I think you're reading the same tea leaves as me. The War is terrible news for Ukraine and Russia.
America on the other hand can't believe their luck that Putin was stupid enough to take the bait. The only problem they are facing is running out of celebratory champagne.
I'm an American and no celebratory champagne for me. I feel like a cup of bitter gall has been set before me, before us all. Having read and watched Biden's speech for myself now, I don't think he went off script at all. It very much appears his call for regime change at the end was written into the speech to start with. Much else is also clearer. The Europeans must have been dismayed (should have been appalled) at the call for regime change and so the White House had to try or walk it back. But now what? Keep this grinding, grinding, grinding economic war going until Russia is ground down? Or we are? The sanctions cut both ways. All because Biden, Nuland and Sullivan want to get rid of Putin? Did the Europeans know what they were signing up for (regime change in Russia) when they rushed into imposing such sweeping sanctions?
This regime change madness is just that, madness. How many Ukrainians will have to die and suffer for it? How many people in how many countries will go hungry as the economic war drags on? How much loss and destruction? Resources that could have been invested in research and development to keep the US and the West from falling behind China will instead be tied up in this long crazy economic war on Russia. As far as I can see, the only winner in this thing will be China. For what? Some crazy scheme to dislodge Putin? How long must we wait for that? And what if it doesn't happen? How likely is it? And if somehow it does happen, will the new guy be any better? He could well be worse. And at what what price?
Sorry, I am appalled and disgusted.
Video of speech:
Transcript:
The Royal Castle in WarsawWarsaw, Poland 6:16 P.M. CETTHE PRESIDENT: Thank you, thank you, thank you. Please, if you have a seat, be
www.whitehouse.gov
The current band of European leaders aren't terribly impressive, but I do hope that speech put some steel in their spines to press hard for ceasefire/peace deal. Without the US signing off on a deal, the paper will be as worthless as Minsk 2015 (or Lisbon 1992). Even with American backing, it may end up botched like Resolution 1244. The thorny parts (Donbas and Crimea) may well have to be hammered out on the battlefield for awhile yet. How I wish it could be different.
In war do not to believe anything you hear or read, everyone has a perspective they want you to believe for whatever end. To get a clear picture you'll probably have to wait a till a few years after the war when all the generals and ex SAS have their memoirs out on how they won it single handed.
That's the thing. I've been in the middle of Other People's Wars and seen firsthand how the media totally distorts what is actually happening, even when there are lots of neutral international observers present and their reports are available to the press. I could tell stpries but will spare everyone. Even a quarter century later, those distortions still stand. We don't have the UN and OSCE and other international alphabet agencies poking about in eastern Ukraine, but surely we will not have to wait years or even months to know whether the Russians slaughter the Ukrainian troops caught in that cauldron or whether they manage to hold or break out. What a hideous senseless waste of young lives it will be if they don't.
I don't know whether the pro-Russian claims (the Ukrainians, cut off from fuel, food and other supplies, are about to be surrounded and annihilated) or whether the pro-Ukrainian claims (they are driving the Russians back over the border, leaving many dead behind) have more merit. My hunch is, given past history, there would be heavy casualties on both sides. But again, what do I know?
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I wrote the above last evening but did not post it. Today, things look a bit better:
Ukraine proposed adopting neutral status and a 15-year consultation period on the future of Russian-occupied Crimea as long as a complete ceasefire with Russian forces is agreed, negotiators said at…
www.france24.com
Perhaps sanity, or at least a little sanity, will prevail after all. Despite what US/NATO and the Western press claimed -- and still claim -- it was obvious Putin never intended to take over the whole of Ukraine. I think the Russians hoped Zelensky would bolt and Ukrainian resistance would be much weaker. They never seemed serious about taking Kiev, and I wondered whether, aside from the obvious actual military value, Russian troop presence there was partly an intimidation tactic and also handy as a bargaining chip to plunk down on the negotiation table when the end game started. The Russians got a lot of things wrong, but maybe they got that one a little bit right.
Again, the Russians were wrong, they are the agressors, and I condemn what they have done. But we only have control over what we do. I hope somehow the Europeans can get some spine and push back the American regime change agenda and work on putting a stop to the carnage. And mitigate the global economic fallout (people who starve in Africa will be just as dead as those who lie beneath the ruins of a Ukrainian city).
EDIT: Thank you for the map
@Ananda -- I take all maps with a shovel full of salt, but feel l better after looking at that one. Good post, and good point about Russians not moving back.