Seems to be what most of us thought it was before the war ever started: try to replicate Afghanistan in the 80s. Keep Russia tied down till Russia collapses, supplying weapons and letting masses of Ukrainians die, avoiding US casualties. The country will be in ruins and not recover for decades if ever.
There are a few problems with this.
Russia is not the USSR. In many ways the USSR was stronger, but Russia is far more resilient. The USSR had a food deficit, while Russia is a net food exporter: one of the world’s largest. They still have a vast market for hydrocarbons and for their weapons. There is nothing the West can sanction that they must have. This is especially the case because while China and India have pretended to go along with the sanctions, both countries are moving into Russia in a big way to replace the Western businesses which left.
In the 80s China was not a Russian ally, and even if it had been it was not the greatest manufacturing power and world’s largest exporter. The Chinese make noises about peace, and they don’t supply weapons, but they are happy to buy Russian oil and gas and to sell Russia whatever else it needs.
Russia has a population problem, but it still has a far larger population than Ukraine. It can feed men into the grinder far longer than Ukraine will. Weapons are great, but they must be used by soldiers.
Further, Russia is not trying to occupy the entire country, but only the parts which are Russian majority or close to it. These places are not anti-Russian. They are not ideal for guerilla operations, both because of the lack of support for them and because Ukraine is basically a large open plain, not mountain or jungle.
Internally, as I’ve pointed out repeatedly, the Russian leadership cannot afford to lose. If Putin is seen by Russians to have lost the war, he will lose power and he may not survive that, nor may his family.
Further, people who think Putin losing power would be good for Ukraine or the West are deranged. The people who will replace him are to his right, and they will want another go. Their primary complaint is that Putin hasn’t gone all in: hasn’t full mobilized, hasn’t used all the weapons available (Russia has been far more restrained than the US was in Iraq), and hasn’t moved to a war economy.
Meanwhile, the West is becoming more unified, but not stronger. China continues its rise, and US reshoring efforts seem to involve taking industry from Europe and some week efforts at moving semiconductor production to the US. China produced more semiconductor patents last year than the rest of the world combined, the idea that the Western tech lead is durable is a joke.
Western power and leadership is a wasting asset. Russia is now firmly a Chinese satrapy, China and Russia and India are moving to their own payment system and OPEC is moving to sell oil in non-dollar denominations. Meanwhile climate change advances and it increases Russia’s advantage in agriculture: it improves their yields.
This is a fantastically stupid war, with no good end and it’s not going to replicate Afghanistan and the USSR because Russia is not the USSR, Ukraine is not Afghanistan and America is not the America of the 80s, still vastly dominant economically.
Negotiation should be the way out, but we are stuck in a maximal position: Russia must get nothing.
And that is not going to happen any more than Russian collapse.
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