This war was obvious.
Every aspect of it.
It was like a chess game where you know who will make what moves before even the first pawn is moved.
Russia will only take the ethnic Russian areas because after they deal with the “insurgents” we trained and armed, the fight is over, i.e. the local population generally supports the Russian side. If Russia goes into the Ukraine nationalist areas, that would spell trouble (long term resistance and the need for expenditure of resources).
But here is what is perplexing: Ukraine will come out of this with a screwed up economy, thousands dead, millions displaced, fear by future investors, it’s armed forces depleted, infrastructure damaged, a major industrial area and port city missing, and all of this because allegedly it was that important for them to join NATO, “which they will not.” So what did Ukraine get out of this? When they pulled the slot machines handle, they were hoping to see NATO appear in that window. But did they ever consider that there was about a 95% chance of getting something else?
RISK = probability x magnitude.
When Ukraine went down that road the probability of war was high, the magnitude of the damage horrific.
Which brings up the next business concept: ROI.
The ROI for Ukraine was real, NATO membership is a big deal. But in the grand scheme of things, Ukraine already had a special deal worked out with the EU. NATO was already playing with them low key. They were already being armed by us and others... It wasn’t like this was all or nothing or that Ukraine had nothing to lose. They had a good thing going for themselves... How did any of this make sense in terms of Return On Investment?
This was a war which a prudent leader would not have sailed towards. Some storms are unavoidable. But this shit storm is nothing but self inflicted damage. Stupid.
Here is an excellent article (and comments) on the subject.