1. Making it fiscally impossible for Russia to prosecute a war. 2. Demonstrating clearly to Putin that he’s far more dependent on the graces of the West than his rhetoric attempts to suggest. 3. Showing China what it will face if it tries something similar with Taiwan.
My opinion, which means nothing, is that Biden and Blinken played this as masterfully as they could with the hand dealt to them by the previous administrations. Personally, I don't think Putin has any desire to see NATO more involved. If he did I think we would have seen more false flags and sabre rattling than we've seen to this point. I don't see the bait. He simply miscalculated our response and China did too. Combine that with an underwhelming military performance and underestimating Ukrainian resistance, and he's got a shit-tasting stew going. So now he has two options: tuck tail and make the best deal with Ukraine that he can, or press on, capture his objectives to tremendous loss of life, and watch his economy collapse. It's a one way ratchet to isolation, either way. If I had to gamble, I don't think he would use nukes should NATO become a more active participant, but I don't want to gamble. The downside doesn't call for it.
So these sanctions are going to give rise to a Hitler type figure? In this case the Hitler type figure is already the head of state.
That analogy only makes sense if we were to continue imposing heavy, unreasonable sanctions on Russia after Putin was gone.
frankly I don’t think the US wants to realign that position. US is allies with Saudi Arabia for one reason and Iran can’t offer what they do.
Don't think there’s anything indirect about it; a restless and angry Russian population knows there’s one guy responsible for this and he’s their “leader”. It puts a tremendous amount of domestic pressure on Putin.
You asked for one single unintended consequence. I gave one. The intention is to stop aggression. The unintended is that it becomes so crippling that even after complete it provides an avenue for someone even worse coming into power.
ok but this is like if you give a mouse a cookie. You could just do this the other way and say if we don’t do sanctions Russia ends up like germany after WW1
There is no good play with nukes on the table, otherwise we’d just go wipe the floor with these clowns
Also Germany is about to become a superpower military again, I don’t think that the Russians wanted that at all
i don’t think that’s happening. Think they are just going to have a functioning military again. Between having to give up their turn in line to lead nato forces, being looked at as head of EU, and this invasion, I think they were truly caught with their pants down
this is the amount they just committed to military spending if I typed the numbers out correctly $72,000,000,000
The German GDP is 3.8 trillion- they committed to going back to 2% + spend it’s a big number, the spending bill they passed or are passing is a rapid revitalization bill. The Germans woke up
If I was Finland or Taiwan I’d see what is going on and invest all my money in AA systems, fighter jets, and shoulder mounted anti tank weapons
We should be much more worried about Taiwan. The Finns have a Tier I military that could would stop Russia in its tracks. They also harbor historical grievances deep down around the land that Stalin stole from them along the border. It would never come out on superficial visits to Finland, but if you live there and do a sauna or two with them, after the 3rd beer the grievances will arise. They are just waiting for Putin to go into Estonia. Before Biden could get off the phone with NATO, I’d like to believe that the Finns would be mobilizing in full force.
Putin’s attempt to recreate the Soviet empire recreated the Soviet empire’s arch-nemesis. Talk about your all time backfires.
Where they going to fly - China, Iran, North Korea, Syria, Pakistan? Make their lives miserable until someone puts a bullet in Putin's head.