But, what is his gain? I cannot figure it out.
Mariupol and Melitopol in particular are exceptionally strategic locations. This video does a good job of explaining why the land bridge to Crimea is so important to Russia:
The pain isn’t just economic. Everything he touches seems to have the completely opposite effect to what he says he wants, such as Ukraine/Finland/Sweden outside NATO. There is no logic.
I really dont think thats true. When Europe is spending billions to host millions of refugees already while inflation keeps climbing the appetite to spend yet more money to rebuild Ukraine is really going to pall. This will be a gift to Europe's far right and EU exit campaigns will spring up in response to the EU's attempts to distribute the pain and costs of this.
Moreover, I think the west has an overly optimistic view of how well it is going to handle 10-20 million Ukrainian refugees long term given how much political strife was caused by 1 million Syrians.
I really think it could break up the EU. I think this may even have been Putin's intention.
NATO is also unlikely to fast track Ukraine's membership in a destroyed state. It'll probably wait.
The "help from the west" I hope will come from e.g. that assets now frozen in London, Switzerland and elsewhere can be transfered to Ukraine as war reparations from Russia. I'm more pessimistic about the future when it comes to China/Taiwan, Russia (How do we even handle having a pariah state on par with Iran but the size of Russia on our doorstep?).
Two weeks ago his goal was a land grab.
If anybody in the Russian army is worth half a ruble, they planned this to take months at least. They came straight out of engagements in Syria and Chechnya, which took years to turn. Whether they told their troops (who, in Russia, are synonim with "cannon fodder" since forever) is another matter, of course.
1. It's not a constantly feuding cornucopia of tribes, regional warlords, and militias that have spent 20 years fighting eachother in a never-ending civil war.
2. Prior to the star of the war, it had fully functional, developed-world logistics networks.
3. Russia borders it, it's not trying to project power across an ocean.
4. Russia is far culturally closer to Ukraine that the United States ever will be to Afghanistan.
5. People accustomed to developed world lifestyles get war-weary much, much faster.
In light of those four factors, Putin was banking on an easy victory, with Ukraine choosing a bad peace over a protracted, bloody war.
Its economy was not steered well since that point, but there's a world of difference between it and Afghanistan.
To be fair, the US policy leadership made similar misunderestimates of the difficulties it would face in Iraq, it just didn't have global sanctions crushing it's economy at the same time.
(On the other hand, a key figure in that determination and policy planning regarding Iraq was reportedly described by the General that commanded the invasion and early occupation as “the dumbest fucking guy on the planet”, so, there's that.)
I can well imagine it's true, just not that you can tell by looking at TV interviews.
Unfortunately, the power of brainwashing is enormous.
That's the why. Why now is a little bit trickier. But I think it's because of a fundamental weakness. Russia's military is essentially still the Soviet military. It's a decaying force using last generation military technology that is rapidly being left behind. MANPADs (infantry mobile air defense) & Javelins (anti-tank missiles) have all but rendered their planes, helicopters, and tanks obsolete. And, as a country, they are too corrupt and poor to modernize their military.
They're going to win this war but it's obvious that they're mustering about the best invasion force they can and even then it's been a slow moving brutal war. Five more years of Russian decay and Ukrainian modernization would bring the outcome into doubt. Ten years and maybe it's impossible.
And I rather expect Putin will try to do exactly that, and we see carnage the world hasn't seen since the last world war to try and goad NATO into reacting. What we need is for the U.N. general assembly to catch up with what's going on. It's not enough to just condemn the invasion. The purpose of the U.N. is to prevent world wars and right now they're not doing enough.
I think people overlook how rational the geopolitical calculus is, it's only shocking because eating so much short/medium term loss is counter to the interest of a "compromised" leader, i.e. one who has to answer to the public. My feeling is Putin has simply secured so much power that he can do what most leaders can not, pursue long term geopolitically maximizing gamble and survive it. I doubt he'll be deposed - no one wants to inherit this shitshow.
Also history rarely looks down on leaders who regain lost land, especially one of such cultural importance as UKR is to RU. If Putin can hold on to UKR, he'll have statues built of him for centuries and impartial historians 100 years from now will likely evaluate his conquest favorably.
In the meantime, the real question is ask what the west will lose not accommodating RU interests and maintaining sanctions comparable to a blockade. RU hasn't even began retaliating yet, they can (IMO will) extract disportionate cost from 40Trillion western block economy versus what the west block can punish a 1.5T RU economy.
Existential risk now pale in comparison to long term existential risk of irrevocably west/NATO aligned UKR, hence emphasis on eating "short/medium term loss". Soviets didn't want to hold AFG, it was peripheral counter insurgency work, on tier of Vietnam war was to PRC. UKR is reforging historic empire, it's core interest like TW is to PRC. As for holding UKR, it remains to be seen. There's very real possibly they'll Grozny the entire country and displace 20M+ which will destabilize Europe and make holding UKR feasible.
>if they keep making big mistakes.
Taking UKR isn't a big mistake, hasty special operations gamble was, but complete occupation isn't, especially now when RU is still capable. UKR with another 5 years US training and support would make such conquest out of reach, especially coupled with continued RU demographic/military decline. TBH for RU best time was 2014 considering how poor sanction proofing their economy went.
>look at what China has managed to achieve
RU isn't PRC in terms of demographics, and even PRC will eventually have to take TW / push back US aligned containment security architecture in East Asia. Common argument for PRC doing so in next 10-20 years is that's when PRC power will be maximal. RU has no peak to look forward to, is already on decline. It can't afford to wait.
Post USSR broken RU didn't have as many carrots as West/NATO. Their leverage was coalescing their big sticks after period of disorder. West/NATO equally culpable indulging UKR and failing to manage her as buffer led to RU resorting to sticks, because they couldn't compete on carrots.
>Even China has not made that mistake
Look at 1st, 2nd, 3rd TW strait crisis, PRC wasn't even capable of succeeding but they still tried. 92 consensus provided ~30 years of detente but that's gone, and PRC is building up to try again. Improving geo strategic conditions for long term security is rarely a mistake, especially considering RU headwinds. The mistake for RU is waiting this long in the first place.
>appeal to Ukraine than China to Taiwan
See how HK opinion on PRC shifted in a generation, and how TW's as well. That's what happens when new gen grows up in antagonistic political systems (again influenced/funded by west) - value fracture, identities diverge. Past certain point, appealing with carrots stop working. Again 1.5T RU economy can't out compete on 40T western block. Was even more lopsided 20 years ago. It's not they didn't try, they just didn't stand a chance.
>might be planning to displace 20M+ people, somehow I doubt that would improve things.
Destabilized europe with 20M refugees while RU has defendable UKR geography and resources is a massive long term "improvement". More than half of world's population are neutral/still need RU exports. I don't think warcriming to victory is the plan considering how kid gloves RU ROE has been so far, but it's likely the inevitable outcome if RU demands aren't met. RU peer-level military strategy is artillery slowly glassing everything. They don't have capability to prosecute a high tech war with relatively less disruption.
The name of the game now is probably self-preservation and saving-face for the Putin government. What "self-preservation" means to Putin is hard to guess but an embarrassing retreat from Ukraine doesn't seem like it's on the table yet.
What's the price of Ukraine as a non-Western state? I'm surprised we can spend hours valuing the cost of the sanctions but few can put a price on what Putin has been asking for.
Perhaps if the message is "I'm not a bully, I'm a school monitor with a badge to prove it" maybe it's different.
The best question to pose oneself is, if NATO was such a bully instead, where is the moral, good, international aid, charity, role model and respect that Putin has performed in times of peace? Where is his school monitor badge that he should have got?
Anyone who thinks Russia can invade NATO is as mistaken as the Russians that currently believe NATO can, and wants to, invade Russia. There are, unfortunately, hundreds of millions of people who believe one or the other.
Do you believe the West would go to war with Russia, only to add a few members to a giant military alliance that was designed for a post-WWII world?
The US will retreat and focus on China and the EU will try to become more independent from NATO and Russia (and they'll negotiate with Putin if need be, unless he already jumped on China's side for good).
No, I believe that alliance will defend its members, and given that Russia can't even successfully bully the poorest country in Europe, it is in no position to start a war over Finland or Sweden.
Of course Ukraine won't be a part of NATO.
The US can't withdraw from Europe, unless it wants to see the American hegemony collapse overnight. And if we know anything about empires, it's that they will keep hold on what they've spent decades building long past the point of positive ROI or reason.
Had Ukraine been a member of NATO or the EU would Russia have invaded? Almost certainly not, and that's because of the credible use of overwhelming military power to repel such an attempt. Why is the U.N. system inadequate in this case? Article 39 and 41 give the Security Council the power to repel breaches to the peace using armed force. But Russia is a permanent member of the Security Council and thus effectively has a veto vote (lack of consent to use armed forces against itself is a certain outcome).
This exposes a real problem when the belligerent is a member of the Security Council. And as Russia cannot be trusted to honor their agreements, and the U.N. Security Council in matters involving Russian aggression can't be depended on, it is completely reasonable for the EU to bring in Ukraine and Georgia as members rather than have Russia initiate yet another war right on Europe's doorstep. This is the third time Putin has waged an aggressive war without provocation or any compelling case for defense.
And hopefully it still is a post-WW2 world. Putin is seemingly making a case of a pre-WW2 view of "might makes right" without any international system of peacefully resolving disputes. He's certainly not bound by any agreements. It's a recipe for a very expensive second Cold War.