I wonder if COVID delayed Russia's invasion of Ukraine?

[SoonerPride]

Purely speculation on my part.

It seems evident Putin wanted to "reclaim" Ukraine forever and was using his useful idiot in our White House to blackmail Zelensky to keep out our weapons and possibly deny US involvement in NATO.

If COVID hadn't descended upon the world in late 2019 and 2020 I wonder if his timetable would have accelerated and this would have happened in 2020 whilst TFG was occupying the WH?

[Kali]

1. interesting

[C_U_L8R]

2. Possibly. He also expected Trump to steal the election.

[Cracklin Charlie]

3. He needed to get us out of NATO before invading.

Or at least diminish our respect for the organization. But, COVID could have affected any timetable they had for all of that.

It’s all a blur. When did they try to character assassin the ambassador to Ukraine? All the crap about the Biden’s “corruption” in Ukraine was after COVID. But, Trumps 1st impeachment was a result of his actions toward Ukraine. That one was right before COVID, I believe.

Ooh, I think you may be onto something. They planned this from the beginning. Probably before Trump was elected.

[Sneederbunk]

4. No, but the Olympics did.

[brush]

5. Very good points about Putin's long-term goal. What...

factored in the start of the invasion short-term, was the end of the Olympics. Putin and Xi now have an alliance and Putin, out of courtesy, waited until the day after the closing ceremony of the Beijing Olympics to start the invasion.

[moondust]

6. Could be a factor.

You can't realistically expect to win a war if large numbers of your troops are sick and dying with a deadly virus. A couple weeks ago there was news that COVID was spreading among Russian troops.

Record Covid cases in Russia and Ukraine complicate military plans