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I've had a bit more thinking on Russia and NATO powers. Clearly I'm just a hobbyist, not a military strategist, so I'm slow on the uptake on these things. But when I finally realize something or change my thinking (whether it is correct or not) I like to post it on nostr.

First, a quote from the book "Prisoners of Geography" by Tim Marshall: "Vladimir Putin says he is a religous man, a great supporter or the Russian Orthodox Church. If so, he may well go to bed each night, say his prayers and ask God: "Why didn't you put some mountains in Ukraine?" If God had built mountains in Ukraine, then the great expanse of flatland that is the North European Plain would not be such encouraging territory from which to attack Russia repeatedly. As it is, Putin has no choice: he must at least attempt to control the flatlands to the west. So it is with all nations, big or small. The landscape imprisons their leaders, giving them fewer choices and less room to manoeuvre than you might think."

Second, Barack Obama said that because Ukraine is a core Russian interest, but not a core American interest (America would not be defeated via Ukraine), then Russia will always be able to maintain escalatory dominance there. "The fact is that Ukraine, which is a non-nato country, is going to be vulnerable to military domination by Russia no matter what we do. There are ways to deter, but it requires you to be very clear ahead of time about what is worth going to war for and what is not. Now, if there is somebody in this town that would claim that we would consider going to war with Russia over Crimea and eastern Ukraine, they should speak up and be very clear about it. The idea that talking tough or engaging in some military action that is tangential to that particular area is somehow going to influence the decision making of Russia or China is contrary to all the evidence we have seen over the last 50 years."

To be clear, America is not at war with Russia. It is supplying Ukraine, but the US remains out of the war. But what Barack was saying is that Russia will escalate because Ukraine matters more to them than to us.

If you assume American military leadership is logical and reasonable (which I think Putin does) then they would never have stepped in to back Ukraine in the first place unless they planned to "go all the way". And this is why Putin takes every Western threat of escalation very seriously. This is why he is now reading his troops to be trained on tactical nukes. If he didn't, he would be derelict in his duties to defend Russia from a threat that must be (logically reasoning thing out) intent on toppling Russia.

So I think America intended to topple Russia, and believed Navalny was one strategy, bombing the Nord Stream was another, sanctions was another, confiscating central bank assets was another, getting the world to back the West by luring Russia to strike first was another, and supplying Ukraine with superior weapons systems was yet another, and with all of that combined with their various covert CIA activities, surely they had a very good chance. But alas, those strategies all failed. And then China decided to backstop Russia.

Ukraine now has long-range ATACMS and successfully strikes military assets far into Russian occupied Ukraine including Crimea, including military bases, military training (over 100 dead nearly instantly) and a civilian oil refinery. This won't turn the tide of the war, but it has caused the war to escalate, as Russia now sends in far more drones seeking artillery, abrams tanks (they just got another) and those ATACMS systems.

As troops in Ukraine are running low, and the West is not ready to concede, they are threatening moving forces in. Russia's response was to train for the usage of tactical nukes. I don't think he is bluffing. I think NATO forces present a very credible threat of an attempt to collapse Russia, and Russia cannot win against NATO forces without resorting to tactical nukes.

So I think the Western forces backing Ukraine (NATO, France, US, UK) at some point will stop talking tough and concede. Because most of their plans already failed. I think there is a limit to how much war they are willing to get involved in... they want a lot, but not quite nukes.