1 - Russian hopes lie in western complacency. This will prove misguided. As an American, indeed someone who lives deep in Trump country, I beg our European friends to NOT underestimate the ability of Moscow to alienate "red" America. Putin is trying very hard to prove me right in his statements RE Israel. If he keeps effing around like that, he will find out how the "red states" feel about such things.
2 - An "early win for Ukraine" was impossible from the moment the Jake Sullivan clique determined to slow-walk M1s, F-16s, and ATACMS in that exact order over a 17-month period. Being a military historian with an appreciation for the combined arms project, I assign complete blame for any Ukrainian defeat, measured in any distance of kilometers from the 1991 borders, to the Biden administration. I say this as a lifelong Democrat with a measure of personal responsibility for electing Democrats.
As to your first point, see this: “Within the United States itself, there is a need for the Russian special services and their allies "to provoke all forms of instability and separatism within the borders of the United States (it is possible to make use of the political forces of Afro-American racists)" (248). "It is especially important," Dugin adds, "to introduce geopolitical disorder into internal American activity, encouraging all kinds of separatism and ethnic, social and racial conflicts, actively supporting all dissident movements--extremist, racist, and sectarian groups, thus destabilizing internal political processes in the U.S. It would also make sense simultaneously to support isolationist tendencies in American politics" (367)." Dugin, Foundations of Geopolitics, at https://tec.fsi.stanford.edu/docs/aleksandr-dugins-foundations-geopolitics.
See also https://streamfortyseven.substack.com/p/putins-playbook-in-action, to wit: "And the elites in the US, and the institutions they control, are doing their utmost best to further this goal, by sending ineffective but very expensive military aid to Ukraine. This seems to have as its main purpose to keep Ukraine fighting but never able to achieve a decisive victory - another lucrative “forever war”, which will decimate the Ukrainian populace and in time, when the aid is cut off and the rug pulled out from under the Ukrainian people, a Russian/Eurasian victory. In combination with the tactics which divide the people of the US against each other - the identity politics, the “diversity training”, and the rest of the DEI program, and the turning of all levels of governance against the majority of the governed, the US itself may well fall into another authoritarian regime."
Well Matt, Trump returning to the Presidency would also be a disaster for Ukraine and blame for that I would also lay directly at the feet of Joe Biden and his politically naive Attorney General who delayed dealing with this serial criminal for a long 18 months before Congress embarrassed him into facing the responsibilities of his job. And then you can look at those voters of America of were dumb enough to send a bunch of brain-dead republicans to Congress, destined to gum-up the resourcing of this fight for the survival of Ukraine. Because without American support Ukraine will be snuffed-out.
You feel a personal responsibility for electing Democrats - I think you still did the right thing because the alternative is even much worse. But the clock is ticking on that choice and there is growing evidence that it may not end well. But before we get to next November, there is the more immediate issue of Congress approving $60 billion for Ukraine. What probability do you place on that happening either when needed or at all? Given the mentalities at play there, it would appear that the republican congress is even more capable than Joe Biden of gumming-up this said-to-be vital support for the Ukrainian defense initiative. So much for the contribution of the "red States" toward sanity of governance in the United States.
It is worth recalling that the current crop of Republicans came to Congress as part of the “Freedom Caucus,” the Tea Party-tinged faction of new, rebel Republicans that made everything so interesting in Washington, DC during the Obama presidency.
Now a new class of “Trump Republicans,” notably Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, wants to stop supporting Ukraine, or reduce that support. To what extent their adoration for Putin and Russia inspires their language of fiscal responsibility is a useless debate.
What matters is that the tea-publicans long ago learned how a small faction can extract policy concessions as the price of forming a majority to support legislation. So it is not correct to say that a Republican majority in the present Congress will automatically bring victory to Russia.
For Joe Biden and Democrats who are not in the "peace party," the price of legislation to support Ukraine has increased. Add it to the wider inflationary pressures of the war on costs of all kinds, everywhere. But that’s it. That’s the net effect that Putin will get from his best-case sausage-making in DC. A more expensive support of Ukraine.
I think Zelenskyy's worst nightmare at the moment must be what the US Congress will do to aid for his country. Do you think he would be having this nightmare if there were a Democratic majority in the House? How much confidence can anyone have in this particular crop of republicans doing "the right thing" any time soon? Do you see the current Speaker of the House even tabling legislation that would enable a vote on this aid? Because that's critical. If it were tabled, a small number of republicans with sufficient Democrat support could get it passed.
"The right thing" is not even a thing you should think about, with Republicans. Which should tell you how jaundiced my view of the GOP is. The number of Republicans who actively oppose support for Ukraine is small and the national security senators ("gang of eight") have ways of making a Speaker of the House want to compromise. Mike Johnson is an amateur, they are professionals. As I said, the price of legislation goes up. That's it. That's all Putin gets. No peace.
Trump has many obstacles to reelection. If that happens, then get ready for another divided government where Democrats hold the House. I've been at this a long time.
Assigning “complete blame” for a Ukrainian defeat on any one thing I think would be highly flawed.
Whilst the Biden administration has been guilty of allowing excessive concern about escalation to influence its decision making there are several other key factors at play.
First, the biggest challenge facing Ukraine has not so much been access to a particular platform but the amount of ammunition it has for the systems it does have access to. Chief amongst these have been 155mm artillery shells (and barrels) and air defence interceptors. In both cases, the supply has been dictated by the availability of Western stocks not US hesitancy (I believe 155mm artillery systems were being supplied to Ukraine as early as June 2022).
Second, and following on from the above point the delays in ramping up production of 155mm artillery and air defence interceptors are in my opinion attributable as much to European nations as they are to the US. In fact, the US has done a far better job of increasing production than Europe.
Third, Ukraine must accept some blame for the lack of preparation prior to 24/02/22 which then allowed Russia to make rapid gains in the opening days/weeks of the war. Given the inherent difficulty in dislodging fortified defences (see Ukrainian summer offensive) this appears a key decision (I fully appreciate there were good reasons for this including not wanting to panic the civilian population).
I think we need to break free from the idea that the systems you mention, M1s, F-16s, and ATACMS, would be/could have been some type of ‘wunderwaffen’. M1s still get blown up by mines, F-16s are still susceptible to air defence missiles, and Russia has already adapted to Ukraine’s use of ATACMS i.e. by dispersing it’s air bases.
I'm not at all sure Putin thinks in terms of long term strategy and plans. My feeling is that he is tactical opportunist. But whatever the case it is quite clear that Putin won't admit defeat and bring back the troops. Apart from this not being in his nature, he knows that the return of a whole lot of embittered soldiers talking loud and long about how badly they suffered for no gain in an avoidable war could really seriously threaten his regime. I'm sure he knows that not too distant Russian history shows that returning soldiers from clearly unsuccessful wars can seriously weaken the government that sent them off to them. So Putin will keep the war cooking and hope that eventually Ukraine will fold. I fear the best chance of peace is a post-Putin one.
No doubt Putin is an opportunist, and really nobody in the West truly understands the man or thinking entirely. Given that, I would opt for the maxim that says, “Believe people when they tell you who they are.” In this context we know Putin wants to reconstitute the Russian/Soviet empire in which non-Russians are second, third class citizens available to exploit and be expendable. The real question is whether Putin will push this to the brink as Alexander III did with the possible repercussions, or hold on for years like in Afghanistan in which all the weaknesses and fracturing become to large ignore? If history is prologue, Putin does not have time on his side in this view. Furthermore, Russian energy resources lose their value to the West as they transition to cleaner and domestic production via nuclear, renewables, etc. Again time is it on his side.
What is concerning is how much Ukraine appears to be slipping off the West’s radar.
Seems to be very little being said by politicians here in the UK, at least publicly, about the steps being taken to produce and procure more artillery ammunition and air-defence interceptors for Ukraine, which by most accounts are their two most urgent needs.
Hopefully given the importance of this war to both European and international security this will change but I’m not seeing a lot of movement in the right direction at present.
War can be seen as a contest of wills and Putin definitely has the will to continue. He also has a lot of levers for trying to undermine Western will to support Ukraine and he appears to be having some success in this. I think it is a lot harder for the West to undermine Putin's will, or at least we haven't found a way yet. Ukraine's will is still strong, but you can see signs of frustration and fatigue setting in, but that doesn't mean that they are ready to talk to Putin. Not by a long shot. I think it was Ukrainian journalist Nastya Stanko who recently tweeted (in Ukrainian) that she missed the atmosphere of the early days of the war. To my mind, those days were marked by a national endorphin rush of coming together to support the war and defeat the invader; shock followed by determination. The Russian withdrawal from around Kyiv and the successful defence of Odesa and Mykolaiv (often forgotten) helped to maintain morale through the hard summer of fighting in 2022 when the Russians had a huge artillery advantage and even as the Ukrainians were pushed back in Kharkiv, Donetsk and Luhansk. The Kharkiv offensive and the Russian withdrawal from Kherson were obviously huge morale boosts They led to a large increase in western support, which sustained morale through the hard winter of 2022/23 as there was hope that a Ukrainian counteroffensive in the summer of 2023 would mark a turning point in the war. With the counteroffensive at an end with not a lot to show for it, I think the Ukrainians are asking "now what?" and there is no easy answer. Zaluzhny's comments reflect that. So, how to continue to sustain morale? We are in the ugly, gritty, determination phase of the war. The Ukrainians have that in droves, but they still need to see some hope. That is the challenge. As an aside, I've been wondering why the Russians haven't launched major missile strikes on Ukraine's main cities and energy infrastructure. I'm beginning to think that they may not want that. Images of people freezing and of civilian casualties and missiles landing in Kyiv and their big cities (where the western reporters are) will only reignite western popular support for Ukraine. Continuous, small-scale civilian casualties in front-line towns (where western reporters generally aren't) don't have the same impact. I was thinking of this as I watched 20 Days in Mariupol last night and the importance of that AP imagery so early in the conflict.
Biden, Scholz, Macron and Sunak are eager to throw Ukraine under the bus to Minsk III, catering to their mollycoddled and entitled populace that is bored with war, and rather wants to focus fully on hedonism, consumption and holidaymaking again. The Kiel-Institut data shows how offensive potential matériel deliveries have dropped like a stone since this spring, and nothing of what is needed most - MBTs, IFVs, APCs, mobile GBAD systems, mobile EW systems, thermal drones, night vision devices, 155 mm regular and precision ammunition - is forthcoming or at least slated to be forthcoming. The same could be said for not improving the dismal training situation and helping the AFU to rid itself of Soviet fighting doctrine, which many Ukrainian soldiers are fairly vocal about.
Why did the West let Russia withdraw over 25,000 of its better trained troops and over 2,000 pieces of matériel across the Dnipro in November 2022 nearly unchallenged?
Why did the West let Russia build the Scholz-Biden-Line of heavily mined field fortifications from November 2022 until June 2023 by not delivering the matériel necessary to hinder such activities?
Why did the West let Russia destroy the Kakhovka reservoir, which, and I have seen it first hand, substantially crippled much of Ukrainian agriculture and industry in the all-important south, also causing a lack of jobs and lack of tax revenue from business no longer able to operate?
"it is hard to see how a Trump presidency would be good for Ukraine or NATO, and Putin might assume this to be such a positive possibility that it is one worth waiting for."
This seems the most likely prognosis at the moment.
It's hard to see how Putin does not win if America drops out.
Europe, unable to defend itself let alone Ukraine, without the US, will be left hoping against hope that Putin does not decide immediately to take the Baltic states, among others.
"This was why they created an energy crisis in 2022 which did have a deleterious effect on Western economies though not one sufficient to undermine support for Ukraine’s war effort."
This energy crisis was created in the years from 1997 onwards - it is a deliberate tactic: "One way in which Russia will be able to turn other states against Atlanticism will be an astute use of
the country's raw material riches. "In the beginning stage [of the struggle against Atlanticism]," Dugin writes, "Russia can offer its potential partners in the East and West its resources as compensation for exacerbating their relations with the U.S." (276). To induce the Anaconda to release its grip on the coastline of Eurasia, it must be attacked relentlessly on its home territory, within its own hemisphere, and throughout Eurasia. "All levels of geopolitical pressure," Dugin insists, "must be activated simultaneously" (367)." A. Dugin, 1997, in "Aleksandr Dugin's Foundations of Geopolitics" at https://tec.fsi.stanford.edu/docs/aleksandr-dugins-foundations-geopolitics.
This has been a very successful tactic, in the EU countries and especially in Germany, which has made itself dependent on Russian natural gas and oil, by means of going away from nuclear power generation which it could have used to secure energy independence (facilitated by Russian-sponsored "anti-nuclear movements") and the creation of pipelines to get those natural resources to the EU and Germany. Once dependent, the EU and Germany may be made to toe Moscow's line.
As for Iran/Hamas/Hezbollah, that's another part of the strategy laid out by Dugin in 1997 - the Moscow-Teheran Axis: "The most ambitious and complex part of Dugin's program concerns the South, where the focal point is a Moscow-Teheran axis. "The idea of a continental Russian-Islamic alliance," he writes, "lies at the foundation of anti-Atlanticist strategy. [T]his alliance is based on the traditional character of Russian and Islamic civilization" (158). "On the whole," he continues, "the entire Islamic zone represents a naturally friendly geopolitical reality in relation to the Eurasian Empire, since the Islamic tradition ... fully understands the spiritual incompatibility of America and religion. The Atlanticists themselves see the Islamic world, on the whole, as their potential opponent" (239).
As the result of an especially broad Grand Alliance to be concluded with Iran, Dugin maintains that Eurasia-Russia will enjoy the prospect of realizing a centuries-old Russian dream and finally reach the "warm seas" of the Indian Ocean. "In relation to the South," he writes, "the 'geopolitical axis of history' [Russia] has only one imperative--geopolitical expansion to the shores of the Indian Ocean" (341). "Having received geopolitical access--in the first place, naval bases--on the Iranian shores," he writes, "Eurasia will enjoy full security from the strategy of the 'Anaconda ring'" (241). Eurasia-Russia and the Empire of Iran, he emphasizes, will have "one and the same geopolitical tendency" (242).
As a consequence of this Grand Alliance, Eurasia-Russia should be prepared to divide up the imperial spoils with "the Islamic Empire in the South" (239). After asking the question "What is the Russian South?" Dugin claims that it includes "the Caucasus [all of it]"; "the eastern and northern shores of the Caspian (the territories of Kazakhstan and Turkmeniya)"; "Central Asia, including Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kirgiziya and Tajikistan"; plus "Mongolia." Even these regions, he notes, should be seen "as zones of further geopolitical expansion to the south and not as 'eternal borders of Russia'" (343)." Ibid.
It's interesting to watch this strategy play out - Dunlop's article was published at Stanford in 2004, yet Western leaders, intelligence agencies, and governments appear to get blindsided at every turn - it's as if Putin's playbook got published, was available, and yet no one bothers to read it, preferring to remain ignorant. "A nation which desires to be both ignorant and free, desires that which never was, and never shall be." - T. Jefferson.
1 - Russian hopes lie in western complacency. This will prove misguided. As an American, indeed someone who lives deep in Trump country, I beg our European friends to NOT underestimate the ability of Moscow to alienate "red" America. Putin is trying very hard to prove me right in his statements RE Israel. If he keeps effing around like that, he will find out how the "red states" feel about such things.
2 - An "early win for Ukraine" was impossible from the moment the Jake Sullivan clique determined to slow-walk M1s, F-16s, and ATACMS in that exact order over a 17-month period. Being a military historian with an appreciation for the combined arms project, I assign complete blame for any Ukrainian defeat, measured in any distance of kilometers from the 1991 borders, to the Biden administration. I say this as a lifelong Democrat with a measure of personal responsibility for electing Democrats.
As to your first point, see this: “Within the United States itself, there is a need for the Russian special services and their allies "to provoke all forms of instability and separatism within the borders of the United States (it is possible to make use of the political forces of Afro-American racists)" (248). "It is especially important," Dugin adds, "to introduce geopolitical disorder into internal American activity, encouraging all kinds of separatism and ethnic, social and racial conflicts, actively supporting all dissident movements--extremist, racist, and sectarian groups, thus destabilizing internal political processes in the U.S. It would also make sense simultaneously to support isolationist tendencies in American politics" (367)." Dugin, Foundations of Geopolitics, at https://tec.fsi.stanford.edu/docs/aleksandr-dugins-foundations-geopolitics.
See also https://streamfortyseven.substack.com/p/putins-playbook-in-action, to wit: "And the elites in the US, and the institutions they control, are doing their utmost best to further this goal, by sending ineffective but very expensive military aid to Ukraine. This seems to have as its main purpose to keep Ukraine fighting but never able to achieve a decisive victory - another lucrative “forever war”, which will decimate the Ukrainian populace and in time, when the aid is cut off and the rug pulled out from under the Ukrainian people, a Russian/Eurasian victory. In combination with the tactics which divide the people of the US against each other - the identity politics, the “diversity training”, and the rest of the DEI program, and the turning of all levels of governance against the majority of the governed, the US itself may well fall into another authoritarian regime."
Well Matt, Trump returning to the Presidency would also be a disaster for Ukraine and blame for that I would also lay directly at the feet of Joe Biden and his politically naive Attorney General who delayed dealing with this serial criminal for a long 18 months before Congress embarrassed him into facing the responsibilities of his job. And then you can look at those voters of America of were dumb enough to send a bunch of brain-dead republicans to Congress, destined to gum-up the resourcing of this fight for the survival of Ukraine. Because without American support Ukraine will be snuffed-out.
You feel a personal responsibility for electing Democrats - I think you still did the right thing because the alternative is even much worse. But the clock is ticking on that choice and there is growing evidence that it may not end well. But before we get to next November, there is the more immediate issue of Congress approving $60 billion for Ukraine. What probability do you place on that happening either when needed or at all? Given the mentalities at play there, it would appear that the republican congress is even more capable than Joe Biden of gumming-up this said-to-be vital support for the Ukrainian defense initiative. So much for the contribution of the "red States" toward sanity of governance in the United States.
It is worth recalling that the current crop of Republicans came to Congress as part of the “Freedom Caucus,” the Tea Party-tinged faction of new, rebel Republicans that made everything so interesting in Washington, DC during the Obama presidency.
Now a new class of “Trump Republicans,” notably Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, wants to stop supporting Ukraine, or reduce that support. To what extent their adoration for Putin and Russia inspires their language of fiscal responsibility is a useless debate.
What matters is that the tea-publicans long ago learned how a small faction can extract policy concessions as the price of forming a majority to support legislation. So it is not correct to say that a Republican majority in the present Congress will automatically bring victory to Russia.
For Joe Biden and Democrats who are not in the "peace party," the price of legislation to support Ukraine has increased. Add it to the wider inflationary pressures of the war on costs of all kinds, everywhere. But that’s it. That’s the net effect that Putin will get from his best-case sausage-making in DC. A more expensive support of Ukraine.
No peace.
I think Zelenskyy's worst nightmare at the moment must be what the US Congress will do to aid for his country. Do you think he would be having this nightmare if there were a Democratic majority in the House? How much confidence can anyone have in this particular crop of republicans doing "the right thing" any time soon? Do you see the current Speaker of the House even tabling legislation that would enable a vote on this aid? Because that's critical. If it were tabled, a small number of republicans with sufficient Democrat support could get it passed.
"The right thing" is not even a thing you should think about, with Republicans. Which should tell you how jaundiced my view of the GOP is. The number of Republicans who actively oppose support for Ukraine is small and the national security senators ("gang of eight") have ways of making a Speaker of the House want to compromise. Mike Johnson is an amateur, they are professionals. As I said, the price of legislation goes up. That's it. That's all Putin gets. No peace.
Trump has many obstacles to reelection. If that happens, then get ready for another divided government where Democrats hold the House. I've been at this a long time.
Assigning “complete blame” for a Ukrainian defeat on any one thing I think would be highly flawed.
Whilst the Biden administration has been guilty of allowing excessive concern about escalation to influence its decision making there are several other key factors at play.
First, the biggest challenge facing Ukraine has not so much been access to a particular platform but the amount of ammunition it has for the systems it does have access to. Chief amongst these have been 155mm artillery shells (and barrels) and air defence interceptors. In both cases, the supply has been dictated by the availability of Western stocks not US hesitancy (I believe 155mm artillery systems were being supplied to Ukraine as early as June 2022).
Second, and following on from the above point the delays in ramping up production of 155mm artillery and air defence interceptors are in my opinion attributable as much to European nations as they are to the US. In fact, the US has done a far better job of increasing production than Europe.
Third, Ukraine must accept some blame for the lack of preparation prior to 24/02/22 which then allowed Russia to make rapid gains in the opening days/weeks of the war. Given the inherent difficulty in dislodging fortified defences (see Ukrainian summer offensive) this appears a key decision (I fully appreciate there were good reasons for this including not wanting to panic the civilian population).
I think we need to break free from the idea that the systems you mention, M1s, F-16s, and ATACMS, would be/could have been some type of ‘wunderwaffen’. M1s still get blown up by mines, F-16s are still susceptible to air defence missiles, and Russia has already adapted to Ukraine’s use of ATACMS i.e. by dispersing it’s air bases.
I'm not at all sure Putin thinks in terms of long term strategy and plans. My feeling is that he is tactical opportunist. But whatever the case it is quite clear that Putin won't admit defeat and bring back the troops. Apart from this not being in his nature, he knows that the return of a whole lot of embittered soldiers talking loud and long about how badly they suffered for no gain in an avoidable war could really seriously threaten his regime. I'm sure he knows that not too distant Russian history shows that returning soldiers from clearly unsuccessful wars can seriously weaken the government that sent them off to them. So Putin will keep the war cooking and hope that eventually Ukraine will fold. I fear the best chance of peace is a post-Putin one.
No doubt Putin is an opportunist, and really nobody in the West truly understands the man or thinking entirely. Given that, I would opt for the maxim that says, “Believe people when they tell you who they are.” In this context we know Putin wants to reconstitute the Russian/Soviet empire in which non-Russians are second, third class citizens available to exploit and be expendable. The real question is whether Putin will push this to the brink as Alexander III did with the possible repercussions, or hold on for years like in Afghanistan in which all the weaknesses and fracturing become to large ignore? If history is prologue, Putin does not have time on his side in this view. Furthermore, Russian energy resources lose their value to the West as they transition to cleaner and domestic production via nuclear, renewables, etc. Again time is it on his side.
This piece is a good counter to the prevailing wisdom that time automatically favours Putin.
I think the war remains highly contingent as Frederick Kagen’s recent summary for ISW points out:
https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/if-west-cuts-aid-ukraine-russia-will-win-if-west-leans-ukraine-can-win
What is concerning is how much Ukraine appears to be slipping off the West’s radar.
Seems to be very little being said by politicians here in the UK, at least publicly, about the steps being taken to produce and procure more artillery ammunition and air-defence interceptors for Ukraine, which by most accounts are their two most urgent needs.
Hopefully given the importance of this war to both European and international security this will change but I’m not seeing a lot of movement in the right direction at present.
War can be seen as a contest of wills and Putin definitely has the will to continue. He also has a lot of levers for trying to undermine Western will to support Ukraine and he appears to be having some success in this. I think it is a lot harder for the West to undermine Putin's will, or at least we haven't found a way yet. Ukraine's will is still strong, but you can see signs of frustration and fatigue setting in, but that doesn't mean that they are ready to talk to Putin. Not by a long shot. I think it was Ukrainian journalist Nastya Stanko who recently tweeted (in Ukrainian) that she missed the atmosphere of the early days of the war. To my mind, those days were marked by a national endorphin rush of coming together to support the war and defeat the invader; shock followed by determination. The Russian withdrawal from around Kyiv and the successful defence of Odesa and Mykolaiv (often forgotten) helped to maintain morale through the hard summer of fighting in 2022 when the Russians had a huge artillery advantage and even as the Ukrainians were pushed back in Kharkiv, Donetsk and Luhansk. The Kharkiv offensive and the Russian withdrawal from Kherson were obviously huge morale boosts They led to a large increase in western support, which sustained morale through the hard winter of 2022/23 as there was hope that a Ukrainian counteroffensive in the summer of 2023 would mark a turning point in the war. With the counteroffensive at an end with not a lot to show for it, I think the Ukrainians are asking "now what?" and there is no easy answer. Zaluzhny's comments reflect that. So, how to continue to sustain morale? We are in the ugly, gritty, determination phase of the war. The Ukrainians have that in droves, but they still need to see some hope. That is the challenge. As an aside, I've been wondering why the Russians haven't launched major missile strikes on Ukraine's main cities and energy infrastructure. I'm beginning to think that they may not want that. Images of people freezing and of civilian casualties and missiles landing in Kyiv and their big cities (where the western reporters are) will only reignite western popular support for Ukraine. Continuous, small-scale civilian casualties in front-line towns (where western reporters generally aren't) don't have the same impact. I was thinking of this as I watched 20 Days in Mariupol last night and the importance of that AP imagery so early in the conflict.
I firmly believe that the ship has sailed.
Biden, Scholz, Macron and Sunak are eager to throw Ukraine under the bus to Minsk III, catering to their mollycoddled and entitled populace that is bored with war, and rather wants to focus fully on hedonism, consumption and holidaymaking again. The Kiel-Institut data shows how offensive potential matériel deliveries have dropped like a stone since this spring, and nothing of what is needed most - MBTs, IFVs, APCs, mobile GBAD systems, mobile EW systems, thermal drones, night vision devices, 155 mm regular and precision ammunition - is forthcoming or at least slated to be forthcoming. The same could be said for not improving the dismal training situation and helping the AFU to rid itself of Soviet fighting doctrine, which many Ukrainian soldiers are fairly vocal about.
Why did the West let Russia withdraw over 25,000 of its better trained troops and over 2,000 pieces of matériel across the Dnipro in November 2022 nearly unchallenged?
Why did the West let Russia build the Scholz-Biden-Line of heavily mined field fortifications from November 2022 until June 2023 by not delivering the matériel necessary to hinder such activities?
Why did the West let Russia destroy the Kakhovka reservoir, which, and I have seen it first hand, substantially crippled much of Ukrainian agriculture and industry in the all-important south, also causing a lack of jobs and lack of tax revenue from business no longer able to operate?
"it is hard to see how a Trump presidency would be good for Ukraine or NATO, and Putin might assume this to be such a positive possibility that it is one worth waiting for."
This seems the most likely prognosis at the moment.
It's hard to see how Putin does not win if America drops out.
Europe, unable to defend itself let alone Ukraine, without the US, will be left hoping against hope that Putin does not decide immediately to take the Baltic states, among others.
"This was why they created an energy crisis in 2022 which did have a deleterious effect on Western economies though not one sufficient to undermine support for Ukraine’s war effort."
This energy crisis was created in the years from 1997 onwards - it is a deliberate tactic: "One way in which Russia will be able to turn other states against Atlanticism will be an astute use of
the country's raw material riches. "In the beginning stage [of the struggle against Atlanticism]," Dugin writes, "Russia can offer its potential partners in the East and West its resources as compensation for exacerbating their relations with the U.S." (276). To induce the Anaconda to release its grip on the coastline of Eurasia, it must be attacked relentlessly on its home territory, within its own hemisphere, and throughout Eurasia. "All levels of geopolitical pressure," Dugin insists, "must be activated simultaneously" (367)." A. Dugin, 1997, in "Aleksandr Dugin's Foundations of Geopolitics" at https://tec.fsi.stanford.edu/docs/aleksandr-dugins-foundations-geopolitics.
This has been a very successful tactic, in the EU countries and especially in Germany, which has made itself dependent on Russian natural gas and oil, by means of going away from nuclear power generation which it could have used to secure energy independence (facilitated by Russian-sponsored "anti-nuclear movements") and the creation of pipelines to get those natural resources to the EU and Germany. Once dependent, the EU and Germany may be made to toe Moscow's line.
As for Iran/Hamas/Hezbollah, that's another part of the strategy laid out by Dugin in 1997 - the Moscow-Teheran Axis: "The most ambitious and complex part of Dugin's program concerns the South, where the focal point is a Moscow-Teheran axis. "The idea of a continental Russian-Islamic alliance," he writes, "lies at the foundation of anti-Atlanticist strategy. [T]his alliance is based on the traditional character of Russian and Islamic civilization" (158). "On the whole," he continues, "the entire Islamic zone represents a naturally friendly geopolitical reality in relation to the Eurasian Empire, since the Islamic tradition ... fully understands the spiritual incompatibility of America and religion. The Atlanticists themselves see the Islamic world, on the whole, as their potential opponent" (239).
As the result of an especially broad Grand Alliance to be concluded with Iran, Dugin maintains that Eurasia-Russia will enjoy the prospect of realizing a centuries-old Russian dream and finally reach the "warm seas" of the Indian Ocean. "In relation to the South," he writes, "the 'geopolitical axis of history' [Russia] has only one imperative--geopolitical expansion to the shores of the Indian Ocean" (341). "Having received geopolitical access--in the first place, naval bases--on the Iranian shores," he writes, "Eurasia will enjoy full security from the strategy of the 'Anaconda ring'" (241). Eurasia-Russia and the Empire of Iran, he emphasizes, will have "one and the same geopolitical tendency" (242).
As a consequence of this Grand Alliance, Eurasia-Russia should be prepared to divide up the imperial spoils with "the Islamic Empire in the South" (239). After asking the question "What is the Russian South?" Dugin claims that it includes "the Caucasus [all of it]"; "the eastern and northern shores of the Caspian (the territories of Kazakhstan and Turkmeniya)"; "Central Asia, including Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kirgiziya and Tajikistan"; plus "Mongolia." Even these regions, he notes, should be seen "as zones of further geopolitical expansion to the south and not as 'eternal borders of Russia'" (343)." Ibid.
It's interesting to watch this strategy play out - Dunlop's article was published at Stanford in 2004, yet Western leaders, intelligence agencies, and governments appear to get blindsided at every turn - it's as if Putin's playbook got published, was available, and yet no one bothers to read it, preferring to remain ignorant. "A nation which desires to be both ignorant and free, desires that which never was, and never shall be." - T. Jefferson.