Was violence against England fans organised by the Russian government?

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The Guardian says "Whitehall experts" think so:

Senior government officials fear the violence unleashed by Russian hooligans at Euro 2016 was sanctioned by the Kremlin and are investigating links with Vladimir Putin’s regime.

It is understood that a significant number of those involved in savage and highly coordinated attacks on England fans and others in Marseille and Lille have been identified as being in the “uniformed services” in Russia. 

The theory is that the sanctioning of hooliganism by Putin is a continuation of what has been described as Russia’s campaign of “hybrid warfare”. Whitehall experts fear the tactic is a ploy to demonstrate Russian strength while building on a narrative inside the country that the rest of the world is lining up against it. 

Following the violence in Marseille, fake Twitter accounts were reportedly set up to spread the view that Russian fans had been provoked. A senior Russian parliamentarian tweeted, “Well done lads, keep it up!” 

Two England fans, Andrew Bache, 51, from Portsmouth, and Stewart Gray, from Hinckley, Leicestershire, were left in comas fighting for their lives after being attacked with hammers and iron bars by Russian hooligans.

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Six of the Best 603

RIA Novosti archive

"If Brexit wins, it will be because a majority of British voters have simply lost confidence in the way they are governed and the people they are governed by. That loss of confidence is part bloody-mindedness, part frivolity, part panic, part bad temper, part prejudice. But it is occurring – if it is – in a nation that has always prided itself, perhaps too complacently, on having very different qualities: good sense, practicality, balanced judgment, and a sure instinct for not lurching to the right or left." Martin Kettle analyses why we have been brought to the verge of Brexit.

Bernard Aris says the Leave campaign has not thought about the implications for Ireland - north and south.

Mikhail Gorbachev still has lots to say finds Neil MacFarquhar.

The good news is that expensive libel cases are in decline, says David Hencke. The bad news is that the rich are using the 'right to be forgotten' to effectively silence their critics instead.

Daniel Ralston tells the story of the fake Zombies - the strangest con in rock history.

York Stories visits the threatened buildings of Ordnance Lane.

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Viktor Korchnoi was a beacon to Soviet dissidents

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In April I wrote that:

Like all sports, chess has a way of mirroring the conflicts in wider society. 

The Fischer vs Spassky match of 1972 was a wonderful metaphor for the Cold War, even if the gentlemanly, quietly dissident Boris Spassky was never a cypher for the Soviet Union. 

In the 1980s the volatile Garry Kasparov was a perfect symbol of glasnost and perestroika against the model Soviet citizen Anatoly Karpov.

In between those two rivalries came the one between Karpov and Viktor Korchnoi, which was a battle between the model Soviet citizen and a dissident.

Korchnoi died today at the age of 85. Leonard Barden's obituary of him in the Guardian explains his significance in and beyond the game:

Viktor Korchnoi ... was a chess grandmaster who defected from the Soviet Union, then twice challenged the USSR’s Anatoly Karpov for the world title. Their first contest, in 1978 in the Philippines, was the most bizarre in championship history, bitterly fought on and off the board. 

Soviet media referred to Korchnoi as “the opponent” or “the challenger” rather than by name. Karpov refused the traditional pre-game handshake, Korchnoi wore mirror glasses. Karpov’s team included a hypnotist seated in the front rows staring at Korchnoi, who enlisted two members of a meditative sect on bail for murder. Needing six games to win, Karpov led 5-2 before Korchnoi fought back to 5-5, only to lose the decisive game. 

Korchnoi was already 45 years old when he defected, an age when most chess players are well past their best. For him it was a liberating experience, and when his results equalled or surpassed what he had achieved as a Soviet citizen, it stimulated an exodus not just of grandmasters but also of other intellectuals.

Korchnoi's agreed  epitaph already seems to be that he was the strongest player never to win the world title.

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Six of the Best 591

"This tells you everything you need to know about the desperate, empty campaign being run by a gang of politicians who’ve stepped beyond mere incompetence, and have ended up somewhere truly nasty, surrounded by supporters who love every bit of it." Rupert Myers is damning about the Brexiteers' assault on President Obama.

Monroe Palmer outlines the improvement to the government's Housing Bill that Liberal Democrat peers have battled to make.

"The premise of Russian foreign policy to the West is that the rule of law is one big joke; the practice of Russian foreign policy is to find prominent people in the West who agree. Moscow has found such people throughout Europe; until the rise of Trump the idea of an American who would volunteer to be a Kremlin client would have seemed unlikely." Timothy Snyder dissects Donald Trump's admiration for Vladimir Putin.

It is good to see Jerzy Skolimowski’s Deep End getting a mention alongside the usual suspects in this Steve Rose survey of films about Britain from the 1960s.

Jessica Fielding brings us the Yorkshire Television schedule for Monday 19 April 1971 - Richard Beckinsale, Austin Mitchell and Ena Sharples in unexpected colour.

The defunct Glasgow Central Railway line left behind a trail of stations, tunnels, shafts, cuttings and bridges throughout the west of the city. Alex Cochrane explores its remains.

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Six of the Best 587

Lynne Featherstone explains how the state killed her nephew. "The crucial papers were destroyed according [to] the Department of Health."

Max Seddon looks at Putin's new army: "Russia’s campaign to shape international opinion around its invasion of Ukraine has extended to recruiting and training a new cadre of online trolls that have been deployed to spread the Kremlin’s message on the comments section of top American websites."

"I had no idea small children could walk so far. We skipped three miles one day and two miles the next, albeit incentivised by fish and chips or ice creams. At night, the children fell asleep like well-exercised puppies." Patrick Barkham says we have betrayed our children from love of cars.

Kashmir Hill on how an internet mapping glitch turned a random Kansas farm into a digital hell.

London bombsites are photographed today by A London Inheritance.

Tom Cox explores Dunwich.

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Sergey Karjakin: Putin's challenger for the world chess title

Like all sports, chess has a way of mirroring the conflicts in wider society.

The Fischer vs Spassky match of 1972 was a wonderful metaphor for the Cold War, even if the gentlemanly, quietly dissident Boris Spassky was never a cypher for the Soviet Union.

In the 1980s the volatile Garry Kasparov was a perfect symbol of glasnost and perestroika against the model Soviet citizen Anatoly Karpov.

"We already have a world champion: we don't need another one," the young Kasparov was once told by the authorities.

Now Segey Karjakin's qualification to challenge Magnus Carlsen for the world title brings another conflict into the limelight.

Because Karjakin was born in Crimea's capital, Simferopol, in 1990 and represented Ukraine until he was poached to play for Russia. In July 2009, President Dmitry Medvedev made Karjakin a Russian citizen by decree.

Which makes him a sort of chess-playing Zola Budd.

Since then, as Radio Free Europe shows, he has become a born again Russian:

From his adopted home, Karjakin has been a staunch supporter of the Kremlin and Russian policy in Ukraine which has seen Moscow forcibly annex the Crimean Peninsula following the ouster of former Russia-backed president Viktor Yanukovych and then support a separatist conflict in the east that has claimed more than 9,100 lives. 

Following the Russian operation in Crimea in 2014, Karjakin posted a photograph of himself on Instagram wearing a T-shirt bearing an image Russian President Vladimir Putin and the caption: "We don't leave our guys behind."

The only time I seem to lose my cool on Twitter is when people who ought to know better show sympathy for the Putin regime. He is all but a Fascist dictator and on the borders on Europe.

He was allowed to annexe territory in Georgia and then Ukraine with barely a word of condemnation from the British left.

Yes, the situation in the Crimea is complicated. Historically, it was part of Russia but was transferred to Ukraine as part of his programme of blurring ethnic boundaries to discourage nationalist risings against the Soviet Union.

So you can make a case that the Crimea should be Russian. But the idea that shared race and culture justify military action that breaks international law is an odd one for the left to embrace.

Meanwhile, I suspect Karjakin has a good chance against Carlsen. At the very least we shall find out how good Carlsen really is,

His challenger in the last two world championship matches, Vishy Anand, never gave the impression that he believed he could win.

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Sergey Karjakin qualifies to challenge for the world chess title

While the geeks were watching a rerun of the election night coverage from 1966, I outgeeked them by watching the final round of the Candidates chess tournament in Moscow.

The tournament was held to find who would challenge the world champion Magnus Carlsen for his title in a match in New York this November.

In today's final round the leaders were playing one another: Sergey Karjakin had white against Fabiano Caruana.

A draw would give Karjakin victory in the tournament, but Caruana needed a win. (By a quirk of the tie-break system that situation could have been reversed if Vishy Anand had won his game, but that never looked likely and he agreed an early draw.)

Caruana obtained an active, unbalance position without taking on too much risk. I got the impression he was drifting slightly when he got to move 35 or so, but there still seemed all to play for.

Then Karjakin played a devastating rook sacrifice that the grandmasters commentating on the game had not anticipated.

A tremendous achievement in such a tense game, though most people believe that Carlsen will retain his title when they meet.

You can play through the game on chess,com.

Karjakin played his sacrifice in the position above: the devastating 37. Rxd5.

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Mark Steel, whataboutery and polytoynbeeism

Outrageous that Corbyn goes to a Stop the War dinner - he should go to dinners held by arms dealers and offshore bankers like a proper MP.

— Mark Steel (@mrmarksteel) December 11, 2015

Back in September I suggested that "whataboutery is pretty much all that enthusiasts for Jeremy Corbyn's leadership of the Labour Party have to offer".

Certainly that trope is alive and well amongst them, judging by the number of times this has been retweeted into my timeline.

The truth, of course, is that it is perfectly possible to believe Corbyn is wrong to hang out with apologists for Putin and Assad and to believe it is wrong for MPs to allows themselves to be wined and dined by arms dealers and offshore bankers.

Still, whataboutery does represent a new departure for Mark Steel. In the past he has relied solely upon polytoynbeeism:

Mark Steel has based a whole stand up and journalistic career on this trick. His every column or routine runs in essence: "So the Tories say X do they? I expect they say Y and Z too!" And everyone laughs. 

They laugh because this technique is a form of political group grooming. It reminds you how generous and sensible you and your allies are, and how cruel and stupid your opponents are.

But then Steel had to broaden his range when he left the SWP in 2008 (but was kept on by Radio 4 even so). For, as Harry's Blog pointed out at the time:

Given that Mark Steel's comedy routine consists of reciting the editorials from last week's Socialist Worker in a "blokey" voice, I wonder what he'll do for material in the future.

So well done Mark. Maybe your comic repertoire will be so broad one day that you will be able to come out against fascists and semi-fascists like Assad and Putin.

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