Free Republic

Why Russia will lose this war? Much of the "realist" discourse is about accepting Putin's victory, cuz it's *guaranteed*. But how do we know it is? I'll argue that analysts 1) overrate Russian army 2) underrate Ukrainian one 3) misunderstand Russian strategy & political goals🧵 Consider a timely paper on Russian army by Bismarck Analysis. It's good & informative. It's correct on its land-based and artillery-centric character. It's also correct that Minister of Defence Serdyukov greatly increased army's efficiency in 2007-2012. But it's still misleading Yes, Minister Serdyukov indeed reformed the army. He increased its efficiency, fought with corrupt and...

Regarding mobilisation, Putin can declare it, indeed. But it will be a risky decision. The USSR maintained a massive infrastructure for the total mobilisation which has been mostly dismantled in post-Soviet Russia. Mobilisation is more likely to trigger political chaos short🧵 Imagine, the government declared a total mobilisation and millions of young males are drafted into the army. What next? Now you need to: 1) test & allocate them (who goes where) 2) train & arm them 3) quarter & feed them 4) place them under the capable officers and NCOs In order to execute 1-4 in case of the...

Since he started consolidating his rule in 1999, Putin has been always manufacturing conflicts artificially. Chechnya, Georgia, Syria. Each time he claimed he needs to defend "security" of Russia, which was difficult to object to. Everyone agrees Russia has the right to be secure The conflict in Ukraine is also artificial, manufactured. It started with the "little green men" taking over Crimea in 2014. It continued with FSB colonel crossing the border to launch the Russian insurgency. It continued with Russia funding and arming irredentists in Ukraine. It culminated with Russia launching the war of conquest in 2022. It's delusionary...

Discussion on the potential deescalation of the war in Ukraine with all security implications it has illustrates the difference between the goal- oriented and the system-oriented thinkingFor example if you want to deescalate the war in Ukraine, what would your best strategy be? Goal-oriented people understand that the only person who could stop the war immediately is Putin himself. Thus they suggest focusing on negotiations with him and persuading him to back offSounds reasonable. And yet, this approach ignores the factor of human will. And goal-oriented people lowkey admit it. For example, when justifying Putin's actions they often point out...