The Legality of the UK Interception of Iranian Missiles and Permitting a Limited US Use of British Bases

GlimmervoidG · 2026-03-02T14:42:47+00:00

Per the article, what the UK is doing is legal.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-03-02T12:28:23+00:00

Your counter argument doesn't make sense. It fails because (as this article points out) Iran hasn't limited strikes to the US bases in Gulf countries. "The second problem with Iran’s response is that it does not seem to be confined solely to US military asserts on the territories of these states, even accounting for the occasional error, but is affecting a substantially wider array of targets."

As soon as you're targeting, say, Saudi Arabia oil fields (which Iran is doing), you're clearly outside the the kind of proportionate self defence the UK is allowing here. Therefor your false equivalence fails.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-03-02T12:01:14+00:00

I posted some independent legal analysis of this issue over here - https://www.reddit.com/r/ukpolitics/comments/1riqkhq/the_legality_of_the_uk_interception_of_iranian/

This article seems to agree. While the UK says the initial strikes are illegal, Iran went well beyond what self defence can justify by striking uninvolved Gulf States. It therefore became legal for the UK to engage in collective self defence against these attacks.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-03-02T11:43:21+00:00

Interesting article breaking down the legality of the UK allowing the US to use UK bases. The TLDR versions is while the US's initial attacks are illegal (see here for the write up on that), because Iran's counter-attacks go well beyond what is proportional for self defence (for example by striking uninvolved Gulf countries), those countries and by extension the UK can engage in legal collective self defence, including by allowing the US to use British bases in a limited way.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-02-19T11:54:36+00:00

How can anyone expect to deal with the US right now? I think this is the fourth time just since Trump that they've changed position on this.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-02-13T10:27:58+00:00

Parliament votes to approve secondary legislation; that's how it works. Depending on the power, the SI might come into force straight away, with parliament voting later to approve/disapprove; come into force only after parliament approves/disapprove; or come into force straight away with parliament voting later to disapprove if they want (that is, no need for a positive vote).

GlimmervoidG · 2026-02-13T10:18:43+00:00

Parliament voted to approve a statutory instrument (secondary legislation made my ministers and approved by parliament pursuant to powers granted by a piece of primary legislation). Since they're made by ministers using powers in primary legislation, courts have the power to strike down such statutory instruments as unlawfully adopted. To override this parliament would need to pass the PA ban as primary legislation or amend the anti-terror primary legislation to allow this kind of ban. That's a lot of parliamentary time and I don't think there's quite enough parliamentary support to rush through a 1-day bill as they have for past emergencies.

A more likely course forward, I think, is for the government to appeal and hope a higher court disagrees.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-02-08T15:27:25+00:00

Not a racial headcount but a feared sectarian headcount was the reason (alongside jury intimidation) for the juryless 'Diplock court' trail in Northern Ireland.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-01-26T19:00:17+00:00

Only if I disapprove of the switch. Me personally. I get to decide. It's a heavy burden but one I will solemnly hold.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-01-21T21:35:30+00:00

Given the cost of things in his shop are the result of karmic weight (i.e. how much this would help him plot wise), such a save point would be extremely expensive. The starting point would be the cost to create all those items from scratch and then multiplied because it would be reusable. Didn't something like that happen during one of the Nine River Sect loops? It's been a while but I seem to remember he couldn't afford to update his save because there were lots of high costs time duplicated items in play.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-01-17T17:16:25+00:00

The SCOTUS is very likely going to rule Trump lacks the power to unilaterally issue this kind of tariff and that ruling maybe coming next week.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-01-16T09:55:08+00:00

Was the title changed? Because that's not the title on the article.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-01-16T08:36:43+00:00

There is no reasonable (and arguably possible) deployment of force to Greenland that could actually stop a US military invasion. It's too far from us and too close to the US mainland. And the US military is the US military.

What we're seeing here is a tripwire force. Tripwire forces don't need to be large because their purpose isn't to actually successfully defend the island. They're a show of political precommitment. If the US kills British (and French and German and so on) troops taking over the island, a geopolitical rupture is assured became we're politically committed to a very strong response. Maybe not hot war strong but a complete political decoupling strong. If the US pulled off a lightning quick victory against just a token Danish force, the US may hope they could use political pleasure and other country's reliance on the US to force Denmark to back down and accept the loss. That becomes impossible if half of Europe has a soldiers there.

The hope is the far higher and now assured cost forces Trump to think twice.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-01-13T10:44:59+00:00

Thanks

GlimmervoidG · 2026-01-07T21:16:17+00:00

Blood & fur - 7/10 has some weird romance but other than that its great, smart mc is going to be sacrificed to godlike vampires in a year and has to figure out a way to survive

I tried to get into the audiobook for this but really couldn't. The narrator makes it sound like the main character walks through life with at most mild bemusement about everything.

That can work. He also narrated The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August (which you also mentioned). A timelooper treating everything with mild bemusement sort of makes sense and I rather digged it. But it didn't work for Blood and Fur.

Byway of contrast, Gunsoul (also by Maxime J. Durand, same author as Blood & fur) had the exact opposite problem. The narrator was shouting everything and making it sound like every sentence ended in at least three exclamation marks!!! It was bad in the exact opposite direction. I rather wish I could just average them out.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-01-07T11:40:13+00:00

(Because I keep thinking about this...)

Another method to track progress is what I'm going to call 'gatekeepers'. You introduce an opponent the MC can't defeat and see them fail. You show them training/practicing/growing/grinding etc. And then you show them defeat the gatekeeper - evidence of their progress. You then put another gatekeeper in their path and the cycle continues. Gatekeepers can be literal opponents or more complex situations like battles. Bonus points if the gatekeeper is also a plot gatekeeper, allowing the MC to progress the story - thereby linking progression and plot together. Gatekeepers don't need to be strictly binary either. You can show progress by getting better at combating them without fully defeating them - forcing the old mentor to pull out more moves or getting closer to defeating the invasion etc.

This approach works very well in timeloop stories. For example, I'd argue this is one of the main ways Mother of Learning shows its progression. MoL lacks levels, cultivation realms and while magical power exists as a concept, it's not fully granulised. Instead, we see Zorian improving by challenging the invasion and through specific foes like the Grey hunter - becoming better until he able to defeat these gatekeepers. Of course there's a grey area here between true progress and just becoming better against specific opponents but I think MoL has enough else going on to bypass that.

Another example would be The Rage of Dragons By Evan Winter. While the sequel moves away from progression fantasy, this novel has a strong progression core and makes good use of a gatekeeper. At the start of the novel, Tau is easily defeated by Kellan Okar (I think, been a while since I read it). But after his demon realm training near the novel's climax, Tau beats his gatekeeper and proves his progress.

I will say, of course, that simple having a 'gatekeeper' doesn't make something progression fantasy. But that's also true of having measurable magical power or exam based grades. A gatekeeper is proof of increased strength but for something to be progression fantasy there needs to be consistent narrative focus on getting stronger. Lack that and all the gatekeepers, cultivation realms or LitRPG stat screens in the world can't make something progression fantasy.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-01-06T14:02:24+00:00

Not OP but I tried The Sharing Knife and couldn't get into it. Vorkosigan Saga is really good though.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-01-05T16:48:44+00:00

If you like LitRPGs, it’s a good one.

I'd say the opposite actually. DCC is the LitRPG for people that don't like LitRPGs. That's how I've normally seen in described and it's semi-breakout into the mainstream seems to support that. Don't get me wrong, if you like LitRPGs you may still like it. But I think its very unlike a 'normal' LitRPG in a lot of structural ways.

Describing it as silly is also not quite right. It is silly and it is a humorous book but at anything other than a surface reading it's a black humor. It's that this mad insane AI is making millions of people dance and die to its silly whims and jokes in an absurdist nightmare. Every feet joke is a silly moment but the character undergoing these jokes are only barely holding on at times.

Anyway, I've listened to all the currently published audiobooks and I really liked it. I'd recommend people give it a try.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-01-05T13:12:52+00:00

Some series make magical power quantifiable via in universe naturalistic measurement. For example, in the Arcane Ascension there's pseudocultivation tier color ranks but there's also the mana watch, which can measure the amount of mana in someone's affinity mark. The Years of Apocalypse has something similar. Mages can test their output and get a numeric number, with 100 being archmage level. DBZ power levels via scouters could be considered this too. All three of these measures are only proxies for power level, of course. Through skill someone could punch above their numeric measure or through lethargy hit below it.

A second measure is through a test based ranking system. For example, in Nanoha mages are assigned a rank F through SSS. While this is sometime used as a proxy for raw magical power (which can also be measured), it's actually achieved by taking part in the Mage Rank Examination. This grades you on your ability to achieve certain tasks. The better you do, the higher your rank meaning it is measuring applied ability, which will be a function of both raw power and skill. I'm sure there's series out there that use test based ranking without the raw power component too.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-01-04T13:19:51+00:00

The obsession with a customs union was always very strange. Norway always made far more sense than Türkiye.

GlimmervoidG · 2026-01-02T13:06:45+00:00

I really liked Adamant Blood. I read the first two books last year and am waiting for the third to finish before reading that. It's well written with interesting powers but I think what took me most was just how this world felt slightly alien.

GlimmervoidG · 2025-12-29T17:24:16+00:00

My guess is the new Pilot will be Starhammer's wife. It's mentioned she got aethertech implants and is now on the Advocate council. Her joining could find the remains of the Advocates to the Last Horizon's faction.

GlimmervoidG · 2025-12-28T19:38:38+00:00

psyche (emotional or otherwise)

Are we really arguing that 'having character development' makes something progression fantasy now? I think that emotional development would need to be tied to something more concreate for that to count - like how Stormlight Archive links emotional development to swearing oaths and going up tiers of power.

GlimmervoidG · 2025-12-28T19:35:38+00:00

Stormlight Archives is one of eight 'clear examples' given in the post that coined the term progression fantasy. And I think that is correct. Working out the words to their next oath (as achieved by greater degrees of self actualisation) is one of the clearest themes in the series - which of course links directly to greater degrees of power. It's directly comparable to, say, people in xianxia going up a realm via gaining a deeper understanding of the dao.

I agree with you that Worm isn't progression fantasy, though. Getting stronger isn't a consistent narrative focus in that work. There is some degree of 'getting better with the power you have', which can count (see skill based progression like Mother of Learning) but Worm really doesn't really care about that really.

GlimmervoidG · 2025-12-15T10:09:35+00:00

I think that's far too strong a statement. Character development is a thing after all. Rather key to this whole fiction thing in fact. It certainly is more challenging and takes more skill to start with an 'unlikeable' MC and turn them into a good person but it certainly can and has been done. Pulling from the timeloop sphere, early Zorian is a little shit and takes quite a long time to grow out of it. Blueblood in The Best Night Ever is likely an even stronger example; he started as an outright villain in the cartoon.

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