Ramping Up

Another click on the ratchet:

Finland has fired warning shots at a suspected foreign submarine off the coast of Helsinki in the early hours of Tuesday morning, amid growing military tensions with neighbouring Russia.

The navy said it noticed an underwater target on Monday and again on Tuesday morning and dropped depth charges the size of grenades.

"During surveillance of [Finland's] territorial integrity, the navy detected a possible underwater object at midday (0900 GMT) on April 27, 2015, within Finland's territorial waters close to the border outside Helsinki," the defence ministry said in a statement. "A second sighting was made during the night and "a warning was given with light depth charges at three in the morning," the ministry added. No further sightings were reported after the warning shots and no details have been given of the type of vessel that was detected.

The incident comes during an spike in Russian military activity in the Baltic which has prompted non-aligned Finland to announce closer military cooperation with its Nordic neighbours - including Nato members Norway and Denmark.

NATO members are tightening the circle, eastern Europe is a tinderbox the likes of which we haven't seen since the 1930s, Putin is holding a lit match, and the Chinese are in the midst of a massive naval expansion. Meanwhile, our so-called President is busy trying to completely destabilize the Middle East by giving nukes to the most radical state therein, while effectively mothballing half of our carrier fleet.

Getting the picture yet? I sincerely hope you don't have any children of draft age.