We’ve just passed the 1 year mark with the Russo-Ukraine conflict. Our friend John Farnam has a few words.
14 Mar 23
“There’s an attrition that takes place inside, one in which options and choices and even desires are ground ever smaller until finally their existence can no longer be confirmed by observation.
… until desire is a ghost.”
Doug Dorst
Some things never change!
On the “Eastern Front” during WWII, our world witnessed the notorious Soviet tactic of casually shoving an endless ocean of hapless, “cannon fodder” troops into the fray, only to be slaughtered wholesale.
However, this tactic “worked” in the sense that Stalin, ever trading space for time, could replace his staggering losses (and did), while Hitler could not. So, gradually momentum shifted. The tide eventually turned in the East, and Germans were forced to fight a retrograde retreat.
As noted, Russian losses were hideous, but of course Joe Stalin couldn’t have cared less!
In 1812, Napoleon similarly found himself on the short end of a war of attrition with the Russians. His invasion of Russia also faltered and ultimately ended in disaster, and mostly for the same reasons.
Today in Ukraine, we are witnessing Putin, now the aggressor, employing Stalin’s old tactics of relentlessly “grinding-down” his opposition, at the expense of extreme losses among Russian units and hapless Wagner mercenaries.
Like Stalin before him, Putin couldn’t care less!
He is confident that the West will grow weary of supporting Ukraine in the same way we grew weary of supporting Vietnamese, Afghans, et al!
There is plenty of Russian youth to replace his losses, so he fully intends to continue to gobble-up Russia’s former “satellite states,” one by one!
Putin holds in seething contempt Western politicians, particularly in the UK and USA, just as Stalin and Hitler did, and for good cause!
/John
On his view of Putin and his contempt for the US and UK governments, John is absolutely spot on, And as far as tythe support for the Ukraine, many in both countries are trired of the constant $$ and material drain. At this point, I don’t think the US could defend itself and yet Uncle Joe continues to announce, almost daily, the addition of more supplies and funds to Zelensky and his cronies.
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