Now on Bbc News political thinking with nick robinson. Hello, And welcome to political thinking a conversation with, rather than a newsy interrogation, of someone who shapes our political thinking about what a shape theirs. My guest this week has just celebrated ending the longest Train Drivers strike in history a strike that was blamed for crippling the railways And angered many, many travellers. His members haVe Got a 15 Pay Rise over three years. He is Mick Whelan, The General secretary of aslef. He said that his members strength, resilience, And determination was what had won that Pay Rise others say it was down to his crafty negotiation style. Mick whelan, welcome to political thinking. Thank you, nick. You finally got a deal after all that time how did you celebrate . Erm, by talking to the press. As soon as it becomes public knowledge, you And your colleagues obviously, so sky, bbc, the guardian, the usual outlets, And press will be Here Today With You And once you ve done that,
to get a resolution and remain in this for the long haul . but ministers and train operators say the latest pay offer, of 4% for two years in a row, is fair and reasonable. we can to talk to our transport correspondent, katy austin who s at paddington station in central london. if paddington usually a bustling, busy station? if paddington usually a bustling, busy station? that s right, as you can probably busy station? that s right, as you can probably see busy station? that s right, as you can probably see behind - busy station? that s right, as you can probably see behind me, - busy station? that s right, as you | can probably see behind me, there are some passengers here today, but very few when you compare it to a normal weekday. and there are very few days damage trains running. some operators affected by the strike are running absolutely nothing at all, others of those 15 operators, which are affected, others have a very limited service, including great wester
he talks about the spring offensive and also towards the end, listen to his description of the russian forces, let s take a listen. i believe we will see the results of true combined arms effect, tanks protected by infantry against anti tank guided missiles, artillery keeping heads down, engineers reducing the obstacles, breaching the fortifications that the russians have established, air defence, keeping the russians off the ukrainians, electronic warfare jaminet russians already not a and control, all orchestrated by very good ukrainian command and control, and using drones over the russians to attack them in depth with the precision munitions that the us and uk and others have provided. and this is going to break, i think, the front lines. where they will do this attack, i m not going to speculate, although the ukrainians have said that their objective is to sever the ground lines of communications that enables the russians to go along the south east coast into crimea. we