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Tom Rinaldo

(22,911 posts)
Sun Apr 3, 2022, 04:58 PM Apr 2022

Long term outlook for Russia is now bleak, but it had been making major Geo-Political advances

This is pure speculation of course, but it makes me think that Putin really may be battling cancer, which could mean in his mind that he was running out of time to leave his mark on history. Before Russia invaded Ukraine, more so than not, events had been breaking Putin's way. The UK left the EU. Relations among NATO allies were frayed, and even though Biden had been making all the right moves to undo Trump's damage, our allies were looking over his shoulder at what might happen next should Trump regain the presidency. The U.S. was no longer thought of in the same way as a long term dependable ally. Our Republican party has gone off the rails, possibly for all time. American media empires, not limited to FOX, had become increasingly reliable mouthpieces for Russian propaganda.

Authoritarian leaning right wing parties and even governments were on the rise in Europe. German dependency on Russia for natural gas was about to be locked in for another decade with the imminent opening of a new gas pipeline from Russia to Germany that bypassed transit through Ukraine. Ties between Russia and China have grown stronger than they have been in many decades, and China is an emerging super power to rival the U.S. Collectively that all represented a huge amount of progress for Putin's Geo-Political agenda. He largely had gotten away with a belligerent military strategy that expanded Russia's international military presence through aggressive, but incremental, advances. His full scale invasion of Ukraine now was a huge gamble that put most of those gains at significant risk. Now Russia is cut off from most international investments and new technology. That gas pipeline has been shelved and is unlikely to ever open while Putin remains in power. The push for a transition away from fossil fuel, Russia's bread and butter, has gotten a major boost which will hurt Russia in coming years. Putin's allies in Europe and America have been forced onto the defensive. NATO is strengthening and possibly growing as countries like Sweden and Finland reconsider becoming a part of it.

Has the timing and hence course of history in large part been determined by one man's sense of impending mortality?

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Long term outlook for Russia is now bleak, but it had been making major Geo-Political advances (Original Post) Tom Rinaldo Apr 2022 OP
I think all these plans were made expecting Trump would be President. hunter Apr 2022 #1
I hate to say it lapfog_1 Apr 2022 #2

hunter

(38,264 posts)
1. I think all these plans were made expecting Trump would be President.
Sun Apr 3, 2022, 05:41 PM
Apr 2022

Trump would have cheered Putin on, or at the very least, looked the other way. Ukraine? Not Trump's problem.

Then came Biden.

Now Russia is doomed to be a pariah state like North Korea, waving its nukes around occasionally to beg for aid.

At best Russia's economy will be split between Europe and the U.S.A. in the west, and China in the east. Nobody will want govern those miserable people or claim their territories, but China and the West will control Russian resources, having demonstrated that they can just say "no" to any Russian investment.

China is an authoritarian state but they do know how the world economy works. Putin must have missed those lessons. There's no such thing as a self sufficient nation in the twenty first century. Any nation that drops out or is expelled from the twenty first century world economy is in for some serious hurt.

Putin's attempt to take Ukraine will be regarded as one of the great blunders of military and economic history. He's burnt toast.

lapfog_1

(29,166 posts)
2. I hate to say it
Sun Apr 3, 2022, 06:03 PM
Apr 2022

but apparently Hungarians are more afraid of brown people than they are horrified by Orban's buddy Putin.

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