I assume “could win the war” is meant to mean “won in a strictly military sense” – like Vietnam, where the US won the battles but ultimately left and allowed the country to be unified under the North Vietnamese government.
I would just emphasize that a failure to win battles does not mean a failure to win militarily. I get that the US military, of which I was once one small part, likes to frame it that way, but such notions tend to be self-serving. Lets the military lay blame for its failures (to include the failures of civilian leadership) at the feet of the broader society, perhaps even beyond civilian military leadership like Putin and LBJ/Nixon. Lends itself to notions of “moral decay” somehow being the reason the US lost in Vietnam or a “stab in the back” explaining how Germany lost WWI while still occupying parts of France.
So let’s be clear. All those wars that the military wants to insist weren’t lost militarily, but by some nebulous (or, again, in the case of the stab in the back, perhaps even some concrete) “other”? Nope. That’s self-serving bullshit. They were lost militarily.
Yeah, “war” is carrying a lot of connotations. Russia could achieve all its military objectives, yet because of its internal politics be forced to agree to Ukraine’s terms.
To me, that can be described by the old phrase ‘they won the battles, but lost the war’.
So true. Militarily the US forces and ARVN won the Tet Offensive but as it turned out, so what?
I think it might be time to stop using absolute terms like “winning” and “losing” in regards to war. Russia is only winning if you completely disregard all of Putin’s strategic objectives.
Could you expand on that? I assume you are broadening strategic objectives to be many outside of this Ukraine campaign, but I figured I’d see if you will list out what you see as his objectives that aren’t being met.
Just the airplane pest again. There is a C17 just leaving Rzeszow, Poland (which is nothing new, it is the closest major airport to the border and Lviv, Ukraine). Reason I mention it is that it is coded as belonging to the Indian Air Force.
Presumably humanitarian supplies, but still an interesting statement by the Indian Government…
Press on.
Not sure about the veracity of this, but it’s very interesting:
- Reestablishing a Russia-friendly buffer between Russia and NATO. A puppet state won’t last 15 minutes.
- Decapitating Ukrainian leadership (de-nazification in Putinese). There will be a hugely popular Ukrainian government for years to come, even if it is directing operations from Warsaw.
- Enhancing his domestic popularity by wagging the dogs of war. This invasion is enormously unpopular in Russia.
- Taking advantage of a weakened EU in the aftermath of Brexit, a pandemic, and the departure of their most unifying figurehead (and Putin arch nemesis) Angela Merkel.
- Taking advantage of a NATO in disarray after years of Trumpian disparagement.
6….I don’t have all morning.
Thoughts on this video purporting to show a possible invasion of Moldova?
Yes but this was from a few days ago and lots of things have happened since then. Even if that was the plan Putin might be weighing up whether his military can afford to spread itself even more thinly. On the other hand, the sanctions can hardly get much worse so he may as well go the whole hog.
If I was the Moldovan President I’d be on the phone to my Romanian counterpart (Romania are in NATO) to ask if they can temporarily annex them.
Not him, but Soviet and Russian doctrine absolutely had that an Army could lose most of the tactical battles but win at the Operational level.
Look at the battles on the Eastern front from Kurk onwards. The Wehrmacht generally won most engagements but still ended the operation having retreated a 100km, lost 10 divisions and a 100,000 men. Rinse lather repeat.
“military victory” isn’t a real thing. Military operations are inherently political. The concerns are inseparable. If your military withdraws without achieving the political objectives of the war, then you lost, plain and simple, with no qualifications.
If Russia leaves Ukraine and it’s still independent and democratic, then Ukraine won the war. All the grousing in the world about political failures doesn’t change that. See: Vietnam.
Its most likely a flight to repatriate Indian students who were stuck in Ukraine.
Pakistan airforce cargo craft were there a couple of days ago as well
Another way to spin this is that because “the public opinion data that we do have shows that over 50% of the Russian population blame the United States for this” the unpopularity is not necessarily reflecting poorly on Putin. Many Russians may hate the war, but blame US and NATO aggression for the war, not Putin.
If that factoid is true, then the pressure on Putin may be far less than is portrayed in Western media and here. It may be wishful thinking that outrage over Russian casualties will create anger towards Putin, when instead it may be creating anger towards NATO, the US, and Ukraine.
Look back towards the divide in the US over the war in Iraq. Many blamed US casualties on the aggression of Bush (and Cheney, Rumsfeld, etc), but many others blamed Saddam Hussein.
My colleague stationed in Serbia says that she is living in a completely different world from her local coworkers. They see the war as Russians coming in to save “Russians” in Ukraine from being ethnically cleansed or genocided by Nazis. The tension between Serbian and Romanian employees (they are part of the same business division so they have a lot of interaction, at least online) is growing by the day.
And these are Serbians who are quite well educated, and have access to lots of news and opinion sources. They still hate NATO and think that they are out to destroy Slavic nationalism.
We’ve truly fallen down the rabbit hole, Toto. In response to Lindsey’s “Brutus” comment…
#SMGDH
I would expect Russian generals to have thought about such a thing and would not be surprised to know such a plan existed. Certain, the current path of conquest along the Ukrainian coastline would provide a land route to do exactly that. I would rate such a thing plausible but not definitely confirmed.
There is also the fact that the breakaway province of Transnistria is between Ukraine and rest of Molodova. If you’ve never hear of Transistria I’m not surprised, it’s tiny, but it’s also very pro-Russia and there is already a Russian presence there.
Here is a video I found helpful in learning the basic about Transistria. Yes, it opens with a commercial, feel free to skip past that to 22 seconds in.
If MTG has says you’re being unreasonable or unhinged or irresponsible then you really are unreasonable, unhinged, and irresponsible.