The western powers along with their allies are authors of their own misfortune.
It is they who constantly push forward, interfering wherever they wish, determined to assert their will over others. How many other nations do this or anywhere near this scale? I would say none on both counts, not even on some extremely small scale. It is almost unknown. Much might be made of China's activities in its coastal waters and perhaps reference Russia and Chechnya... but these instances pale to insignificance when compared to the multi-pronged incessant interference of the USA, UK and France in particular, both in the recent and far past.
These nations (USA, UK, France et al) should be the ones correctly grouped as an 'Axis of Evil', not China, Russia, Iran and others. This is plain for all to see that wish to look straight at geopolitical realities. However, using the fig leaf of 'democratic' for themselves, and the pejorative term, 'authoritarian' for the rest, they successfully obscured, muddies and distorted the obvious reality for their populations. The reality, that their myriad bloody regime change operations have perpetrated evils of enormous magnitude down the years from hundreds of years ago to the present day.
The greatest evil that exists upon this planet is the U.s. concept of 'manifest destiny'. The U.S. political elites, along with their similarly-minded British colleagues use an asserted 'superiority' as justification for all their many abuses. The democracy they talk of is of course a sham. What they are referencing is in fact a dictatorship of the 0.1% and if we are being totally honest with ourselves we know this implicitly. This western 0.1% may not be evil by any dictionary definition of the word, but their combined effort to perpetually undermine the sovereignty of other nations is. As we can plainly see if we look without our usual parochial eyes. This combined elitist aggression of the western powers produces without a shadow of a doubt, the greatest in terms of evil consequences that exist on our planet.
Some talk of an ‘if only’ circumstance regarding the western powers, that they are not using all the lethal force they could potentially wield, and that this is the answer if they find their will hard to enforce. The notion by some runs along these lines regarding the conflict in Ukraine: if only the western powers-that-be had supplied the Kiev regime with absolutely everything they needed in the past they wouldn't be being beaten so badly now, or be quite so clearly losing the war. On this subject of 'too little too late', I would like to point out that neither side believed that it would be necessary to go to full scale war for very different reasons. On the Ukraine side it would certainly have been the case in the early months of 2022 that the western powers would have been very confident regarding two things in particular.
- That Russia would be massively damaged and weakened by what they thought were devastating financial and economic sanctions they were ready to hit Russia with. Plus demanding all western companies leave Russia. and secondly,
- That they could count on the support of the vast majority of nations to ostracize Russia and cease their trading and cultural connections with it. Then, in addition, there was the military and financial support package which they could deliver to Zelnsky. All this combined, I am sure made them believe that there was no way Russia could prevail as it has. This thought I am sure never entered their minds.
Add to the above the initial successes of the Ukrainians in hitting the sitting duck convoys of Russians put there in the initial phase of Russia’s campaign, their purpose being to intimidate Zelensky and co. into coming to their senses and agreeing talks with the view to a speedy end to this situation and most important to the Russians agreeing that Ukraine would stay neutral.
On the Russian side it was clearly expected that Zelensky would swiftly come to his senses seeing the Russian troop formations so close to Kiev and in many other strategic places around Ukraine.
Quite clearly Putin and the Russian high command did not foresee the intervention by the West in the way that occurred just as the peace negotiations had progressed so far, first in Belarus then in Turkey. Putin appears to have placed far, far too much trust in the western leadership. Of course he had still to hear how he was betrayed during the entirety of the Minsk peace process.
In any case, thinking that the Istanbul negotiations were going well, and without doubt shocked at the number of casualties the Ukrainians were inflicting upon the sitting ducks around Kiev, he withdrew these latter forces., saying it was a goodwill gesture. And so we then have Boris Johnson's visit to Kiev and all that follows. So, I think it’s clear that neither side saw the need to go all in the earlier stages of this conflict. Of course this depends to some degree on how far back we mean by that.
Perhaps 6 months to a year ago piling everything possible into Ukraine by the West would have made a big difference. But there would have been a Russian response to this. What we do not know, but there certainly would have been one. Would it have been nuclear as Russia had not geared up sufficiently to make an adequate response at that time? Maybe. But it is not safe to discount any consequential outcome in this respect. If Russia was to get significantly desperate at any point... watch out. Piling all in a year ago may have had catastrophic results for Ukraine, perhaps Russia would have formally declared war upon the regime. We will never know. But giving the Ukrainian regime EVERYTHING would have been no universal panacea at any point, of that I am certain.
The spokespersons of western elites reduce everything to a single sound byte from time to time. This is that if Russia simply withdraws all its troops over the original borders between Ukraine and Russia the conflict will be over. However, there is absolutely no question of Russia exiting from the bulk of the territory it has liberated so far. The end to the conflict will be arrived at, by all the signs we see now, by military means. This is recognised by both sides. Any talk of peace negotiations or peace conferences is about appearances, so much theatrical froth designed to keep allies on side as well as their populations if at all possible. No one at this juncture believes any such sideshows for press, media and surface benefits will bring any kind of peace, not even a temporary peace, never mind a lasting one..
Perhaps ultimately, having won its campaign of grinding attrition, Russia will negotiate to leave certain areas once this operation is at its maximum extent, i.e. most probably at the banks of the Dnieper (or just across in Dnipro and Kiev). Russia might certainly give Dnipro and Kiev back to the Ukrainian regime at the negotiating table. But if anyone thinks Russia came all this way just to retreat and go back to the original borders they are kidding themselves.
If an effort is made to bludgeon Russia into doing this by going all-in and supplying Kiev with the long-range missiles and permission to hit deep inside Russia currently being mulled over, and if the West has any significant success in doing this I am certain (as Prof. Mearsheimer has said) Russia will drop at least one if not several big ones somewhere in response.
This conflict, war or whatever you want to call it, is (again as Prof. Mearsheimer says) existential for Russia. There is no way that Russia will allow itself to be forced back over the original borders to then be faced with NATO right there before it within eyeshot. That is simply never going to happen. Russia will wreak even greater havoc upon the Ukrainian regime first. The potential declaration of war by Russia at that point rather than conducting its present operation would mean the range of targets within Ukraine would be massively expanded and would certainly include every single government office. Is that where we are headed? If the western powers are determined to take this all the way and start programming and launching missiles deep inside Russia I’d say it’s quite likely.
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Conclusion:
Vladimir Putin, the Russian military and the Russian people never for a moment wanted this war. For the best part of a decade Vladimir Putin walked every extra mile available in the search for peace and reconciliation. The western powers placed stumbling blocks before every one of his steps. In Minsk he thought all was being done in good faith with the same outcome in mind, peace. Only after all the years of thinking this did Merkel, Hollande and Poroshenko boast of how they tricked him. The outcome they wanted was more war, not peace. Finally, Putin saw there was no other way out of the impasse laid before him by the West. At last he saw that war was inevitable. Though even then he sought peace both in the negotiations in Belarus, then in Turkey. But again he was tricked… but for the final time. Pursuing the conflict to the necessary outcome for the Russian nation was the only path left open to him. So undoubtedly with huge regret and sorrow in his heart he saw finally that this situation had to be brought to a conclusion as the only way, in the fullness of time, for peace to return again.
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