Just curious, if Russia is not a threat to anyone, and NATO has been on the border of Russia for years and never attacked, why does taking Ukraine or parts of Ukraine help Russia
Russia was trading freely with the west, west was investing in Russia, much of that is gone now along with large portions of Russian military equipment and soviet legacy equipment along with that little thing of 10s of thousands killed and wounded
In a war with NATO the advantages Russia has will be minimal.
They succeed now because of artillery and air power advantages( degraded a bit over the last few days), and manpower. A war with NATO would eliminate air annd artillery advantage pretty quick, and industrial targets that Russia can’t protect against drones now would likely be hit as well.
How is a country in 2021 (thanks to us they now are building up) with:
—55% of our ground forces.
—47% of our air forces.
—43% of our naval forces.
—44% of our population.
—40% of the number of men reaching military age.
—Less industry.
—Less high tech.
—1/10 our defense budget.
—1/3 the size of our Intel Community.
—Heavily reliant on conscription. Loss of military institutional knowledge (high turn over) and generally lower morale in a conflict.
—1/10 our GDP, 1/5 our PPP.
—Less allies.
—Weaker allies. Belarus their most powerful ally has less military capability than the Netherlands.
Going to be this huge threat that conquers the West?
Make up your mind. Either Russia is this huge threat about to roll through the Fulda gap tomorrow, or they are a nation that is struggling to take a part of Ukraine.
The real reason why we even did our gamble with Ukraine and NATO is because we figure Russia is so weak as a conventional force, that after we spent the last 7 years building up Ukraine's military, the Russians will acquiesce to our will without a fight.
The Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact are no more. This military threat that once existed is only today re-emerging on a much smaller scale because of a self fulfilling prophesy. Yes, we have (((succeeded))) at creating a sworn enemy.