they are liars!) requires disbelieving the British spies (the Russians did it, they're liars!).
So it has the property of being believe the British government narrative or you're agreeing with the Russian government, which feels a lot like guilt by similarity of argument.
The default position for those who believe in the rule of law is to not believe the British narrative, because they are the accusers and the burden of proof is theirs and they have publicly provided only circumstantial evidence.
It's quite a clever trap that many educated people seem to have left unchallenged.