I wish I was as "optimistic" as you. In the end what matters is what narratives are spin and which are believable and to whom.
If spending a lot of time on internet has taught me something is that people believe what they want, not what the evidence points to.
The question I would have is how long will it take for the west to forget ? (My last piece btw talks exactly about this from a more meta perspective ...).
Ukraine has not won homogeneously popular support accross the west. The disinformation from the Kremlin and its puppets sitting comfortly in Europe has played a significant role in ensuring people focus on Ukraine's corruption problems (which nobody denied) rather than Russian aggression and Hybrid Warfare tactics.
How long will people remember what happened and more essentially what will they remember as the narrative of "Truth" ? Many still don't believe that Russia is an aggressor, not only Russia found apologists, but they are now also agressively using Orthodoxy (you know how this matter is dear to me) as honey to attract western disenfranchised men (and a lot of women too btw ... I was rather surprised).
The problem I see is that a lot of politicians in Europe are ready to open a door to cooperation with Russia again and forget this episode of nasty history. Whether we should find cooperative threads with states like Russia is a cornerstone in International Relations and how this echoes into the future.
And "common" people have already forgotten this episode ( some of them even have forgotten there is a war still ongoing) and focus on the football cup, summer holidays and the fact that gas costs 50 cents more.
I want to take a break here and thank you for the work you do on keeping the truth out there, because it is essential and you play an important role in what I discuss in my last piece which is to keep memory alive.
When it comes to the future ... We are facing a very hard equation ...
Not to sound like a broken record, looking back at 1914-1918, the isolation of Germany and the drastic measures that were taken in Versailles did not yield the expected result but rather the opposite.
In my perspective which is rooted in never forgetting while looking ahead ... We need to focus on Deterrence by Denial against enemies (especially by becoming less sensitive to the lower intensity attacks which are typically of the order of disinformation and cultural campaigns) of the west while keeping a door open for interaction (which can be also sanctions btw, but there needs to be a possible additional interaction), because the end of interaction is in general leading to much more dramatic outcomes.
This is not a naïve take, it is rooted in strength, we (the west) need the capacity to impose violence if pushed to, but we also need to look at the future with the confidence of our position.
I think People will forget and even if it becomes just a new region to China, Russia will remain an agressive neighbour.
Whatever happens with Russia, we needs the tools of dissuasion accross the full spectrum of threats as they remain our main direct territorial threat.
Question is how do we do all that when the U.S. Stabs us repeatedly in the back and China pokes in the Eye from the distance at the same time.
The objectives lens is the right way to read this war, and you use it well. Two honest additions, though. First, "Russia failed" shouldn't obscure what it cost Ukraine: cities erased, a generation killed or scattered, millions gone, a demographic hole that will shape the country for decades. Survival comes deeply wounded. Second, one Russian aim doesn't fit the "all failed" scorecard—breaking Western hegemony and pushing a multipolar world. There Moscow can claim partial success: much of the Global South didn't isolate it, sanctions leaked, the Russia–China axis hardened. Grim, costly progress, bought with near-vassalage to Beijing—but not nothing.
Oh, by no means am I trying to downplay the cost here. In another article, I wrote about Slavic folklore and how much I appreciate the Western storytelling tradition, where good ultimately triumphs and the hero earns a happy ending. In Slavic folklore, however, evil often prevails, and even when the hero wins, the victory comes at a terrible price. The dragon destroys his village, kills his wife, and devours his children. As children listening to these stories, we often found ourselves wondering whether the victory was worth the sacrifice. So I sometimes joke - albeit darkly - that we've been preparing for this our entire lives.
The cost is brutal, but it is the price of severing ties with the "Russian world" once and for all. That has often been the reality in Eastern Europe. We have rarely enjoyed the luxury of peaceful, civilized neighbors; historically, the bill has been paid in blood and destruction. There is little value in pretending otherwise. It is simply the reality we inherited.
As for China, its support for Russia's war effort serves one strategic purpose: weakening the West by forcing it to devote enormous resources to supporting Ukraine. Beijing has no particular affection for Russia. Its long-term interests lie elsewhere, including expanding its influence over Russia's vast resource-rich territories without firing a shot or formally annexing them. As Shimon Peres once reportedly told Putin: "When the snow in Siberia melts, the first thing you will see there are Chinese. Because there are plenty of Chinese in the East, and not many Russians."
While I have always been something of a hawk on China, I will give Beijing this much: Xi Jinping is not representative of the Chinese people in quite the same way that Putin reflects broad mentality within Russian society. Moreover, China's approach to pursuing power is generally more pragmatic and less overtly destructive. Because of that, we find ourselves in a new Cold War rather than a kinetic Third World War.
In that sense, we may have been fortunate that China, rather than Russia, emerged as the dominant power of the East. Had Russia possessed China's economic weight and geopolitical influence, it is not only Ukraine that would be burning today, but much of Europe as well.
The nuclear issue is perhaps the most interesting one: I’ve heard even quite intelligent people make the argument that it is impossible for Russia to lose because they have nuclear weapons. To me, that is an extremely reductionist argument: Russia using nuclear weapons, even small, tactical ones, is Russia signing its own death warrant - and Putin and the siloviki know that very well. The Western reaction will be strong (or at least, Europe’s reaction will be - not sure about the orange one in the White House) but much more importantly, China will not be amused, at all. I know Putin has, in the past, said that, in effect, a diminished Russia is not worth keeping and therefore he will use nukes if Russia’s sovereignty is at stake, but I chalk that up as strategic bluster designed to intimidate. And that has worked remarkably well…
Oh, very much true - China has very strong opinions regarding the usage of nuclear weapons (even if it’s just tactical), and has voiced them to russia. Given that russia cannot exist without China, they have no other option than to comply.
China, for all their faults, are pragmatists. And unlike russia, Xi Jinping is not representative of the Chinese, whereas Putin is representative of the Russian mentality. China doesn’t want a global, kinetic war - God forbid the usage of nuclear weapons - because this is a net destroyer of wealth. Russia doesn’t care about it.
It’s about survival of a nation. We are used to it, our entire folklore is based on that. The Disneyfied version of “victory” is a Western fantasy domain, not ours.
I'm criticizing the Russian effort as a disaster. Ukraine has done extraordinarily well. It would be hard to see me commenting on a story about Russia's war effort being directed at Ukraine, particularly if you check my other comments. You'd be very hard to find anything that could be considered pro Russian...
I live in the US. A few days into this full-scale invasion, I expected Ukraine to win, and then the West to forgive russia and even come to the aid of its miserable populace, yet again. You have written me the perfectly phrased set of arguments that I can use against this, when the time comes.
Again an incredible article. Especially the focus on the war objectives. I and many people far smarter than me have been hammering on this point for years now but this is a perfect, up-to-date description.
I also enjoy the point about mladic, may he rot in hell, because he very much shows that these institutions arent pointless and arent toothless. They are just not as quick as many want them to be. And I agree with that.
Right now, it’s headed for the North Korean scenario - isolation and mass poverty. The next president is likely going to be a veteran from the war, so there’s virtually zero chance of them getting pacified.
Most likely, they will become a new North Korea and a Chinese vassalage. Their demographics are also dismal, and while Moscow was burning, Russian social media was filled with gleeful Russians from the rest of the country being happy about it. The Moscowites are loathed all the way through Siberia.
Nothing good is on the cards for them, even if they don’t outright collapse.
I wish I was as "optimistic" as you. In the end what matters is what narratives are spin and which are believable and to whom.
If spending a lot of time on internet has taught me something is that people believe what they want, not what the evidence points to.
The question I would have is how long will it take for the west to forget ? (My last piece btw talks exactly about this from a more meta perspective ...).
Ukraine has not won homogeneously popular support accross the west. The disinformation from the Kremlin and its puppets sitting comfortly in Europe has played a significant role in ensuring people focus on Ukraine's corruption problems (which nobody denied) rather than Russian aggression and Hybrid Warfare tactics.
How long will people remember what happened and more essentially what will they remember as the narrative of "Truth" ? Many still don't believe that Russia is an aggressor, not only Russia found apologists, but they are now also agressively using Orthodoxy (you know how this matter is dear to me) as honey to attract western disenfranchised men (and a lot of women too btw ... I was rather surprised).
The problem I see is that a lot of politicians in Europe are ready to open a door to cooperation with Russia again and forget this episode of nasty history. Whether we should find cooperative threads with states like Russia is a cornerstone in International Relations and how this echoes into the future.
And "common" people have already forgotten this episode ( some of them even have forgotten there is a war still ongoing) and focus on the football cup, summer holidays and the fact that gas costs 50 cents more.
I want to take a break here and thank you for the work you do on keeping the truth out there, because it is essential and you play an important role in what I discuss in my last piece which is to keep memory alive.
When it comes to the future ... We are facing a very hard equation ...
Not to sound like a broken record, looking back at 1914-1918, the isolation of Germany and the drastic measures that were taken in Versailles did not yield the expected result but rather the opposite.
In my perspective which is rooted in never forgetting while looking ahead ... We need to focus on Deterrence by Denial against enemies (especially by becoming less sensitive to the lower intensity attacks which are typically of the order of disinformation and cultural campaigns) of the west while keeping a door open for interaction (which can be also sanctions btw, but there needs to be a possible additional interaction), because the end of interaction is in general leading to much more dramatic outcomes.
This is not a naïve take, it is rooted in strength, we (the west) need the capacity to impose violence if pushed to, but we also need to look at the future with the confidence of our position.
I think People will forget and even if it becomes just a new region to China, Russia will remain an agressive neighbour.
Whatever happens with Russia, we needs the tools of dissuasion accross the full spectrum of threats as they remain our main direct territorial threat.
Question is how do we do all that when the U.S. Stabs us repeatedly in the back and China pokes in the Eye from the distance at the same time.
The objectives lens is the right way to read this war, and you use it well. Two honest additions, though. First, "Russia failed" shouldn't obscure what it cost Ukraine: cities erased, a generation killed or scattered, millions gone, a demographic hole that will shape the country for decades. Survival comes deeply wounded. Second, one Russian aim doesn't fit the "all failed" scorecard—breaking Western hegemony and pushing a multipolar world. There Moscow can claim partial success: much of the Global South didn't isolate it, sanctions leaked, the Russia–China axis hardened. Grim, costly progress, bought with near-vassalage to Beijing—but not nothing.
Oh, by no means am I trying to downplay the cost here. In another article, I wrote about Slavic folklore and how much I appreciate the Western storytelling tradition, where good ultimately triumphs and the hero earns a happy ending. In Slavic folklore, however, evil often prevails, and even when the hero wins, the victory comes at a terrible price. The dragon destroys his village, kills his wife, and devours his children. As children listening to these stories, we often found ourselves wondering whether the victory was worth the sacrifice. So I sometimes joke - albeit darkly - that we've been preparing for this our entire lives.
The cost is brutal, but it is the price of severing ties with the "Russian world" once and for all. That has often been the reality in Eastern Europe. We have rarely enjoyed the luxury of peaceful, civilized neighbors; historically, the bill has been paid in blood and destruction. There is little value in pretending otherwise. It is simply the reality we inherited.
As for China, its support for Russia's war effort serves one strategic purpose: weakening the West by forcing it to devote enormous resources to supporting Ukraine. Beijing has no particular affection for Russia. Its long-term interests lie elsewhere, including expanding its influence over Russia's vast resource-rich territories without firing a shot or formally annexing them. As Shimon Peres once reportedly told Putin: "When the snow in Siberia melts, the first thing you will see there are Chinese. Because there are plenty of Chinese in the East, and not many Russians."
While I have always been something of a hawk on China, I will give Beijing this much: Xi Jinping is not representative of the Chinese people in quite the same way that Putin reflects broad mentality within Russian society. Moreover, China's approach to pursuing power is generally more pragmatic and less overtly destructive. Because of that, we find ourselves in a new Cold War rather than a kinetic Third World War.
In that sense, we may have been fortunate that China, rather than Russia, emerged as the dominant power of the East. Had Russia possessed China's economic weight and geopolitical influence, it is not only Ukraine that would be burning today, but much of Europe as well.
The nuclear issue is perhaps the most interesting one: I’ve heard even quite intelligent people make the argument that it is impossible for Russia to lose because they have nuclear weapons. To me, that is an extremely reductionist argument: Russia using nuclear weapons, even small, tactical ones, is Russia signing its own death warrant - and Putin and the siloviki know that very well. The Western reaction will be strong (or at least, Europe’s reaction will be - not sure about the orange one in the White House) but much more importantly, China will not be amused, at all. I know Putin has, in the past, said that, in effect, a diminished Russia is not worth keeping and therefore he will use nukes if Russia’s sovereignty is at stake, but I chalk that up as strategic bluster designed to intimidate. And that has worked remarkably well…
Thank you for this insightful piece!
Oh, very much true - China has very strong opinions regarding the usage of nuclear weapons (even if it’s just tactical), and has voiced them to russia. Given that russia cannot exist without China, they have no other option than to comply.
China, for all their faults, are pragmatists. And unlike russia, Xi Jinping is not representative of the Chinese, whereas Putin is representative of the Russian mentality. China doesn’t want a global, kinetic war - God forbid the usage of nuclear weapons - because this is a net destroyer of wealth. Russia doesn’t care about it.
A beautiful piece of heroic writing.
Slava Ukraini
Putin Derangement Syndrome.
Brilliant writing. Agree 💯.
It's beyond Pyrrhic and not even a victory...
It’s about survival of a nation. We are used to it, our entire folklore is based on that. The Disneyfied version of “victory” is a Western fantasy domain, not ours.
I'm criticizing the Russian effort as a disaster. Ukraine has done extraordinarily well. It would be hard to see me commenting on a story about Russia's war effort being directed at Ukraine, particularly if you check my other comments. You'd be very hard to find anything that could be considered pro Russian...
I live in the US. A few days into this full-scale invasion, I expected Ukraine to win, and then the West to forgive russia and even come to the aid of its miserable populace, yet again. You have written me the perfectly phrased set of arguments that I can use against this, when the time comes.
The russia being a gas station quote originates from McCain. I miss him!
Again an incredible article. Especially the focus on the war objectives. I and many people far smarter than me have been hammering on this point for years now but this is a perfect, up-to-date description.
I also enjoy the point about mladic, may he rot in hell, because he very much shows that these institutions arent pointless and arent toothless. They are just not as quick as many want them to be. And I agree with that.
In that sense, best wishes and have a great day.
Excellent - 🌺🇺🇦⚔️
Will Russia collapse post-Putin?
I don’t know.
Right now, it’s headed for the North Korean scenario - isolation and mass poverty. The next president is likely going to be a veteran from the war, so there’s virtually zero chance of them getting pacified.
Most likely, they will become a new North Korea and a Chinese vassalage. Their demographics are also dismal, and while Moscow was burning, Russian social media was filled with gleeful Russians from the rest of the country being happy about it. The Moscowites are loathed all the way through Siberia.
Nothing good is on the cards for them, even if they don’t outright collapse.