The longer this escalates, the more likely one of the leaders gets killed. It would be a service to the world if it was Putin.
Yes, it would- one would think the military is probably mad that they had to invade Ukraine for egotistical reasons - and may be tired of Putin, they are the key. Someone should put an anonymous 1bn bounty on Putin's head. DD
I've learned to hate the russians, all through my whole life if another war comes, it's them we must fight... ...I can't think for you, you'll have to decide Whether Judas Iscariot, had god on his side
I guess I see only a few possibilities, but we could have many surprises still to come. 1. Slow quagmire as Putin maintains the heel role, takes Kyiv, installs puppetry, but controls only X% of the country. Both sides declare victory and have their own governments. A not-quite-stable DMZ sort of situation arises, with a cease fire for no official end to hostilities. 2. Putin pushes onward and overwhelms the tired Ukrainian military, installs puppet regime successfully. But guerilla warfare and bloodshed (partly supported by "the west") continues for years. 3. Putin accepts some Russian-speaking chunks of eastern Ukraine, says that's the only people he was looking to "protect." 4. Least likely by a factor of 1 million. Putin gets ousted. I just don't see evidence of that being possible, but I wouldn't mind hearing some fascinating back-channel of the oligarchs right about now. And I wonder if Xi has his own Moscow contacts or more than Putin would like. I am talking out of my butt and just want to openly apologize for that. But nearly all of us world wide have incomplete perspectives and data sets for this **** show. I will say I'm leery of lionizing Ukraine just b/c Putin behaved so badly. But that's natural. We all thought America was a perfect and innocent place on 09/12/2001. I remember that well. Then we went all Putin on Iraq.
Super ugly and not surprising. Maybe under-represented in this thread is a non-white-world perspective. And who better to share than Al Jazeera: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/27/western-media-coverage-ukraine-russia-invasion-criticism TL;DR = world suddenly cares when majority white countries fight each other, but cares a lot less if a white country attacks a majority-dark-skinned land, etc etc. Predictable narrative but they're not exactly wrong, and they catch some really cringe media statements.
Anyone surprised that Poland would deny black refugees entry vs whites? Probably will be the same here. You won't hear anyone complain here about accepting Ukrainian refugees and open borders. Now, Syrian on the other hand...
Some people just think being contrarian makes them smart, regardless of anything else. I'd be curious to see all these people during WW2.
A friend of mine's husband used to be in the military intelligence community. Their bet is that the odds of Putin losing control of Russia in the next 3-6 months are actually pretty high. Still just conjecture, but he knows the players in Putin's circle and there are some that have been waiting for an opportunity to step in.
It's hard to imagine how it plays out in a good way. But one possibility - if NATO and the EU are up for it - is if there's a peace agreement (that we know Russia will violate), the west goes in and starts a full long-term rebuilding Ukraine infrastructure/etc. It's hard to argue against that given the destruction, and it makes it impossible for Russia to attack again if Westerners are there.
I don't doubt these guys are idiots but didn't you say this on the same page? "No one should HATE the Russians - they should HATE their government." So what's wrong with saying you'd rather be Russian?
I think about the parallels of our invasion of Iraq and the Russian invasion of Ukraine a lot these last few days. A lot of parallels but also a lot of dissimilarities. I also think about the story of Sparta vs Persia in the Battle of Thermopylae. While Sparta eventually lost, they showed even a god could bleed.