I do not think it is much of a mystery... and its not what is being presented. Start with what is in Putin's head:
1) The US has been promoting bringing Ukraine into NATO. This is as if the USSR had tried to get Mexico into the Warsaw Pact during the Cold War... pretty huge incitement.
2) In 2014, a democratically elected Russian leaning government was thrown out in a coup, probably CIA instigated. Its called the Maidan "Revolution". The word revolution is there for a reason...
3) The US was screwing with Russia's internal politics long before Putin started screwing with us. There is an ostensibly private organization called the National Endowment for Democracy that is fully funded by Congress. It issues grants to local country NGOs to evolve democracy in the grantees country. Many of these grants have gone to Russia.
Putin is not a happy camper about these things.
He wants to screw up NATO and weaken it. What he needs to do is to get the major NATO players going in different directions.
Putin is inciting the US and the UK to sanction Russia. These sanctions are quite detrimental to Germany and some of the other Western nations that rely on Russia's fossil fuel and other trade. They do not want more sanctions (and have not been following them anyway).
Here is what I think is happening:
1) Putin will not make a broad attack on Ukraine. Russian forces are positioned to freeze the major parts of the Ukraine military in the North and South away from the East.
2) Russia will attempt to separate the Donbas Eastern region of Ukraine from the rest of Ukraine. This region was partially separated in 2014. It has a large ethnic Russian speaking population. Putin put that into motion today by recognizing the two separatist "republics" already set up in that region, followed up by troops to support their independence.
3) Ukraine has the choice of removing its blocking forces in the North or the South to contest this. That would open the way for a blitz into Kyiv and up from the Ukraine. Ukraine will probably not do that... which means ceding the Donbas to Russia.
4) The US ask for heavy sanctions from the EU... which we have already done. If the sanction damage Germany too much they will not comply...breaking NATO. If the sanctions are weak then NATO is perceived as weak.
Either way, Putin gets the Donbas AND NATO is weakened.
The US Administration has been running around like a chicken with its head cut off promoting doomsday scenarios. These are based on "take the bait" troop movements made by Russia.
Joe... Putin is screwing with you. He was never going to wage a big war. Big wars are very very expensive. Smart munitions cost an arm and a leg...Russia does not have big stockpiles. Armor and vehicles get chewed up quickly by infantry with anti-tank weapons. Israel found that out in 1973... the weapons are vastly better today. Russia also does not have the logistics train to maintain an offensive... munitions, spare parts and technical personnel.
The Russian military is a small corp of good troops with modern weapons with a much larger cadre of unproven troops with Cold War weapons. There are a limited number of reliable units. The rest are not really likely to give their lives for the Motherland.
Overall its like Putin is playing chess getting advice from a grandmaster and Biden is playing checkers with Corn Pop advising him. Actually... Corn Pop might be better than some of the people Biden has around him.
1) The US has been promoting bringing Ukraine into NATO. This is as if the USSR had tried to get Mexico into the Warsaw Pact during the Cold War... pretty huge incitement.
2) In 2014, a democratically elected Russian leaning government was thrown out in a coup, probably CIA instigated. Its called the Maidan "Revolution". The word revolution is there for a reason...
3) The US was screwing with Russia's internal politics long before Putin started screwing with us. There is an ostensibly private organization called the National Endowment for Democracy that is fully funded by Congress. It issues grants to local country NGOs to evolve democracy in the grantees country. Many of these grants have gone to Russia.
Putin is not a happy camper about these things.
He wants to screw up NATO and weaken it. What he needs to do is to get the major NATO players going in different directions.
Putin is inciting the US and the UK to sanction Russia. These sanctions are quite detrimental to Germany and some of the other Western nations that rely on Russia's fossil fuel and other trade. They do not want more sanctions (and have not been following them anyway).
Here is what I think is happening:
1) Putin will not make a broad attack on Ukraine. Russian forces are positioned to freeze the major parts of the Ukraine military in the North and South away from the East.
2) Russia will attempt to separate the Donbas Eastern region of Ukraine from the rest of Ukraine. This region was partially separated in 2014. It has a large ethnic Russian speaking population. Putin put that into motion today by recognizing the two separatist "republics" already set up in that region, followed up by troops to support their independence.
3) Ukraine has the choice of removing its blocking forces in the North or the South to contest this. That would open the way for a blitz into Kyiv and up from the Ukraine. Ukraine will probably not do that... which means ceding the Donbas to Russia.
4) The US ask for heavy sanctions from the EU... which we have already done. If the sanction damage Germany too much they will not comply...breaking NATO. If the sanctions are weak then NATO is perceived as weak.
Either way, Putin gets the Donbas AND NATO is weakened.
The US Administration has been running around like a chicken with its head cut off promoting doomsday scenarios. These are based on "take the bait" troop movements made by Russia.
Joe... Putin is screwing with you. He was never going to wage a big war. Big wars are very very expensive. Smart munitions cost an arm and a leg...Russia does not have big stockpiles. Armor and vehicles get chewed up quickly by infantry with anti-tank weapons. Israel found that out in 1973... the weapons are vastly better today. Russia also does not have the logistics train to maintain an offensive... munitions, spare parts and technical personnel.
The Russian military is a small corp of good troops with modern weapons with a much larger cadre of unproven troops with Cold War weapons. There are a limited number of reliable units. The rest are not really likely to give their lives for the Motherland.
Overall its like Putin is playing chess getting advice from a grandmaster and Biden is playing checkers with Corn Pop advising him. Actually... Corn Pop might be better than some of the people Biden has around him.
.
. In end this is all about money for US defense contractors whose ex-US generals sit on their boards with huge salaries and profit from instability around the world.Look how stupid Saudi is buying endless Patriot missiles at $3m a rocket to shoot down cheap drones. War is a racket sadly.
