"the war in Ukraine was originally conceived.. a “Bunga war” - frivolous, gratuitous, neither a serious act of great power politics, nor a dramatic effort to restart history."
Dr. Putin explained, clearly and in depth, why he launched the punitive expedition into Ukraine. Unlike the dozen wars the West have launched lately, his reasoning and and justification are impeccable: it is a matter of Russia's life or death. Here are some memory-jogs:
In the summer of 1997, Joe Biden put out a statement explicitly saying that NATO expansion in the Baltic regions would rightly provoke Russia to take military actions. Biden even suggested that NATO would be responsible for creating a “vigorous and hostile” Russian response. Biden said: “I think the one place where the greatest consternation would be caused in the short-term for admission [to NATO], having nothing to do with the merit and preparedness of the country to come in, would be to admit Baltic states now in terms of NATO-Russian, US-Russian relations. If there was ever anything that was going to tip the balance, were it to be tipped, in terms of a vigorous and hostile reaction in Russia, I don’t mean military, it would be that.” https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/video-of-joe-biden-warning-of-russian-hostility-if-nato-expands-resurfaces/ar-AAUMVjI
In 2007, in Munich, Dr. Putin told a Western audience, “It turns out that NATO has put its frontline forces on our borders, and we continue to strictly fulfil the treaty obligations and do not react to these actions at all. I think it is obvious that NATO expansion does not have any relation with the modernization of the Alliance itself, or with ensuring security in Europe. On the contrary, it represents a serious provocation that reduces the level of mutual trust. And we have the right to ask: against whom is this expansion intended? And what happened to the assurances our western partners made after the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact? Where are those declarations today? No one even remembers them.”
Putin added, “But I will allow myself to remind this audience what was said. I would like to quote the speech of NATO General Secretary Mr Woerner in Brussels on 17 May 1990. He said at the time that: “the fact that we are ready not to place a NATO army outside of German territory gives the Soviet Union a firm security guarantee”. Where are these guarantees?” That was 15 years ago.
The referendums conducted by the two self-proclaimed Republics of Donetsk and Lugansk in May 2014, were not referendums of “independence” (независимость), as some unscrupulous journalists have claimed, but referendums of “self-determination” or “autonomy” (самостоятельность). The qualifier “pro-Russian” suggests that Russia was a party to the conflict, which was not the case, and the term “Russian speakers” would have been more honest. Moreover, these referendums were conducted against the advice of Vladimir Putin.
After the election of the post-coup new model Ukrainian government in 2014, opposition parties were declared illegal and some leaders were arrested for “treason,” the media was censored and the parliament outlawed Russian, the language of a third of the population, as an official language. Then the government declared war on the predominantly Russian Eastern provinces and, for past eight years, has killed 14,000 people.
Ukraine is not a human catastrophe like Vietnam, where the US burned children to death and poisoned those that survived, eventually killing 3,000,000 civilians. It's not a war. It's a police action, like the Korean War in '51 (that also killed 3 million civilians). And it's not a criminal act, because UN Article 15 applies to Russia as it did when the US invoked it against Iran.
Against Iran, for God's sake.
The Ukrainian population normally speaks both Russian and Ukrainian, but often also Hungarian (or Magyar), since 1st September 2020 the use of any language other than Ukrainin has been strictly forbidden in public administrations and schools. Russian- and Magyar-language schools have been closed, prompting official protests from Russia and Hungary. On 21 July 2021, President Volodymyr Zelensky signed the law on the “Indigenous Peoples of Ukraine.” It stipulates that only Ukrainians of Scandinavian origin, as well as Tatars and Karaites have “the right to fully enjoy all human rights and all fundamental freedoms” (sic), thereby depriving Ukrainians of Slavic origin of the same rights.
"The choice that we faced in Ukraine — and I'm using the past tense there intentionally — was whether Russia exercised a veto over NATO involvement in Ukraine on the negotiating table or on the battlefield," said George Beebe, a former director of Russia analysis at the CIA and special adviser on Russia to former Vice President Dick Cheney. And we elected to make sure that the veto was exercised on the battlefield, hoping that either Putin would stay his hand or that the military operation would fail."
There was no Ukraine war under the previous more-populist US President. Populism = history restarting = war -- that's not what's going on here. The populist take is that Americans by-and-large support isolationism, which would have prevented this Ukraine war because the US would have (a) not encouraged Ukraine to fight and (b) not pushed NATO up to Russia's border.
Predictions of larger future European conflicts that an isolationist USA would be dragged into echo the discredited Domino Theory of the Vietnam War.
That's one way to completely misunderstand what's going on. Not least that the invasion was always going to happen, regardless of whether Trump had won in 2020 or not. That's kind of the whole point of invading: the supposed irrelevance of the US. And indeed, had Trump won, Putin would have been vindicated in that respect: the US would have made itself irrelevant.
"There was no Ukraine war under the previous more-populist US President." Because Putin was waiting for Trump's second term where he fully intended to break away from Nato.
Hogwash, Ukrainians have have made a choice, look East toward the Sino-Russo alliance or West toward the liberal democracies of Europe. They chose the West, the Ukrainians know what it means to be aligned with Moscow. A vassel state of Russia, with no growth prosperity, and corruption.
But America caused this war. There is no question about that from any perspective. Perhaps that is the biggest piece of history that stays intact. From the notes of the Imperial Cruise to the trade partnership to the pushing of NATO borders to pay for play meddling to weaponizing the dollar over and over and over. All triggered such events. Same for angle drilling oil kitchens from Kuwait under Iraq. Same for soft resets to be exploited, same for staying in Europe for zero justifiable reason.
I think the only way to make 'Stacks work requires that you clean out the Tankies and such—if it is a bad-faith point you would shut down in a seminar you are teaching, you should shut it down here. Otherwise, it just will not be sustainable...
No disagreement from “ Tankies” (admittedly the above article was heavily Bolshies questioning Liberalism end of history).
But that is how we are in the mess of flirting with nuclear war at present, and how 18 months ago we were on the brink of Civil War in America. A brink we remain paused at today…
If any disagreement is bad faith don’t be surprised when events overtake you.
I’m a Veteran 🇺🇸 so presumably not a Trot/Tankie etc. Nor Bolshevik, Neolib, etc.
Putin has clearly warned since 2008 not to expand NATO eastward. The response then was Georgia getting savaged for trusting us.
He has been warning and acting- with measured steps - since 2014 over Ukraine.
It is wise to listen to heads of state when they explicitly warn you go no further, and not bad faith to point out the provocations that led to war.
The US media has reported that the US government actually lied in a lot (some, many, all) of the news provided lately with regards to Russia/Ukraine. Somehow it admitted the bio-labs...
And you should continue to teach only economics. But only if you continue with the 101 on history of economics and the intermingling btw politics and economics. And have this research presented at the start of any of your courses:
The grasp of Mr Tooze is far beyond economics and well into Politics and Political economy, you should read “The Wages of Destruction “ or to understand how America found itself in 1945 staring across the Elbe “Deluge.”
I am not paying to listen to an unwise man, his grasp of many interrelated subjects quite remarkable .
My criticisms of the military analysis of the war in Ukraine notwithstanding Mr Tooze has a brilliant and broad mind.
You are unwise Mr Kouros to dismiss him as economics 101, its more Political Economy 501 but most importantly no one else is saying it or writing this way - he has if you’ll pardon the reference a mind as broad as Lenin’s or the young Bonaparte.
No, America did NOT cause this war and there are plenty of perspectives which would question the entirely ridiculous notion that somehow the US forced Russia to invade Ukraine.
So you don't share Kissinger's opinion? What are your thoughts on weaponizing the dollar, sanctions, SWIFT bans, dollar-denominated payment and how they seem to always work there way into conflict? And what of the US and allies having Putin as a trade partner where $700 million was purchased daily from him? So suddenly, Putin is a madman and did this all on his own, willing to face all the above? Or was he boxxed in? Or you just deny that none of it triggered the Russian leader? Who does war favor? How does Zelenskyy benefit? Has he benefitted? Why did NATO agree to arm Zelenskyy, knowing the wars stagnate and knowing Russia's Syria gameplan? America meddled, while its allies solely should have decided Ukraine, war and energy/ag needs. That cannot be disputed. And that little tidbit has gone unanswered, BTW. America holds too many hostage. And that is due to the power of the reserve currency. Too much wrong here to not see that this is all on the US. Know your audience, know best case-most likely-worst case scenarios, before leaping in with both feet. The world did none of that... But the US did. And just the US.
Wow, so you don't see the death of Ukarine's monetary system, banking, wealth, savings, employment, agriculture? Infrastructure and buildings damaged? They will be in debt forever; they will never develop the gas deposits; they will never totally de-mine. I guess I've just seen a lot more war than you and the subsequent outcomes of sustained conflicts. The war in Ukraine is Zelenskyy's at this point. As many have written, he's won. But they cannot quanitfy what winning looks like. Neither can you I guess. Who would you sleep with, Putin or the IMF, if you ran that particular nation, knowing the history of both Putin and the IMF? Only fools continue to bend to US aggression. The true aspect of Putin, Xi, Modi... but also of individual corporations... be them German with regard to Iran, or the thousands having to suck it up now. I think you're a bit naive about wars of proxy and how they are triggered. Yes?
Putin wanted something, but hardly wanted war. Zelenskyy caused the war. He ran on ending the conflict with Russia. He "played ball" with Nato and actually just the Bidens. Nord Stream II sidestepped revenues that would have gone to Ukraine. Putin, who largely has a regional defense capability, invaded. But the war is hardly his. Plus as for their previous agreement,that was bs also for both nations. Mind you, no one liked Zelenskyy prior to the actual conflict Just how much more background do you need???
Yeah he hardly wanted war with hardly 150,000 troops hardly surrounding 2/3rds of Ukraine's borders. And speaking of "borders", pard, you've pretty much crossed over to insane ... just sayin'.
And Putin didn't want Belarus to stick out like a finger that couldn't be protected... same same. Let me know when the fertilizer from Russia and Belarus shows up for the crop season.
He? What of the actual citizen? Do you know much about the mindset of the average eastern European worker who knows regime change comes with just more corruption. You're naive... pard. But that's fine. Wrapped in a flag, you haven't digested how bad policy from a stupid comedian could possibly trigger a war, espcially with the US pushing for it. And still does. Carpe diem, yes? American taking advantage of this war of proxy. Who benefits? Not the average Ukrainian, and he/she won't for the rest of the century. Read any pundit on the outcome of war. Pard.
You argue that the "original invasion plan" (seizure of Kiev) failed; then plan B (encirclement etc) also failed. Where do these notions come from? ". . .as far as our media allow us to glimpse it." Is this the same media which "allowed us to glimpse" Trump colluding with the Russians daily for four years? But did not allow us to glimpse Hunter's laptop? Scott Ritter, a military man who does not rely on "our" media, but reads maps, on the ground tactical maneuvers, etc argues (I think quite convincingly) that the war is over; the Russians won. He also points out that unfortunately he did not have access to Putin's Plan; nor, I might add, did "our" media.
I was wondering the same sort of thing. The Russian invasion force is not (never was) large enough to invest the entire country. I have heard it posed that the column which advanced upon Kyiv/Kiev was designed to "pin" a large Ukrainian force there while the main objectives were underway in the east -- reduction of Mariupol, the creation of a "land bridge" to Crimea, and the encirclement and surrender (or failing that, destruction) of the bulk of Ukrainian forces nearest to Donetsk and Luhansk.
*IF* that was the plan, it looks rather less of a disaster than many would have us believe. But it's difficult to ascertain much of anything with so many motivated actors spinning narratives here, there and everywhere -- it could be years before a cogent analysis coheres.
The Russians were maneuvering at leisure and (to my initial surprise) very sparing in the indirect fires (artillery/ air) which is against their doctrine.
In RU mil artillery is the arm of decision- not supporting infantry-armor as in the West but the arm of decision.
When they didn’t use it except sparingly digging a bit deeper showed they are using same methods as in Syria. It makes peace easier, and they can avoid most of the atrocity Porn (best term) the Western media desires.
Mr. Tooze; your military analysis is flippant and open to question; whoever is telling you this should be in future viewed with grave skepticism. Frankly Sir this is the equivalent of “real estate only goes up!”
We will not know long after the war is over what was plan A, B, C - based on what emerges from fog of war so far is that encirclement and fast negotiation was plan A (failed due to capable and fierce resistance), and plan B was to pin lots of AFU forces in Kiev area (seems have succeeded).
Occupying Kiev was never a plan, for the following reasons:
- no troops, logistics, huge losses expected, while in rest of Ukraine AFU units could keep their mobility and overwhelm easily local LPR/DPR/Russian units
- protecting Russian speakers in Donbass from constant AFU and affiliated Neo-Nazi units plays well in Russia (can even generate enlistment) but occupying core Ukrainian land doesn't
- Zelensky in place is actually in Russian interest - he has been oversold so much to western audiences so much that any peace treaty on which he signs will be grudgingly accepted. Assumed he has real authority which is doubtful.
Along with other commentators here I find AT's approach to the causes, military progress, and likely outcome to the war to be implausible. But he is very well placed to view the outcomes in terms of changes to political economy locally and globally. Especially given his knowledge of, and access to, the key European polity, Germany. While the US has chosen to involve the world in what could be regarded as a 'local war', the consequences for Europe are likely to be seismic. Both economically, given the blow-back of sanctions, and politically, perhaps starting today (the French election).
You are asking some extremely profound and important questions.
What is it that will restart history--class analysis/populism or war or as you say, human freedom, not as a philosophical abstraction but as a concrete political proposition that remains a key part of being human?
Is this sense of being able to make history through an act of will our salvation or are downfall or maybe somehow both?
Please consider writing more about such a sense of voluntarism.
Caveats: I have not read Hegel; I read something or other about/by Marx as assigned reading in a poli sci class a half-century ago and remember almost nothing except the photo of Marx on the cover. So I'm just an ordinary citizen trying to make sense of the world.
These two paragraphs from your essay most affected me:
"So if the Ukraine war marks a a break, to put the emphasis on Putin may be misguided. If the honor of rekindling history, of “returning us to the 19th century” belongs to anyone, it is not to Bunga-Putin. That honor belongs to the Ukrainians.
It is the Ukrainians, to the amazement and not inconsiderable embarrassment of the West, who are enacting a drama of national resistance unto death. ....There are many other peoples who are struggling for their existence and recognition today. The difference is that the Ukrainians do so in the classic form of a nation in arms rallying around a nation state. And the Ukrainians do so efficaciously. They have turned back a Russian army. They have saved their capital city. Those are not merely symbolic achievements."
So, no, there is nothing "Bunga" about this war (other than the comparison you make to January 6), although some of the discourse and news coverage of it seems bent on making it so. But that is what much of our public discourse does, totalizing and simplificating - both words that I have coined to describe our inability to deal with complexity - being their primary tools.
Your premise - as I understand it - that this war may be "restarting history" explains the combination of dread and hope that I feel as I devote hours each day to learning about it. It feels like that term I learned recently, 'the hinge of history.' I feel dread at the prospect of Putin winning, in whatever form that might take, because I fear that such an outcome will shut the already-closing door on our imperfect liberal world order. I feel hope at the prospect of Ukraine winning - successfully defending and reclaiming their entire sovereign nation and asserting their right to determine their own path forward and their place in the world - because this outcome might help to keep that door open, perhaps in some ideal world flinging it fully open.
I'm reminded of a William Carlos Williams poem:
so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow
glazed with rain
water
beside the white
chickens
I know nothing, but, to me, it seems that so much depends on the Ukrainian people, their government, and their military - and on our fortitude and steadfastness in supporting them. Putin will do what he will do. He may have dealt the cards, but Ukrainians willing to sacrifice all to preserve their nation and their freedom may be demonstrating to the world how to win with what seemed a weak hand.
Russia will no more lose than the US would lose a war with Canada or Mexico.
The only Intelligence being cooked up is the meth the CIA fed the media - which they just admitted to NBC news yesterday.
Moreover the Russians are not losing nor are they broke down on the road, etc et al. They are maneuvering at leisure and have from the start, fighting and using their overwhelming superiority in firepower of artillery and air very sparingly. They are under no obligation to close the distance to 2Km (max range of JAVELIN) nor invest the cities anymore then they are obligated to make bayonet charges. They are accomplishing their purpose and don’t need the extra casualties.
Its inspiring resistance from a safe distance. Up close you’d despair if you lived east of the Dnipier and feared Russian rule.
I don't dispute your analysis, but do wonder how it relates to my comment. However, I agree totally with your final statement; in fact, I despair even though I live thousands of miles west of the Dnieper .....
"the war in Ukraine was originally conceived.. a “Bunga war” - frivolous, gratuitous, neither a serious act of great power politics, nor a dramatic effort to restart history."
Dr. Putin explained, clearly and in depth, why he launched the punitive expedition into Ukraine. Unlike the dozen wars the West have launched lately, his reasoning and and justification are impeccable: it is a matter of Russia's life or death. Here are some memory-jogs:
In the summer of 1997, Joe Biden put out a statement explicitly saying that NATO expansion in the Baltic regions would rightly provoke Russia to take military actions. Biden even suggested that NATO would be responsible for creating a “vigorous and hostile” Russian response. Biden said: “I think the one place where the greatest consternation would be caused in the short-term for admission [to NATO], having nothing to do with the merit and preparedness of the country to come in, would be to admit Baltic states now in terms of NATO-Russian, US-Russian relations. If there was ever anything that was going to tip the balance, were it to be tipped, in terms of a vigorous and hostile reaction in Russia, I don’t mean military, it would be that.” https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/video-of-joe-biden-warning-of-russian-hostility-if-nato-expands-resurfaces/ar-AAUMVjI
In 2007, in Munich, Dr. Putin told a Western audience, “It turns out that NATO has put its frontline forces on our borders, and we continue to strictly fulfil the treaty obligations and do not react to these actions at all. I think it is obvious that NATO expansion does not have any relation with the modernization of the Alliance itself, or with ensuring security in Europe. On the contrary, it represents a serious provocation that reduces the level of mutual trust. And we have the right to ask: against whom is this expansion intended? And what happened to the assurances our western partners made after the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact? Where are those declarations today? No one even remembers them.”
Putin added, “But I will allow myself to remind this audience what was said. I would like to quote the speech of NATO General Secretary Mr Woerner in Brussels on 17 May 1990. He said at the time that: “the fact that we are ready not to place a NATO army outside of German territory gives the Soviet Union a firm security guarantee”. Where are these guarantees?” That was 15 years ago.
The referendums conducted by the two self-proclaimed Republics of Donetsk and Lugansk in May 2014, were not referendums of “independence” (независимость), as some unscrupulous journalists have claimed, but referendums of “self-determination” or “autonomy” (самостоятельность). The qualifier “pro-Russian” suggests that Russia was a party to the conflict, which was not the case, and the term “Russian speakers” would have been more honest. Moreover, these referendums were conducted against the advice of Vladimir Putin.
After the election of the post-coup new model Ukrainian government in 2014, opposition parties were declared illegal and some leaders were arrested for “treason,” the media was censored and the parliament outlawed Russian, the language of a third of the population, as an official language. Then the government declared war on the predominantly Russian Eastern provinces and, for past eight years, has killed 14,000 people.
Ukraine is not a human catastrophe like Vietnam, where the US burned children to death and poisoned those that survived, eventually killing 3,000,000 civilians. It's not a war. It's a police action, like the Korean War in '51 (that also killed 3 million civilians). And it's not a criminal act, because UN Article 15 applies to Russia as it did when the US invoked it against Iran.
Against Iran, for God's sake.
The Ukrainian population normally speaks both Russian and Ukrainian, but often also Hungarian (or Magyar), since 1st September 2020 the use of any language other than Ukrainin has been strictly forbidden in public administrations and schools. Russian- and Magyar-language schools have been closed, prompting official protests from Russia and Hungary. On 21 July 2021, President Volodymyr Zelensky signed the law on the “Indigenous Peoples of Ukraine.” It stipulates that only Ukrainians of Scandinavian origin, as well as Tatars and Karaites have “the right to fully enjoy all human rights and all fundamental freedoms” (sic), thereby depriving Ukrainians of Slavic origin of the same rights.
"The choice that we faced in Ukraine — and I'm using the past tense there intentionally — was whether Russia exercised a veto over NATO involvement in Ukraine on the negotiating table or on the battlefield," said George Beebe, a former director of Russia analysis at the CIA and special adviser on Russia to former Vice President Dick Cheney. And we elected to make sure that the veto was exercised on the battlefield, hoping that either Putin would stay his hand or that the military operation would fail."
There was no Ukraine war under the previous more-populist US President. Populism = history restarting = war -- that's not what's going on here. The populist take is that Americans by-and-large support isolationism, which would have prevented this Ukraine war because the US would have (a) not encouraged Ukraine to fight and (b) not pushed NATO up to Russia's border.
Predictions of larger future European conflicts that an isolationist USA would be dragged into echo the discredited Domino Theory of the Vietnam War.
That's one way to completely misunderstand what's going on. Not least that the invasion was always going to happen, regardless of whether Trump had won in 2020 or not. That's kind of the whole point of invading: the supposed irrelevance of the US. And indeed, had Trump won, Putin would have been vindicated in that respect: the US would have made itself irrelevant.
"There was no Ukraine war under the previous more-populist US President." Because Putin was waiting for Trump's second term where he fully intended to break away from Nato.
Hogwash, Ukrainians have have made a choice, look East toward the Sino-Russo alliance or West toward the liberal democracies of Europe. They chose the West, the Ukrainians know what it means to be aligned with Moscow. A vassel state of Russia, with no growth prosperity, and corruption.
But America caused this war. There is no question about that from any perspective. Perhaps that is the biggest piece of history that stays intact. From the notes of the Imperial Cruise to the trade partnership to the pushing of NATO borders to pay for play meddling to weaponizing the dollar over and over and over. All triggered such events. Same for angle drilling oil kitchens from Kuwait under Iraq. Same for soft resets to be exploited, same for staying in Europe for zero justifiable reason.
I think the only way to make 'Stacks work requires that you clean out the Tankies and such—if it is a bad-faith point you would shut down in a seminar you are teaching, you should shut it down here. Otherwise, it just will not be sustainable...
Yours,
Brad DeLong
Bad faith = disagree.
Or negative feedback.
No disagreement from “ Tankies” (admittedly the above article was heavily Bolshies questioning Liberalism end of history).
But that is how we are in the mess of flirting with nuclear war at present, and how 18 months ago we were on the brink of Civil War in America. A brink we remain paused at today…
If any disagreement is bad faith don’t be surprised when events overtake you.
I’m a Veteran 🇺🇸 so presumably not a Trot/Tankie etc. Nor Bolshevik, Neolib, etc.
Putin has clearly warned since 2008 not to expand NATO eastward. The response then was Georgia getting savaged for trusting us.
He has been warning and acting- with measured steps - since 2014 over Ukraine.
It is wise to listen to heads of state when they explicitly warn you go no further, and not bad faith to point out the provocations that led to war.
The US media has reported that the US government actually lied in a lot (some, many, all) of the news provided lately with regards to Russia/Ukraine. Somehow it admitted the bio-labs...
And you should continue to teach only economics. But only if you continue with the 101 on history of economics and the intermingling btw politics and economics. And have this research presented at the start of any of your courses:
https://www.ineteconomics.org/research/research-papers/predicting-united-states-policy-outcomes-with-random-forests
The grasp of Mr Tooze is far beyond economics and well into Politics and Political economy, you should read “The Wages of Destruction “ or to understand how America found itself in 1945 staring across the Elbe “Deluge.”
I am not paying to listen to an unwise man, his grasp of many interrelated subjects quite remarkable .
My criticisms of the military analysis of the war in Ukraine notwithstanding Mr Tooze has a brilliant and broad mind.
You are unwise Mr Kouros to dismiss him as economics 101, its more Political Economy 501 but most importantly no one else is saying it or writing this way - he has if you’ll pardon the reference a mind as broad as Lenin’s or the young Bonaparte.
Do not dismiss as “economics “.
I would hazard a guess that Kouros' response was directed at DeLong rather than Tooze, eh?
See what I mean?
No, and if you explain the same way to your students, they are lost.
Policing comments is for the constable, however this is certainly not good faith.
No, America did NOT cause this war and there are plenty of perspectives which would question the entirely ridiculous notion that somehow the US forced Russia to invade Ukraine.
So you don't share Kissinger's opinion? What are your thoughts on weaponizing the dollar, sanctions, SWIFT bans, dollar-denominated payment and how they seem to always work there way into conflict? And what of the US and allies having Putin as a trade partner where $700 million was purchased daily from him? So suddenly, Putin is a madman and did this all on his own, willing to face all the above? Or was he boxxed in? Or you just deny that none of it triggered the Russian leader? Who does war favor? How does Zelenskyy benefit? Has he benefitted? Why did NATO agree to arm Zelenskyy, knowing the wars stagnate and knowing Russia's Syria gameplan? America meddled, while its allies solely should have decided Ukraine, war and energy/ag needs. That cannot be disputed. And that little tidbit has gone unanswered, BTW. America holds too many hostage. And that is due to the power of the reserve currency. Too much wrong here to not see that this is all on the US. Know your audience, know best case-most likely-worst case scenarios, before leaping in with both feet. The world did none of that... But the US did. And just the US.
"So you don't share Kissinger's opinion?" I typically don't agree with war criminals ... unlike you.
"Has he benefitted? Why did NATO agree to arm Zelenskyy, knowing the wars stagnate ..." The only stagnation we see here is with Russia's military.
Wow, so you don't see the death of Ukarine's monetary system, banking, wealth, savings, employment, agriculture? Infrastructure and buildings damaged? They will be in debt forever; they will never develop the gas deposits; they will never totally de-mine. I guess I've just seen a lot more war than you and the subsequent outcomes of sustained conflicts. The war in Ukraine is Zelenskyy's at this point. As many have written, he's won. But they cannot quanitfy what winning looks like. Neither can you I guess. Who would you sleep with, Putin or the IMF, if you ran that particular nation, knowing the history of both Putin and the IMF? Only fools continue to bend to US aggression. The true aspect of Putin, Xi, Modi... but also of individual corporations... be them German with regard to Iran, or the thousands having to suck it up now. I think you're a bit naive about wars of proxy and how they are triggered. Yes?
Huh?
Putin caused this war.
Putin wanted something, but hardly wanted war. Zelenskyy caused the war. He ran on ending the conflict with Russia. He "played ball" with Nato and actually just the Bidens. Nord Stream II sidestepped revenues that would have gone to Ukraine. Putin, who largely has a regional defense capability, invaded. But the war is hardly his. Plus as for their previous agreement,that was bs also for both nations. Mind you, no one liked Zelenskyy prior to the actual conflict Just how much more background do you need???
Yeah he hardly wanted war with hardly 150,000 troops hardly surrounding 2/3rds of Ukraine's borders. And speaking of "borders", pard, you've pretty much crossed over to insane ... just sayin'.
And Putin didn't want Belarus to stick out like a finger that couldn't be protected... same same. Let me know when the fertilizer from Russia and Belarus shows up for the crop season.
He? What of the actual citizen? Do you know much about the mindset of the average eastern European worker who knows regime change comes with just more corruption. You're naive... pard. But that's fine. Wrapped in a flag, you haven't digested how bad policy from a stupid comedian could possibly trigger a war, espcially with the US pushing for it. And still does. Carpe diem, yes? American taking advantage of this war of proxy. Who benefits? Not the average Ukrainian, and he/she won't for the rest of the century. Read any pundit on the outcome of war. Pard.
You argue that the "original invasion plan" (seizure of Kiev) failed; then plan B (encirclement etc) also failed. Where do these notions come from? ". . .as far as our media allow us to glimpse it." Is this the same media which "allowed us to glimpse" Trump colluding with the Russians daily for four years? But did not allow us to glimpse Hunter's laptop? Scott Ritter, a military man who does not rely on "our" media, but reads maps, on the ground tactical maneuvers, etc argues (I think quite convincingly) that the war is over; the Russians won. He also points out that unfortunately he did not have access to Putin's Plan; nor, I might add, did "our" media.
I was wondering the same sort of thing. The Russian invasion force is not (never was) large enough to invest the entire country. I have heard it posed that the column which advanced upon Kyiv/Kiev was designed to "pin" a large Ukrainian force there while the main objectives were underway in the east -- reduction of Mariupol, the creation of a "land bridge" to Crimea, and the encirclement and surrender (or failing that, destruction) of the bulk of Ukrainian forces nearest to Donetsk and Luhansk.
*IF* that was the plan, it looks rather less of a disaster than many would have us believe. But it's difficult to ascertain much of anything with so many motivated actors spinning narratives here, there and everywhere -- it could be years before a cogent analysis coheres.
It will be years before the cogent is acceptable.
The Russians were maneuvering at leisure and (to my initial surprise) very sparing in the indirect fires (artillery/ air) which is against their doctrine.
In RU mil artillery is the arm of decision- not supporting infantry-armor as in the West but the arm of decision.
When they didn’t use it except sparingly digging a bit deeper showed they are using same methods as in Syria. It makes peace easier, and they can avoid most of the atrocity Porn (best term) the Western media desires.
Mr. Tooze; your military analysis is flippant and open to question; whoever is telling you this should be in future viewed with grave skepticism. Frankly Sir this is the equivalent of “real estate only goes up!”
We will not know long after the war is over what was plan A, B, C - based on what emerges from fog of war so far is that encirclement and fast negotiation was plan A (failed due to capable and fierce resistance), and plan B was to pin lots of AFU forces in Kiev area (seems have succeeded).
Occupying Kiev was never a plan, for the following reasons:
- no troops, logistics, huge losses expected, while in rest of Ukraine AFU units could keep their mobility and overwhelm easily local LPR/DPR/Russian units
- protecting Russian speakers in Donbass from constant AFU and affiliated Neo-Nazi units plays well in Russia (can even generate enlistment) but occupying core Ukrainian land doesn't
- Zelensky in place is actually in Russian interest - he has been oversold so much to western audiences so much that any peace treaty on which he signs will be grudgingly accepted. Assumed he has real authority which is doubtful.
Along with other commentators here I find AT's approach to the causes, military progress, and likely outcome to the war to be implausible. But he is very well placed to view the outcomes in terms of changes to political economy locally and globally. Especially given his knowledge of, and access to, the key European polity, Germany. While the US has chosen to involve the world in what could be regarded as a 'local war', the consequences for Europe are likely to be seismic. Both economically, given the blow-back of sanctions, and politically, perhaps starting today (the French election).
You are asking some extremely profound and important questions.
What is it that will restart history--class analysis/populism or war or as you say, human freedom, not as a philosophical abstraction but as a concrete political proposition that remains a key part of being human?
Is this sense of being able to make history through an act of will our salvation or are downfall or maybe somehow both?
Please consider writing more about such a sense of voluntarism.
S. Ritter today:https://youtu.be/WPdCLzfUKyk
Caveats: I have not read Hegel; I read something or other about/by Marx as assigned reading in a poli sci class a half-century ago and remember almost nothing except the photo of Marx on the cover. So I'm just an ordinary citizen trying to make sense of the world.
These two paragraphs from your essay most affected me:
"So if the Ukraine war marks a a break, to put the emphasis on Putin may be misguided. If the honor of rekindling history, of “returning us to the 19th century” belongs to anyone, it is not to Bunga-Putin. That honor belongs to the Ukrainians.
It is the Ukrainians, to the amazement and not inconsiderable embarrassment of the West, who are enacting a drama of national resistance unto death. ....There are many other peoples who are struggling for their existence and recognition today. The difference is that the Ukrainians do so in the classic form of a nation in arms rallying around a nation state. And the Ukrainians do so efficaciously. They have turned back a Russian army. They have saved their capital city. Those are not merely symbolic achievements."
So, no, there is nothing "Bunga" about this war (other than the comparison you make to January 6), although some of the discourse and news coverage of it seems bent on making it so. But that is what much of our public discourse does, totalizing and simplificating - both words that I have coined to describe our inability to deal with complexity - being their primary tools.
Your premise - as I understand it - that this war may be "restarting history" explains the combination of dread and hope that I feel as I devote hours each day to learning about it. It feels like that term I learned recently, 'the hinge of history.' I feel dread at the prospect of Putin winning, in whatever form that might take, because I fear that such an outcome will shut the already-closing door on our imperfect liberal world order. I feel hope at the prospect of Ukraine winning - successfully defending and reclaiming their entire sovereign nation and asserting their right to determine their own path forward and their place in the world - because this outcome might help to keep that door open, perhaps in some ideal world flinging it fully open.
I'm reminded of a William Carlos Williams poem:
so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow
glazed with rain
water
beside the white
chickens
I know nothing, but, to me, it seems that so much depends on the Ukrainian people, their government, and their military - and on our fortitude and steadfastness in supporting them. Putin will do what he will do. He may have dealt the cards, but Ukrainians willing to sacrifice all to preserve their nation and their freedom may be demonstrating to the world how to win with what seemed a weak hand.
Russia will no more lose than the US would lose a war with Canada or Mexico.
The only Intelligence being cooked up is the meth the CIA fed the media - which they just admitted to NBC news yesterday.
Moreover the Russians are not losing nor are they broke down on the road, etc et al. They are maneuvering at leisure and have from the start, fighting and using their overwhelming superiority in firepower of artillery and air very sparingly. They are under no obligation to close the distance to 2Km (max range of JAVELIN) nor invest the cities anymore then they are obligated to make bayonet charges. They are accomplishing their purpose and don’t need the extra casualties.
Its inspiring resistance from a safe distance. Up close you’d despair if you lived east of the Dnipier and feared Russian rule.
I don't dispute your analysis, but do wonder how it relates to my comment. However, I agree totally with your final statement; in fact, I despair even though I live thousands of miles west of the Dnieper .....
This is the link to your comment…” demonstrating to the world how to win with what seemed a weak hand.”
The win can be; Ukraine save Donbass, neutral, essentially Finland now that they showed they’ll fight.
As the Finns did, but lost Karelia.
Okay, I see it now. Thanks for your response.