In many ways, Russia already lost the Winter War of 2022. This isn't to say that Ukraine couldn't also lose, possibly even worse than Russia loses. But even a Russian battlefield victory isn't enough to obscure, let alone reverse, Russia's decline.
The war goes on. Russia intensified bombing Ukrainian civilians while slowly plowing forward at a low rate. Ukraine hits Russia's railroads seemingly part of an effort to isolate Crimea and the Kherson front. And unless I'm seeing what I want, it seems like Ukraine is carrying out some punishing local counter-attacks. Something I've long looked for but haven't seen. Yet Ukraine's casualties are accumulating even if well short of Russian levels of loss.
In analyzing the process by which the Russia-Ukraine war will end, the most critical factor, as I have argued before, is that by not defeating Ukraine, Russia already has lost the war. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s primary interest was in creating and controlling a buffer between Russia and Poland on the eastern edge of NATO. Beyond that, he wanted to recover Russia’s status as a great power, which it had held from the end of World War II to the collapse of the Soviet Union. ...
For Russia, the loss of military significance was accompanied by an inability to become a major economic power. Under the czars and the communists, Russia had always been an economic weakling. Although it had vast and valuable lands, as well as a reasonably educated population, Russia has continued to be what can most kindly be called an underperforming economy.
Invading Ukraine didn't solve the problem of Russia's military and economic weakness. It enhanced the weakness and Putin lost his chance for a partial victory through American-sponsored diplomacy:
Putin gambled on the chance he could break Ukraine in one last, ruthless effort. Instead, the U.S. has pulled close to NATO and is sending weapons to Ukraine in concert with Germany, which has also deployed tanks closer to Russia’s border. The mystery is whether Putin can politically survive his ongoing miscalculations.
The result has been a dual-economy: while military expenditures create a wartime boom, the civilian economy has been battered[.]
Putin has lost far too much to settle for anything less that victory on the terms he first set. But a successor unencumbered by the heavy losses Russia has endured on Putin's orders could make that deal to "save" Russia by the simple expedient of refusing to keep digging in the "special military operation" hole they find themselves in.
Is Putin creating that successor? Hell, the justification writes itself.
I wasn't kidding when I said that the "post-Cold War" period between the Cold War and the new Era of Great Power Competition should be known as the Russian Decline Era.
#WhyRussiaCan'tHaveNiceThings
UPDATE (Friday): Is Russia considering a Dnipro River crossing operation at Kherson?
UPDATE (Saturday): Where will North Korea's second expeditionary force of 30,000 be sent to fight? A river crossing operation seems like a good target for completely expendable troops to carve a bridgehead for Russians to follow, no? An offensive at Kherson would also compel Ukraine to reinforce the front that no doubt is considered a relatively quiet sector requiring fewer troops because of the river.
NOTE: ISW updates continue here. Also, I put war-related links and commentary in the Weekend Data Dump.
NOTE: You may also read my posts on Substack, at The Dignified Rant: Evolved.
