This war is one that Russia cannot win in any meaningful sense. Putin's foreign military successes around the world after 2008 were all achieved by using small units of elite forces, mercenaries and local militia groups alongside Russian air power. This gave Moscow considerable leverage at low cost during interventions in Georgia, Nagorno-Karabakh, Syria, Libya, Mali and twice in Ukraine during 2014, first in illegally annexing Crimea and then in creating self-declared Russian statelets in Luhansk and Donetsk. In every case, Russia moved swiftly and ruthlessly in ways the western world was unable to counter except through graduated sanctions regimes...
