Friday, February 10, 2023

Can Putin Win?

© Pavel Bednyakov/POOL/TASS   

Politico: Can Putin win? 

A Russian assault is expected in Donbas, but all will depend on whether Russia has fixed major flaws in logistics and coordination. 

“I am wicked and scary with claws and teeth,” Vladimir Putin reportedly warned David Cameron when the then-British prime minister pressed him about the use of chemical weapons by Russia’s ally in Syria, Bashar al-Assad, and discussed how far Russia was prepared to go. 

 According to Cameron’s top foreign policy adviser John Casson — cited in a BBC documentary — Putin went on to explain that to succeed in Syria, one would have to use barbaric methods, as the U.S. did in Abu Ghraib jail in Iraq. “I am an ex-KGB man,” he expounded. 

The remarks were meant, apparently, half in jest but, as ever with Russia’s leader, the menace was clear.  

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WNU Editor: Putin fought and won the Chechen war, the Georgian war, and he has secured Assad from being defeated in Syria. The Chechen war lasted 9 years, and the Syrian war is still ongoing, but at an intensity that is far less than the past. 

Bottom line. 

Putin (and Russia) are not strangers to long wars. 

In the past few months, everything that the Kremlin has done and said tells me that they have made the decision that the Ukraine war is also going to last a very long time, and my gut is telling me that they are gearing up for this conflict to last well into 2024 and beyond. 

This war is shaping up to be a battle of wills, and in this battle of wills I just do not see the West having the stomach to support this war for the next few years. 

A few months into the war I said that the conflict was only going to end when Europe stands up and says enough is enough. That it will be a few key European leaders making the decision to tell the Ukraine government to compromise and agree to the Kremlin's conditions to end the war. I do not see that happening now. But later this year, especially before the US elections in 2024, I predict that we are going to see a lot of cracks in the West and a push for a deal that Ukraine will not like. And if that happens, yup, one can say that Putin has won. 

On the flip side. If this war expands and NATO gets directly involved. Putin is not going to win, nor the West. In such a war, everyone is a loser.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

It is time to go to war with Russia.

Anonymous said...

Why does the west have so much animosity for Russia and not China? Could it be that we were conditioned for generations now? White Christians are the enemy of the elite who want to be our gods, that’s why they and their cultures are disappearing in the west, it’s the will of the evil that Russia is fighting against.

Anonymous said...

Nah mate, go to work on the lgtbqabcd toxic male hating simp democrats

Anonymous said...

The bear will fight the will out of the political class that prop up Ukraine, Z will go, negotiations had, some land given, end of war

Anonymous said...

Like a book

Anonymous said...

Begin by defining "win."

Anonymous said...

Fred is MIA. Embarrassed?

Anonymous said...

@5:39 Exactly.

The definition of "winning" that most western thinkers would use probably looks like the Chechnyan model, with the territorial defeat of the Zelesky govt and the installation of a pro-Kremlin strongman who can run the state with minimal interference from terrorist/partisan activity during the rebuilding years.

This is the exact scenario that western planners have been training and preparing the nationalist battalions to subvert, so will Putin even go that route? If not, then how do the Russians define victory? They've laid out their broad objective on Feb 24th 2022, but as to how they intend to fulfill them, no one knows.

One thing is for certain though: western pundits and officials will declare victory no matter what happens. Objectivity is dead, politics are a team sport now, and we're always winning. Until we're not.

Anonymous said...

Victory will be Russia not being destroyed or it’s leaders toppled and replaced by western puppets. The vast land package and four million additional tax paying citizens added to Russia is a bonus

Anonymous said...

"A few months into the war I said that the conflict was only going to end when Europe stands up and says enough is enough."

No, you predicted a Russian steamroll. Stop trying to rewrite your own history.