Putin threatens war when he perceives weakness. Oil sales are down even to India and PRC As he just announced the capture of Pokrovsk, recently announced in August before Alaska summit, the weaker Putin becomes the more obdurate he becomes. Because his regime would collapse without war in Ukraine.
It also serves his larger goal of separation of US from NATO.
Obviously Putin wants more than Dombass wasteland. He will never accept Ukraine as a sovereign state with defensible borders and meaningful security guarantees.Just another territory to be acquired for the current incarnation of Peter I and Catherine
Putin actually Stated today that Europe better watch out. He suggested that his war was being conducted in a restrained moderate way and that could change. Tell that to someone who survived Buccha Irpin,Izium, Mariupol in 22
He is another version of Hitler. Just a kinder more subtle Gestapo.
Until he is stopped and pushed back or economy collapses he will keep fighting to the last Ukrainian. In fact he actually said that
https://youtu.be/GPbHgxMFtWQ?si=pqFZ3JPYID2nXxgb
https://youtu.be/QTVOnU6qkh8?si=kxFepXBz9_dVNMEn
Why do you think you're right?
Last forecast 2025
There will not be a peace agreement with Russia. This year or almost certainly next year. Why because the US and NATO / EU hereafter NEU representing UK and the major European components of NATO, UK, France, Germany,Poland have not utilized the hard and soft power at their disposal to stop Putin.
Yet the West collectively instigated the latent neo Stalinism of the Putin regime. They failed to recognize that Putin an ex KGB Lt. Colonel stationed in East Germany would react like Stalin and his Soviet Successors did after WWII. By any means necessary the Soviet Leadership would invade or instigate revolt in any lands bordering the Soviet Union. and they would ensure only friendly or Finlandized regimes controlled all nations on Russias borders.
Russia lost at least 25 million people in WWII. The goal, simply put was never again
Hungary in 1956, Czechoslovakia in , 1948; and 1968, instigate rebellions in Poland in 1956 and 1982, invade Afghanistan in 1979, Korea in 1950. As late as 90 91 even Gorbachev killed hundreds of people in Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia.
Yet, the action of NATO in adding Estonia Latvia and Lithuania and Poland to NATO in 2002 lit a fire under the neo Soviet state. Because that was what Russia with Putin and his FSB head Nikolai Patrushev were neo Soviets. Except this regime was not moored in Communist ideology. It was like a mafia gang that seized the commanding heights of power in Russia and rather than being satisfied with the dachas and Mercedes limousines and foreign vacations and privileged shopping at GUM that motivated the Soviet nomenklatura, they wanted.more...
In 2014 immediately after the Sochi Olympics, Putin seized Crimea and instigated the proxy invasion of Dombass.
Just like the seizure of Abkhazia and South Ossetia which left Russian forces 20 miles from Tbilisi in 2008
Why.? The Sashkavilli regime in Tbilsi was moving toward the EU and NATO. Following the Rose Revolution in 2003, the US built an enormous embassy in Tbilisi and deployed the CIA and it's vast network of non profits in Georgia. Georgia entered association agreements with NATO and EU under the Saashkivili regime and in 2008 Russia invaded. That regime fell and now Georgia is the functional equivalent of Belarus.
and Putin warned us in 2007 just before invasion of Georgia.
I think it is obvious that NATO expansion does not have any relation with the modernisation of the Alliance itself or with ensuring security in Europe. On the contrary, it represents a serious provocation that reduces the level of mutual trust. And we have the right to ask: against whom is this expansion intended? And what happened to the assurances our western partners made after the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact? Where are those declarations today? No one even remembers them. But I will allow myself to remind this audience what was said. I would like to quote the speech of NATO General Secretary Mr Woerner in Brussels on 17 May 1990. He said at the time that: “the fact that we are ready not to place a NATO army outside of German territory gives the Soviet Union a firm security
Putin speech Feb 10 2007 MSC http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/transcripts/24034
Then the Euromaidan revolution in Kiev.November 21 2013 to Feb. 22 2014
https://kyivindependent.com/euro-maidan-revolution/
What did Putin do? He immediately invaded Crimea on Feb 27 2014. As soon as his proxy Yanuivich was out he was in Sebastopol.
Next he instigated a proxy war in the Dombass starting in 2015.
After agreement to the end of that rebellion in the Minsk agreement in 2017 and 2018 he invaded Ukraine and attempted to seize Ukraine in toto on Feb. 24 2022.
So when Lavrov and Putin warn that there can be no peace deal without the root cause of the problem being solved, they mean they want a new security architecture for Europe. They want US and NATO troops out of the Balts and friendly neutral governments there. and they want Ukraine by any means necessary.
That's why he mobilized troops on the Ukrainian border throughout 2021 and negotiations were held between Blinken and Lavrov. That was the Russian ask.
But Putin miscalculated. He pushed Finland and Sweden into NATO made the Baltic, the critical artery through which 80 percent of Russian oil and gas flows, a NATO lake. Putin miscalculated on the amount of assistance that US and NEU would provide Ukraine.
Why did Putin miscalculate?He's far more intelligent than Biden or Trump or a Merkel or Starmer but probably became unhinged in his bunker after COVID.
He miscalculated because after every act of aggression by Putin, the US and NEU did absolutely nothing. Or actively collaborated with him. Never imposed any meaningful sanctions. Never helped Ukraine in any meaningful way.
After he invaded Crimea and started his proxy war in Dombass, Obama vetoed the McCain Graham bill to provide 250 million in lethal anti tank weapons to Ukraine. Germany would not give Ukraine any military aid just blankets and helmets. And in 2015, The Germans agreed to build Nordstream II and made itself and EU entirely dependent on Russian hydrocarbons. And Biden failed to send any meaningful aid to Ukraine until after the 22 invasion. It was the 250 million that Trump sent Ukraine in javelins after Impeachment I and the NLAWs and other munitions Boris Johnson sent Ukraine after 2019 that saved Ukraine. Biden was worse than useless. He talked like Churchill in Warsaw in 22 but only gave Ukraine enough to survive not enough to win. Biden a man of extremely limited intelligence called out Putin as a war criminal and like Hitler in Warsaw and then after sounding like Churchill acted like Neville Chamberlain. Then in late 2022 he lost control of Congress. He needed to be urgent. He was weak and Ukraines chance to regain much of it's territory was lost by mid 23.
Everyone though Ukraine would be defeated in 6 weeks. Everyone was wrong. The brave determination of the Ukrainian people is truly the only thing that saved Ukraine. Unlike other US allies they have 800,000 men in the field and fight like hell. Ukraine renovated and created a vibrant military industrial base and pioneered Drone warfare while NEU languished.
Now deprived of those cheap hydrocarbons Germany has been in a technical industrial recession for 3 years. The AFD is growing in force.LePen and her protege will come to power in 18 months, and France is stagnating as is UK. and in 3 years the Reform Party will come to power in UK. Putin has backed all 3. Meanwhile Trump is Trump. until 2028.
Resolutely irresolute the NEU stumbles on
Putin thinks he's winning and with gold over 4000 per ounce. he thinks he can keep the war going until 2028 doing business deals with Trump cronies.
And he may be right because after 2008, after 2014, and after 2022 the US and NEU self deter based upon his nuclear threats which he now has increased to threats of a general war with NEU and he will fight to the last dead Ukrainian.
There are 4 things the NEU can do to end this war within 2 years on favorable terms to Ukraine without major escalation. Any competent military planner could end the war within 90 days with a soft blockade of Baltic With existing resources. Except 20 percent of our fleet and 15,000 marines are off the shore of Venezuela getting ready for Bay of Pigs II under the Monroe doctrine.. That force should be just north of Scotland.
But Trump and NEU cannot do anything and chances are won't do anything and Putin will win. Next the Balts in 2028 or 2029
sad.....Trump is not making America Great. He is making America like 1928 again. Mark my word with his approval rating in Gallup at minus 22, he will be the least popular President since Herbert Hoover. One whose economic and security policies make depression and WWII more likely.But in his mind he has ended 8 wars and started a new Golden Age for America. I hope he is right. Logic and history and economics indicate he is deluded. America today is in the greatest danger it's been in since December 7, 1941.
We could be the arsenal of democracy and the unquestionable leader of the Free World and greatest economic and military power in the world for another 30 years.
Saving Ukraine and Taiwan and our alliance system in Europe and the Pacific is the essential pre requisite.
Why might you be wrong?
A miracle according to Moscow Komsolets.