- Vladimir Vladimirovich, master strategist
"Whoa, if countries are annexed willy nilly then we better join NATO before it happens to us"
- Every single one of those doorsteps
Even without involving Finland, it's worse than that. If he successfully invades and conquers Ukraine, he will certainly have NATO at his doorstep. I doubt this was his real reasoning.
Maybe the plan was to take only as much of Ukraine to show that he could, if he wanted to, take the whole. Effectively turning the Ukraine into a no-mans-land and maintaining the threat of "don't join NATO, or else..." And Finland doesn't have oil to profit from, so he likely had no plans of ever touching that wasp's nest.
I'm not a politician nor military strategist, but I prefer not underestimating powerful people when thinking about their strategies.
https://www.anews.com.tr/world/2023/03/26/poland-nuclear-arm...
while also this:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/oct/05/poland-us-nucl...
(Ignoring Kaliningrad, which has a border with Lithuania and Poland but is not militarily defensible, and the awkward satellite state of Belarus)
Putin was looking to Finlandize NATO, but ended up NATOizing Finland instead.
The invasion occurred because of Ukraine's movement toward the EU which, eventually, would curtail the ability of Putin and the oligarchs to swindle Russias oil and gas wealth through rampant price fixing and kick-backs. Everything else was rhetoric.
What meaningful move did Ukraine make towards joining EU to trigger an invasion?
TIL!
Russia invaded and annexed Crimea in 2014. Pretending this counts is like charging a rape victim with criminal assault because they fought back.
I was just outlining the timeline and showing that their desire to join EU/NATO was not something dreamt up post-2022.
Egypt?
- USA is just going to come across either Alaska, the North Pole, or EU allies' military bases.
- UA/Finland/etc are going through their land borders.
- Rest of EU is going to have a problem without sending troops through their neighbors. (And using the Black sea is just a huge detour ...)
- China would use its land border.
Look at a map of Europe, put yourself in the mind of a highly suspicious and pessimistic person and ask yourself "how would I invade Russia?" "how do I get an SRBM or MRBM within striking range of Moscow?" "how do I increase my ability to have Russian speaking agents plausibly cross into and out of Russia?"
Now put yourself in the mind of someone else seeking power and look at the map and, keeping an eye to history, ask yourself "what is the most effective way to destabilize Russia without involving US forces?"
Both parties are playing a very dangerous game that has a non-zero chance of ending with a nuclear exchange, limited or not. If peace was the goal then both sides need to agree to an immediate ceasefire and withdrawal of both military and political forces. A new agreement needs to be reached that places Ukraine as a neutral, sovereign country and both sides should pay for reconstruction efforts and restitution to survivors. Of course, peace is never the goal.
You don't need Ukraine to do any of this. Poland and the Baltic states are NATO members already.
This is clear Russian propaganda.
You "seem to forget" that Russia attacked Ukraine, committed several war crimes... Ukraine would be the happiest if the Russians GTFO and left them to be . They should even pay for the reconstruction costs and should be punished for their war crimes. That would almost make things even.
No, not both sides. Ukraine was perfectly to stay home and take care of their own citizens. There's only one country that invaded the other and started stealing their kids and bomb their population.
Russia can leave anytime, peace will be immediate.
Also, who are you talking about when you say "both sides"?Are you talking about Ukraine and Russia? Withdraw to where? Agreement with whom?
Please be specific.
What you are suggesting ist just not realistic in any way. It’s pure fantasy.
Come to the 21st century and ask yourself: "why war when we can have commerce"?
Can't help but sad chuckle over this whole clash of rams battle of perspectives and the fact that Russia, Ukraine and other western countries had somewhat great relationships at the beginning of the century.
One could ask the same question from the Russian perspective when analyzing how Russia-West relations have deteriorated from Russia being in love with it, towards Russia having a lovecraftian fear of it (from Russian perspective, this is more of a proxy war with the West). This is actually the TLDR of Putin's Munich speech in late 2000-something.
I wonder what could be games theory solution here. Russia and the West don't trust each other and can't meet each-other expectations of peaceful coexistence - Ukraine got caught in the crossfire. What could hypothetically serve as a common ground for aligning the perspectives before it inertly escalates too far?
from the wets prospective a quick internal cue falloewed by regim change to a more western friendly pro democracy leader that ideally is afraid of china would be the best outcome.
Wonder what is the realistic incentive for that?
Russia is on its way to becoming hamstrung by China. Who else can Russia turn to?
China does not want Russia to implode and fracture, because that is an unstable situation for them. But if Russia was to fracture, you can be sure that China will want to control the pieces bordering China. They don't want chaos on their borders, or the power vacuum there somehow filled by western powers.
China's and Europe's attitudes and practices towards their let's say "dependent trade and strategic partners" is a different story, but EU can hardly boast on that front, judging e.g. by various African states.
A peace that grants Russia the Sudetenland as a consolation prize along with a guarantee that Ukraine is sovereign (but with a big asterisk in that they are also not sovereign in the sense that they are able to join an alliance of their choosing to protect themselves from aggressors) is just an invitation for Russia to consolidate the new territory and prepare the next push. And not being able to see that is for me much more shallow thinking.
I wonder if that's actually realistically true.
The civil war has been going on for far longer and it will have to be dealt with. Ukrainian government seems to have also been signaling that its goal is to liberate Crimea, so this is also something that will be going on.
How would you deal with the Crimeans who got overly cozy showered with Russian Oil/Gas money?
I'm just curious why do you suppose that there would be no friction or resistance.
Maybe I misunderstood who you meant. I was thinking about business leaders striking lucrative deals, mayors appointed by the Russian administration, and so on.
I think there will probably be some resistance, but once the Russian troops leave Crimea, I can't see a popular uprising against the Ukraine as a state or something like that. Time will tell. I don't think Russia can hold Crimea in the long run. I'm not qualified to even guess, but when did that stop anybody?! :-D
I think it's likely Kiev will control Crimea within 24 months.
Based on what Ukraine at least appears to want, especially now, if it is sovereign it won't be neutral, and if forced to be neutral it isn't really sovereign.