Russia, unlike Iran, is vulnerable to a decapitation strike. And this is a card the US (EU, Ukraine, name it) can play at any moment: simply assassinate Putin. The war would end there. In chess terms, the Russians, for some reason unknown, call this a "Chinese draw": the side that gets tired of playing simply turns the board over. Russians don't know how to play team games, and if a grandmaster drops out, there's no one to replace him. The next player will set up the pieces again and begin their own game.
Putin as far as I can tell has promoted competent people around him...
Whereas the US is about 10-20 key figures away from almost none of it's institutions attaching to each other in a predictable or coherent manner.
The interests driving US policy are so tenuously attached to how the institutions are supposed to work... That it's not clear if say 10 senators like Lindsay Graham or 3 SCOTUS Justices... Or core generals started dying that it would actually hold together as a descision making organ...
Like depending on which party wins the Midterm the PARTY in-charge of the Whitehouse can instantly switch to the opposite party if Pres and Vice Pres go down.
For this reason, i doubt the US would open that can of worms.
It´s not that simple. I think Putin is well enough protected that it would be very difficult to assassinate him. And a failed attempt would likely lead to a nuclear warning shot.
Would anybody risk losing a city for an attempt at Putin?
Putin once claimed there had been an assassination attempt on him: a wave of drones flew toward his Valdai residence. No nuclear escalation occurred. Thus, he made it clear: as long as assassination attempts are unsuccessful, they can be repeated as often as necessary; nuclear weapons will not be used. And we, of course, don't know whether there will be a nuclear escalation in the event of a successful assassination attempt. Why would his successor need that? He has his own chess game ahead of him; he has no need to finish Putin's.
His successor would be an ultra-hardliner, and the first thing he does would be to make sure nobody even THINKS about doing the same thing to him.
The wave of drones came from Ukraine. No one takes Ukraine seriously enough to nuke it. With an assassination attempt provably made by the West, it is an entirely different ballgame.
Putin's successor will be Mikhail Mishustin, the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation, an ordinary accountant with no connection to the military or the secret services. He will simply breathe a sigh of relief and make peace.
Forgive me for invoking this mythological figure, but let's imagine that Britain had killed Hitler in a bombing raid in early 1944. Surely, his successor would be a monster who would make Hitler look like a complete pacifist, right?
By early 1944, Germany had been at war for four and a half years, and the Germans were thoroughly tired of the war. Russia had also been at war for four and a half years. The last thing the Russians needed was a Genghis Khan on the throne, and if the current dictator were to disappear, the result would be a quick peace.
Russia is the country with the largest nuclear arsenal in the world.
There may be a plan to launch nukes in the event of a decapitation strike. There was one in the USSR for sure. Whoever would follow Putin might stop the nukes, and his generals might all obey him.
What this comes down to is that it is not 100% sure that Russia would answer with nukes, but it’s possible, and it’s likely enough that no sane poker player would go all in on this.
So let’s hope and pray that no insane person will make that gamble.
As I’ve already written in various comments, I found it very troubling, not to say downright stupid, to see our European leaders using what little taxpayer money they have left to fund the destruction of Russian refineries right when the Strait of Hormuz had just been closed.
Now I understand. They’re desperate. The quiet, patient Kutuzov-style Russian strategy might well bear its fruits...
The biggest difference between the kings of 18th century and the elected presidents of 21st century is that the kings are willing to cut losses and swallow their pride. They would go home and rebuild and study the failures to become better. If I was the President, I would make a deal and shut down the war in Iran and Ukraine so that I can use the failure in both theaters to force the ruling class to shut up and make the real changes to politics and economy and make US truly independent power again.
Consequences of wars becoming rare is that they become more ideological and sides are less willing to give up
In purely utilitarian terms, either side capitulating in 2022 would be better off. Emigration alone cost both sides millions. Neither side is willing through. Neither side is able to, either. Because if Zelensky or Putin sign s peace treaty that can be interpreted as surrender that’s basically an invitation for “coup me and become a dictator”
Outstanding analysis. I would have liked to seen your thoughts though on what has to be considered with the change from Biden to Trump. It seems clear that Trump would prefer to end this whole NATO/globalist push east into the Russian area of control and that he doesn't favor Western Europe with their authoritarian shift. So, it seems apparent he's limited in his ability to end Deep State/Globalist determination to fight on in Ukraine...and maybe make the best of a bad situation by using it force Europe to buy more US arms, thus limiting the political costs of antagonizing the domestic arms manufacturers. Anyway, I'd like to hear your thoughts on this, since I think the US regime change needs to be addressed.
- I feel like this article's author brought too much into russian propaganda. Intelligent author, but brought too much into Russia's kool-aid. Just because western elites are scum doesn't mean eastern elites are cool, enlightened folks.
- Ukraine actually has trillions worth in resources. Rare Earths, Gas, etc. Talking about the gas, if the EU got Ukrainian Gas, they could cut down a lot of dependence on Russia,
- The Western Globohomo might suck, but from what I hear, Russia ain't all that great either. Ask the Russian Nationalists about it, I know a few. Russian Ethnonationalists aren't big fans of Putin, they see Putin as also doing a Great Replacement of Russians with Central Asians, and many of the republics as wastes of taxpayer money and a bunch of people that have nothing to do with Russia and frankly better off independent- places like Chechnya and such.
- The Strait of Hormus being blocked again is good for Putin... except his refinaries are all going up in flames right now, as well as export ports and such. At this rate, Russia will become an oil exporter and a fuel importer. Not very good for them.
- I feel like this article ignores too much the Ukrainians themselves. I'm pretty sure most Ukrainians aren't interested in being invaded by Russia. If Ukrainians had no morale to fight, they would have lost a long time ago.
- If anything, the war is mostly being financed by Europe nowadays. Being pragmatic, its smart of them - having a friendly, heavily-armed Ukraine means Ukraine becomes Antemuralis Europa. Essentially, Ukraine becomes the EU's Border March. With Ukraine onboard, Europe can, in strategy game parlance, "scale" so much beyond Russia its not even funny.
- On artillery: I don't think this is an artillery war anymore. Its mostly drones killing people nowadays.
- I don't think the Ukrainians are provoking the Russians... I think the Ukrainians are genuinely attacking the Russians and the Russians are genuinely powerless to do much. Firebombing Kiev doesn't really produce more results on the battlefield, it just would make the Ukrainians fight Russia harder and would just make Europe more outraged and willing to side with Russia. No no, the problem is that Russia has genuinely peaked. There's nothing they can do that they haven't done already, or is worth the cost. WWI with Drones is the best they can do on the field of battle, now.
- On Crimea: I don't think the Ukrainians even want that shit right now. Right now, the best thing Crimea can do is be a bleeding wound on Russia's side. Ukraine is sieging Crimea, so Russia needs to "relieve" the siege by adding more supplies and protection... except this means more supplies and resources and protection that aren't elsewhere. Russia cannot leave Crimea because its a matter of pride and taking Crimea and the land bridge has been a big nationalist talking point by Russia. Its hard if not impossible to leave.
- On mobilization: That's not how it works. Logistics are a killer. You have to train, to equip, to supply, to deploy to the battlefield. Russian manpower is already stretched thin by all the people working to keep society and the war effort functioning. If Putin declares war and announced mobilization, that will make up for their manpower troubles for a while... and then what? All those mobilized soldiers are people who are no longer working in civilian jobs, including the ones vital to the war effort. Mobilization won't unexplode all those russian refinaries. What weapons and armor will these mobilized masses use? Likely nothing very decent, seeing as Russia has pretty much eaten through soviet stocks. Plus, Russia has to supply all these people. Which only strains the already-strained russian logistics.
Correct, but still understating how one-sided all of this is.
Russia had won this war on the first day and would win even if there had never been a Strait of Hormuz disaster.
USA are not a serious country, EU is simply garbage. China thinks in centuries, Russia in decades, Western countries cannot even plan a few years ahead with certainty. They all deserve to go under.
I’ve been hearing this my whole life 0- how stupid and short-sighted Americans are.
And yet, while Americans may lose tactically here and there, they somehow stay on top of the strategic game. Russia has nukes and really not much else.
Clicked too soon. China has a lot of industrial capacity, a large army built for lots of purposes other than warfighting, and serious fundamental ticking time bombs financially and demographically.
Russia can do nothing to affect the US’s fundamental strategic position, other than start a nuclear war. China has a few more options, but the clock is running out (a risk in and of itself, true). But this whole “Americans are stupid and shortsighted and play poker, [foreign adversary] is wise and farsighted and plays chess or go or whatever so America is doomed” is just not supported by the record to date.
America has never had an advantage in leadership. George Washington was the last generally competent US leader.
Seriously read about how all their advantages were squandered against fewer and less experienced men in Canada during the war of 1812.
Anywhere else in the world General Hull would have been shot... Instead Madison commuted his sentence and set the standard for the next 200 years
.
What America has always had is fundamentals: its the size of Europe with better geography, every resource on earth, and until recently had a 200 million strong white population from the most industrious and inventive stock in the world.
America has always been such an insanely blessed place and amazing people that even DC's incompetence and active malice has struggled to screw it up.
On the other hand, those migrating to the colonies were, by and large, the most chaotic parts of an overly chaotic race.
(And Whites are already rather chaotic in Homer, so this is not something invented by our detractors and also not something that we can blame our enemies for.)
You can say that about the Canadian campaign, but the British brought one of the most experienced armies in human history to New Orleans, and Col. Jackson, some hillbillies, and French pirates wrecked them.
Yes. That was entirely a local reaction by a Col. AFTER the peace treaty was already signed.
The second DC touches anything leadership and organizational accumen collapses.
The US system of government is Anti-Matter to leadership. This is why American commanders get worse as communications technology improves and DC can micromanage commanders in the feild.
Is the war with the Ukraine in its endgame? Think about what Russia really wants as the endgame -- a world in which the Euros treat Russia as just another country to trade & exchange with and do not threaten Russia. Ukraine as a neutral non-threatening country is part of that. But the Euros won't allow that peaceful endgame -- they want war.
Realistically, the endgame will be that the Euros get the wider war they so desperately want. It will do a lot of damage to Russia, and absolutely destroy Europe. The challenge for the US and China is to make sure they are not dragged into a third unnecessary pointless European-sourced war.
And if the Canadian authorities want to line up with the Euros in demanding wider war over the Ukraine, the US should volunteer to help avoid any misunderstandings about the destinations of Russian missiles by having the US nuke Ottawa on Russia's behalf. A lot of the remaining Canadians would thank the US.
Very interesting analysis. I will recommend this article highly. I am unsure if you are 100% right (as I lack subject expertise and the propaganda from all sides has been dense), but you certainly have an interesting and historically supported answer for what has appeared to be strange behavior by Russia in this war. Thank you.
Start with the fact that, whatever the Biden Administration wanted to achieve,. the war in the Ukraine is now almost entirely a European effort. If Europeans decided to stop arming & funding the Ukraine, the war would quickly come to an end. Clearly, President Trump wants to end the war. Even if the US Deep State and unrepresentative Congress wants to continue the war, there would be nothing they could do if Europe denied the US use of its bases.
Kutuzov could wait until Napoleon was forced out of Russia by logistics and the winter. What can force the Euros (or at least their "leaders") to stop supporting the Ukraine? It is hard to imagine the kind of low-quality "leader" who predominates in most of Europe shrugging their shoulders and admitting that spending Billions of Euros on the corrupt undemocratic Ukraine was a mistake. The likelihood is that Europe struggles on, spending money it does not have on a war it cannot afford.
In the meantime, Russian citizens are increasingly having their lives disrupted by those Euro/Ukrainian missiles reaching deeper & deeper into Russia. Maybe President Putin does not have the freedom to endure that Kutuzov had?
Possible scenario that President Putin (or a successor) might follow: First, have the Duma make a formal Declaration of War on the Ukraine, and advise the Euros that co-belligerents are now on the target list. If that does not frighten the spineless Euros into folding, then a selective round of non-nuclear strikes on prominent European infrastructure -- the Channel Tunnel between England & France; the bridge between Denmark & Sweden; key Norwegian oil & gas assets. If that in turn does not make the Euros back off, the only option would be the nuclear destruction of Europe's main political centers in London, Brussels, Paris, Berlin. As long as the US does not have a Democrat Administration, the US would probably choose to stay out of Europe's war.
I wouldn't over estimate the "hardship" of having missiles land in your country.
Short of mass terror-bombing like Dresden, airstrikes tend to make a population more hardened and indifferent to the risks of war... Since actually statistically you're less than 1 in 10,000 likely to get hurt yourself.
All you do is train the populace that war is visually compelling but not that disruptive, and encourage them to start thinking of themselves as little "badasses".
See the British during the blitz... they praise their "stiff upper lip" and "keeping calm" when the blitz was less deadly to the average brit as commuting to work in some bad traffic in the US.
Strategic bombing doesn’t work or achieves the opposite of its goal, I agree.
But this isn’t WW2, where the capacity for bombing and the accuracy made destruction of military and industrial assets hard. In WW2, the real destruction was caused by the fire storms, and industrial plants don’t burn well enough for that, as opposed to inner cities.
Today Russia can hit every point in Europe with pinpoint accuracy, choosing from Kinzhal to Oreshnik, and there is nothing the EU can do about this. There are hundreds of juicy targets, military or logistical or industrial. If the Russians really decide to go ballistic, they can destroy dozens of industrial plants, power plants, ports, airports and railway stations in the first week.
The constant attempts of the Ukraine to escalate the war to where NATO would be directly involved are IMO misguided. The Ukraine‘s greatest strategic asset is the secure rear. Inviolable NATO drones and ISR planes help the Ukraine with their deep strikes, telling them where the Russian AD is. Factories in the EU can build grenades and tanks. I think a direct involvement of NATO would make the Ukraine‘s situation worse in many ways.
Americans got us into this, and we should NEVER forgive them for orchestrating the Maidan coup and blowing up Nordstream.
But once Europeans picked up the bill, they found it harder and harder to quit, because that would mean writing off an enormous investment that may well have economically ruined us.
I want to get out immediately, of course, but I can sort of understand why many Europeans hesitate.
Would that imply that an independent enough ukraine being an arms dealer is an acceptable outcome?
Is there evidence of putin punishing and rewarding ukraine when they signal they wont be gay? Did the bombings of cities stop for a month when Zelensky "didnt say thank you"?
What does Russia care if Europe is ruled by homos or patriots? Look at Dugin, he hates the west in any case and feels more aligned with third worlders. Let's remember that Russia is also importing Indians and Muslims.
I mean, if the war turns out to help us, good. But I need to know what Russia stands to gain from supporting us.
Russia, unlike Iran, is vulnerable to a decapitation strike. And this is a card the US (EU, Ukraine, name it) can play at any moment: simply assassinate Putin. The war would end there. In chess terms, the Russians, for some reason unknown, call this a "Chinese draw": the side that gets tired of playing simply turns the board over. Russians don't know how to play team games, and if a grandmaster drops out, there's no one to replace him. The next player will set up the pieces again and begin their own game.
I'd say the US is actually more vulnerable.
Putin as far as I can tell has promoted competent people around him...
Whereas the US is about 10-20 key figures away from almost none of it's institutions attaching to each other in a predictable or coherent manner.
The interests driving US policy are so tenuously attached to how the institutions are supposed to work... That it's not clear if say 10 senators like Lindsay Graham or 3 SCOTUS Justices... Or core generals started dying that it would actually hold together as a descision making organ...
Like depending on which party wins the Midterm the PARTY in-charge of the Whitehouse can instantly switch to the opposite party if Pres and Vice Pres go down.
For this reason, i doubt the US would open that can of worms.
If Putin is assassinated I assure you that Russia will launch nukes. The West knows this fact.
I hope so.
A country with a leadership insane enough to do something like that deserves to be nuked.
No it’s not
If Putin is assassinated chances he’d either be replaced by a hardliner, or if the successor isn’t one he’ll get couped
Even if that causes Russia to break apart (highly unlikely) that’ll just result in Ukraine getting multiple sunrises
It´s not that simple. I think Putin is well enough protected that it would be very difficult to assassinate him. And a failed attempt would likely lead to a nuclear warning shot.
Would anybody risk losing a city for an attempt at Putin?
Putin once claimed there had been an assassination attempt on him: a wave of drones flew toward his Valdai residence. No nuclear escalation occurred. Thus, he made it clear: as long as assassination attempts are unsuccessful, they can be repeated as often as necessary; nuclear weapons will not be used. And we, of course, don't know whether there will be a nuclear escalation in the event of a successful assassination attempt. Why would his successor need that? He has his own chess game ahead of him; he has no need to finish Putin's.
His successor would be an ultra-hardliner, and the first thing he does would be to make sure nobody even THINKS about doing the same thing to him.
The wave of drones came from Ukraine. No one takes Ukraine seriously enough to nuke it. With an assassination attempt provably made by the West, it is an entirely different ballgame.
Putin's successor will be Mikhail Mishustin, the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation, an ordinary accountant with no connection to the military or the secret services. He will simply breathe a sigh of relief and make peace.
You are delusional.
Putin´s successor, if he is murdered, will be either Genghis Khan or someone who believes that Genghis Khan is a pacifist.
Forgive me for invoking this mythological figure, but let's imagine that Britain had killed Hitler in a bombing raid in early 1944. Surely, his successor would be a monster who would make Hitler look like a complete pacifist, right?
By early 1944, Germany had been at war for four and a half years, and the Germans were thoroughly tired of the war. Russia had also been at war for four and a half years. The last thing the Russians needed was a Genghis Khan on the throne, and if the current dictator were to disappear, the result would be a quick peace.
Russia is the country with the largest nuclear arsenal in the world.
There may be a plan to launch nukes in the event of a decapitation strike. There was one in the USSR for sure. Whoever would follow Putin might stop the nukes, and his generals might all obey him.
What this comes down to is that it is not 100% sure that Russia would answer with nukes, but it’s possible, and it’s likely enough that no sane poker player would go all in on this.
So let’s hope and pray that no insane person will make that gamble.
Well done
Thank you!
Very insightful.
As I’ve already written in various comments, I found it very troubling, not to say downright stupid, to see our European leaders using what little taxpayer money they have left to fund the destruction of Russian refineries right when the Strait of Hormuz had just been closed.
Now I understand. They’re desperate. The quiet, patient Kutuzov-style Russian strategy might well bear its fruits...
The fewer oil refineries that operate in Russia, the cheaper Russian oil becomes, and Europe will produce gasoline itself.
Yes... Win the war and get the Russian crude dirt cheap was always part of the plan.
But it didn't happen and now the US are fed up and turned their fleeting attention elsewhere. Hence the all-or-nothing Eurocrats' tactics...
The biggest difference between the kings of 18th century and the elected presidents of 21st century is that the kings are willing to cut losses and swallow their pride. They would go home and rebuild and study the failures to become better. If I was the President, I would make a deal and shut down the war in Iran and Ukraine so that I can use the failure in both theaters to force the ruling class to shut up and make the real changes to politics and economy and make US truly independent power again.
Consequences of wars becoming rare is that they become more ideological and sides are less willing to give up
In purely utilitarian terms, either side capitulating in 2022 would be better off. Emigration alone cost both sides millions. Neither side is willing through. Neither side is able to, either. Because if Zelensky or Putin sign s peace treaty that can be interpreted as surrender that’s basically an invitation for “coup me and become a dictator”
Outstanding analysis. I would have liked to seen your thoughts though on what has to be considered with the change from Biden to Trump. It seems clear that Trump would prefer to end this whole NATO/globalist push east into the Russian area of control and that he doesn't favor Western Europe with their authoritarian shift. So, it seems apparent he's limited in his ability to end Deep State/Globalist determination to fight on in Ukraine...and maybe make the best of a bad situation by using it force Europe to buy more US arms, thus limiting the political costs of antagonizing the domestic arms manufacturers. Anyway, I'd like to hear your thoughts on this, since I think the US regime change needs to be addressed.
Some thoughts:
- I feel like this article's author brought too much into russian propaganda. Intelligent author, but brought too much into Russia's kool-aid. Just because western elites are scum doesn't mean eastern elites are cool, enlightened folks.
- Ukraine actually has trillions worth in resources. Rare Earths, Gas, etc. Talking about the gas, if the EU got Ukrainian Gas, they could cut down a lot of dependence on Russia,
- The Western Globohomo might suck, but from what I hear, Russia ain't all that great either. Ask the Russian Nationalists about it, I know a few. Russian Ethnonationalists aren't big fans of Putin, they see Putin as also doing a Great Replacement of Russians with Central Asians, and many of the republics as wastes of taxpayer money and a bunch of people that have nothing to do with Russia and frankly better off independent- places like Chechnya and such.
- The Strait of Hormus being blocked again is good for Putin... except his refinaries are all going up in flames right now, as well as export ports and such. At this rate, Russia will become an oil exporter and a fuel importer. Not very good for them.
- I feel like this article ignores too much the Ukrainians themselves. I'm pretty sure most Ukrainians aren't interested in being invaded by Russia. If Ukrainians had no morale to fight, they would have lost a long time ago.
- If anything, the war is mostly being financed by Europe nowadays. Being pragmatic, its smart of them - having a friendly, heavily-armed Ukraine means Ukraine becomes Antemuralis Europa. Essentially, Ukraine becomes the EU's Border March. With Ukraine onboard, Europe can, in strategy game parlance, "scale" so much beyond Russia its not even funny.
- On artillery: I don't think this is an artillery war anymore. Its mostly drones killing people nowadays.
- I don't think the Ukrainians are provoking the Russians... I think the Ukrainians are genuinely attacking the Russians and the Russians are genuinely powerless to do much. Firebombing Kiev doesn't really produce more results on the battlefield, it just would make the Ukrainians fight Russia harder and would just make Europe more outraged and willing to side with Russia. No no, the problem is that Russia has genuinely peaked. There's nothing they can do that they haven't done already, or is worth the cost. WWI with Drones is the best they can do on the field of battle, now.
- On Crimea: I don't think the Ukrainians even want that shit right now. Right now, the best thing Crimea can do is be a bleeding wound on Russia's side. Ukraine is sieging Crimea, so Russia needs to "relieve" the siege by adding more supplies and protection... except this means more supplies and resources and protection that aren't elsewhere. Russia cannot leave Crimea because its a matter of pride and taking Crimea and the land bridge has been a big nationalist talking point by Russia. Its hard if not impossible to leave.
- On mobilization: That's not how it works. Logistics are a killer. You have to train, to equip, to supply, to deploy to the battlefield. Russian manpower is already stretched thin by all the people working to keep society and the war effort functioning. If Putin declares war and announced mobilization, that will make up for their manpower troubles for a while... and then what? All those mobilized soldiers are people who are no longer working in civilian jobs, including the ones vital to the war effort. Mobilization won't unexplode all those russian refinaries. What weapons and armor will these mobilized masses use? Likely nothing very decent, seeing as Russia has pretty much eaten through soviet stocks. Plus, Russia has to supply all these people. Which only strains the already-strained russian logistics.
Correct, but still understating how one-sided all of this is.
Russia had won this war on the first day and would win even if there had never been a Strait of Hormuz disaster.
USA are not a serious country, EU is simply garbage. China thinks in centuries, Russia in decades, Western countries cannot even plan a few years ahead with certainty. They all deserve to go under.
I’ve been hearing this my whole life 0- how stupid and short-sighted Americans are.
And yet, while Americans may lose tactically here and there, they somehow stay on top of the strategic game. Russia has nukes and really not much else.
Clicked too soon. China has a lot of industrial capacity, a large army built for lots of purposes other than warfighting, and serious fundamental ticking time bombs financially and demographically.
Russia can do nothing to affect the US’s fundamental strategic position, other than start a nuclear war. China has a few more options, but the clock is running out (a risk in and of itself, true). But this whole “Americans are stupid and shortsighted and play poker, [foreign adversary] is wise and farsighted and plays chess or go or whatever so America is doomed” is just not supported by the record to date.
America has never had an advantage in leadership. George Washington was the last generally competent US leader.
Seriously read about how all their advantages were squandered against fewer and less experienced men in Canada during the war of 1812.
Anywhere else in the world General Hull would have been shot... Instead Madison commuted his sentence and set the standard for the next 200 years
.
What America has always had is fundamentals: its the size of Europe with better geography, every resource on earth, and until recently had a 200 million strong white population from the most industrious and inventive stock in the world.
America has always been such an insanely blessed place and amazing people that even DC's incompetence and active malice has struggled to screw it up.
On the other hand, those migrating to the colonies were, by and large, the most chaotic parts of an overly chaotic race.
(And Whites are already rather chaotic in Homer, so this is not something invented by our detractors and also not something that we can blame our enemies for.)
You can say that about the Canadian campaign, but the British brought one of the most experienced armies in human history to New Orleans, and Col. Jackson, some hillbillies, and French pirates wrecked them.
Yes. That was entirely a local reaction by a Col. AFTER the peace treaty was already signed.
The second DC touches anything leadership and organizational accumen collapses.
The US system of government is Anti-Matter to leadership. This is why American commanders get worse as communications technology improves and DC can micromanage commanders in the feild.
But is it not ultimately the system Americans deserve?
I find it hard to believe that a political system does simply spring up randomly without any causal relation that ties it to the governed stock.
At some point in time, Americans CHOSE Liberalism.
America is done for. If it doesn´t lose against Russia, it is going to certainly lose against China. There is simply no contest.
Is the war with the Ukraine in its endgame? Think about what Russia really wants as the endgame -- a world in which the Euros treat Russia as just another country to trade & exchange with and do not threaten Russia. Ukraine as a neutral non-threatening country is part of that. But the Euros won't allow that peaceful endgame -- they want war.
Realistically, the endgame will be that the Euros get the wider war they so desperately want. It will do a lot of damage to Russia, and absolutely destroy Europe. The challenge for the US and China is to make sure they are not dragged into a third unnecessary pointless European-sourced war.
And if the Canadian authorities want to line up with the Euros in demanding wider war over the Ukraine, the US should volunteer to help avoid any misunderstandings about the destinations of Russian missiles by having the US nuke Ottawa on Russia's behalf. A lot of the remaining Canadians would thank the US.
They are all out to kill white boys.
Very interesting analysis. I will recommend this article highly. I am unsure if you are 100% right (as I lack subject expertise and the propaganda from all sides has been dense), but you certainly have an interesting and historically supported answer for what has appeared to be strange behavior by Russia in this war. Thank you.
Start with the fact that, whatever the Biden Administration wanted to achieve,. the war in the Ukraine is now almost entirely a European effort. If Europeans decided to stop arming & funding the Ukraine, the war would quickly come to an end. Clearly, President Trump wants to end the war. Even if the US Deep State and unrepresentative Congress wants to continue the war, there would be nothing they could do if Europe denied the US use of its bases.
Kutuzov could wait until Napoleon was forced out of Russia by logistics and the winter. What can force the Euros (or at least their "leaders") to stop supporting the Ukraine? It is hard to imagine the kind of low-quality "leader" who predominates in most of Europe shrugging their shoulders and admitting that spending Billions of Euros on the corrupt undemocratic Ukraine was a mistake. The likelihood is that Europe struggles on, spending money it does not have on a war it cannot afford.
In the meantime, Russian citizens are increasingly having their lives disrupted by those Euro/Ukrainian missiles reaching deeper & deeper into Russia. Maybe President Putin does not have the freedom to endure that Kutuzov had?
Possible scenario that President Putin (or a successor) might follow: First, have the Duma make a formal Declaration of War on the Ukraine, and advise the Euros that co-belligerents are now on the target list. If that does not frighten the spineless Euros into folding, then a selective round of non-nuclear strikes on prominent European infrastructure -- the Channel Tunnel between England & France; the bridge between Denmark & Sweden; key Norwegian oil & gas assets. If that in turn does not make the Euros back off, the only option would be the nuclear destruction of Europe's main political centers in London, Brussels, Paris, Berlin. As long as the US does not have a Democrat Administration, the US would probably choose to stay out of Europe's war.
I wouldn't over estimate the "hardship" of having missiles land in your country.
Short of mass terror-bombing like Dresden, airstrikes tend to make a population more hardened and indifferent to the risks of war... Since actually statistically you're less than 1 in 10,000 likely to get hurt yourself.
All you do is train the populace that war is visually compelling but not that disruptive, and encourage them to start thinking of themselves as little "badasses".
See the British during the blitz... they praise their "stiff upper lip" and "keeping calm" when the blitz was less deadly to the average brit as commuting to work in some bad traffic in the US.
Strategic bombing doesn’t work or achieves the opposite of its goal, I agree.
But this isn’t WW2, where the capacity for bombing and the accuracy made destruction of military and industrial assets hard. In WW2, the real destruction was caused by the fire storms, and industrial plants don’t burn well enough for that, as opposed to inner cities.
Today Russia can hit every point in Europe with pinpoint accuracy, choosing from Kinzhal to Oreshnik, and there is nothing the EU can do about this. There are hundreds of juicy targets, military or logistical or industrial. If the Russians really decide to go ballistic, they can destroy dozens of industrial plants, power plants, ports, airports and railway stations in the first week.
The constant attempts of the Ukraine to escalate the war to where NATO would be directly involved are IMO misguided. The Ukraine‘s greatest strategic asset is the secure rear. Inviolable NATO drones and ISR planes help the Ukraine with their deep strikes, telling them where the Russian AD is. Factories in the EU can build grenades and tanks. I think a direct involvement of NATO would make the Ukraine‘s situation worse in many ways.
It´s the sunk cost fallacy.
Americans got us into this, and we should NEVER forgive them for orchestrating the Maidan coup and blowing up Nordstream.
But once Europeans picked up the bill, they found it harder and harder to quit, because that would mean writing off an enormous investment that may well have economically ruined us.
I want to get out immediately, of course, but I can sort of understand why many Europeans hesitate.
Would that imply that an independent enough ukraine being an arms dealer is an acceptable outcome?
Is there evidence of putin punishing and rewarding ukraine when they signal they wont be gay? Did the bombings of cities stop for a month when Zelensky "didnt say thank you"?
Putin is a foreign asset. He’ll listen to his masters.
What does Russia care if Europe is ruled by homos or patriots? Look at Dugin, he hates the west in any case and feels more aligned with third worlders. Let's remember that Russia is also importing Indians and Muslims.
I mean, if the war turns out to help us, good. But I need to know what Russia stands to gain from supporting us.
Nice. Excellent work my friend.