i wonder how many NATO soldiers speak Ukrainian? how many can pass as Ukrainian? put a few thousand of them in uniform and turn them loose on the russians around lysychansk and sievierodonetsk...
or we could just make the grown up decision and just go stomp russia's guts out of it's lying asshole...but i guess it's a better idea to let as many Ukrainians die as possible, while allowing the russians to do as much damage as possible, before it all grinds to a halt because all the young men capable of waging war will be dead, for a bastard's dreams of empire...
I got where you’re coming from…this may not be THE point, but it’s mine, I guess.
Putin put essentially all of Europe and NA on notice with his nuclear saber-rattling: even though *he* can speak directly of being at war with NATO and Europe and “the west” & dispose his forces accordingly, for the west to actually step in “would result” in the nuclear nightmares that have stripped sleep from generations of innocents in their beds all coming true. If everything went off perfectly for Poutine, it would be the worst blow to civilization in recorded memory…and even if he were so ‘fortunate’, the western response would erase Russia’s cities.
That’s a fine fucking line to walk. There’s always the chance that Pippi could chicken out - that he’d realize that setting the northern hemisphere on fire was not something to be remembered for - Pyrrhus, the general who destroyed himself, his army and his people to spite his “foes”. We can’t count on that, tho; this may seem like some grand strategic move from the ‘good old days’…and since his entire plan was poorly-conceived, it depends almost entirely on NATO and Europe being willing to let him get away with this land grab - just like the USSR did with the eastern-European nations that became the Iron Curtain. The same pattern: minority calls for “Russian protection”, followed by Russian troops, a quick seizure of the Capita, installation of a ‘pro-Russian interim government’, a ‘wildly-popular’ referendum ginned up by the new regime in support of joining Russia, who then “joined” them, was used in Syria, in Crimea, and in the Donbas, now in the “New Peoples Republics of Russians in Ukraine”)…the same play worked in Belarus fairly recently, and currently active in Moldava/Transnitsia and in Kaliningrad/Lithuania.
Europe is under no illusion here: Puti and Russian imperialism must be stopped, now, or Russia will continue nibbling away at its neighbors incessantly - a constant source of strife, destabilization, & encroachment that will never end on its own, it can *only* be stopped. THE ONLY THING that has kept NATO out of the Ukraine action *this* much is wanting to avoid daring the paranoid bully of the kremLin to push the button. The thing is, Putin set it up wrong (for him). By waving that flag, he made sure Europe knew he is a clear and present danger to the safety and security of the continent: he can’t just send up a warning nuke. ANY nuclear action by Russia or Russian client-states would be met by a complete retaliatory response: once that candle is lit, it’s too late to blow it out.
The only thing conceivably worse would be a world completely dominated by the pervasive fear of annihilation, in which the successful extortionists get to do pretty much whatever they want.
So as I see it, Putin is committed to his own destruction and plans to take Russia down with him; the real question is what & where he takes down as collateral damage.
I find myself almost hoping for some actionable misstep on Russia’s part - some direct, unequivocal encroachment of NATO territorial sovereignty, or some fatal skirmish between Russian & NATO troops where Russia is *CLEARLY* out-of-bounds; the right opportunity & the right response could end Putin’s Ukrainian Vacation in days. *Almost* hoping.