Originally Posted by
WB627
I called this on day one of the invasion, Putin was never going to win. The west could not afford to let him on all sorts of levels. Think about it.
The West, well Boris and Biden, the Poles, the Dutch and the Czechs and a few others, having decided that they could not let Ukraine lose, they had two choices, mobilise and march into Ukraine with all guns blazing, risking nuclear war with the Ruskies, or fight a proxy war, supply the Ukrainians with whatever it takes and let them fight the war for. you hoping the Ruskies would not go nuclear.
I did think at one point it would go nuclear, it still might and at another point that the west had to step in with troops to stop those murdering, raping, looting Russian bastards from harming any more civilians, but the supply of "whatever it takes" weapons seems to have stabilised the situation.
Zelenski is probably the best war leader since Churchill and Ukraine will kick the Russians out of their country. Putin will be finished, it is just a matter of time.
The Russians are going to pay for the reconstruction of Ukraine and a lot more in reparations. Russia will be bankrupt financially and morally for the next millennium, if not forever.
Slava Ukraini
Edited to add... Do you seriously think we would have let the Nazis march up Whitehall in 1940 and take over? The Ukrainians are as determined as we were to prevent an invader taking over.
Very much agree that Zelensky is a top notch war leader, running circles around Putin, who seems to have decided that his best option was to appear the remote autocrat, not a winning stance imho when the plan goes pear shaped.
That said, Zelensky has the huge advantage of guaranteed supply of money and material, the US and NATO are picking up that tab. His job is to keep the people engaged, which he is doing superbly. The Russian press mocks him as a comedian, but he has his finger on the pulse much better than Putin's press crew. What is not clear is what price in blood Ukraine is paying, whether they are able to sustain the losses going forward.
There is a fine book 'The Audit of War' by
, which lays out in some detail the way that the war laid bare the shortcomings of the pre WW2 British economy. Imho, Putin's Russia is experiencing a similar shock, a wire brush audit of the state of Russia's economy now that the western technical inputs are withdrawn.
What is surprising is that the regime in Russia does not appear to be taking this seriously. Russia is losing the war and the leadership response is not mobilization, but to recruit convicts from the prisons. This is a continuation of the penny pinching technique that has been the bane of Russia's Ukraine invasion from day 1, when they attacked a 200,000 strong armed force with about 130,000. The concern is of course that the leadership is blind to the actual state of affairs and will throw in their nuclear forces to force a conclusion once they realize the true state of affairs.