Loser

They're calling it Pearl Harbor as Ukraine managed to hit Russia deep in its own territory, taking out as much as one-third of the Z Army's long-range bombers, which have been wreaking havoc on Ukrainian cities for the past three years.  Of course, Vlad was none too happy and shelled Ukrainian cities in another petulant display. 

Meanwhile, Vlad tries to play peacemaker by sending a delegation to Istanbul to lay down terms for surrender. At least that's the way Ukraine sees it as there is nothing in the Russian terms that would indicate they are willing to cede anything to Ukraine.  Maybe Vlad should take another look at The Art of the Deal, as this isn't going to further ceasefire talks one bit.

Now that Ukraine no longer has any limits as to how deep it can hit inside Russia, the war has come home for Russians.  They no longer have the sense of security they have enjoyed the past three years.  They got a glimpse of it last year when Ukrainian forces invaded Kursk, a region on the northern Ukrainian border, but it was still far away from Moscow.  One doesn't realize just how vast Russia is.  It is a country two-and-a-half times larger than the United States.  Of course, much of that land is sparsely settled, Russian in name only, but nevertheless Russian.  Ukrainian strikes deep inside its imperial boundaries can not only stir up anxieties but independence movements, as Russian forces are so heavily committed to the war in Ukraine that they have little chance of defending its own territory if civil war were to break out.  

This from a country that in 2021 toyed with the idea of invading Hokkaido. Maybe Putin's so-called "brain" told him what happened when Russia invaded Japan in 1904.  The last tsar lost not just his Asian fleet but his Baltic fleet as well in that war and had to negotiate a surrender that ultimately led to the collapse of the former empire.  Ukraine was the easier target.  No one gave Kyiv a chance of holding off the vaunted Russian Z Army but it did, and now Putin finds himself hopelessly mired in a war with no way out other than trudge on.  At the rate Russia is going it would take 94 years to claim all of the Ukrainian territory it now regards as its own.  While Google AI says that's an oversimplification, Russia is claiming territories literally by inches and at a great cost to army munitions and personnel.  To date, the Z Army has suffered nearly one million casualties.

I've long wondered where this Z came from, as there is no Z in the Cyrillic alphabet.  Russians claim the Z stands for the Latin transliteration "za pobedu" or "for victory."  They have used V as well, but Z became the popular choice, making me think they were actually referring to the campy film World War Z starring Brad Pitt that came out in 2013.  They hoped to strike fear in European hearts and what better way than fast-moving zombies crawling over the top of each as they scale huge walls.  Only problem is that they move at a snail's pace.  It's more like Night of the Living Dead in slow motion.

Vlad has been able to beef up his manpower with recruits from Central Asia and troops from North Korea, but one would think there is a limit as to how many soldiers he can draw from extant oblasts and Asian fiefdoms before he has to start recruiting more of his own.  I imagine Russia has pretty much emptied out its prisons by this point, offering "freedom" to serve as fodder on the front line.  The idea was that these "soldiers" would show no mercy, but they also had few skills and for the most part have served as little more than meat in the ongoing war.

Meanwhile, Ukraine has tried to carry on the good fight, refraining itself from bombing Russian cities, which it could easily do in retaliation to the nightly bombings of virtually all its cities.  It's principal aim has been to hold the line along the Dnipro River, forcing Russia to dig itself in, which it has done, mining the entire length of the river with over 2 million anti-personal mines.  One can only hope that Russia's own soldiers have stumbled upon many of these booby traps in having to make hasty retreats.

For too long Ukraine has had to fight with one arm tied behind its back with all the restrictions imposed by the US and NATO.  One of Biden's great failings was to flinch when Putin threatened the use of tactical nuclear weapons because Ukraine had Russia on its heels back in the Fall of 2022. The opportunity was lost and since then Russia has been able to entrench itself all along the front making it very difficult for Ukraine to regain anymore of its lost territory.  Recognizing this mistake, NATO has since removed these limits on the missiles it provides Ukraine.  

Still, the missiles only have a range of 500 km.  So Ukraine has to come up with clever ways to hit much deeper inside Russia.  In this particular case, they disguised convoy trucks that brought drones to within striking distance of air bases strung along a 4000 km. distance between the border of Finland to remote regions of Siberia. These drones laid waste to as many as 40 Russian bombers and other aircraft in the worst strike on Putin's army since Ukraine blew apart his 60 km. long military convoy back in April, 2022, ending his assault on Kyiv before it had even begun.  It is being described as a total embarrassment. 

Back in Washington, the Trump administration is at wit's end.  his Orangeness had hoped to end this war within 24 hours of becoming president, but here we are four months later and there is no sign of progress on a ceasefire.  Trump has had to eat his words, something he hates to do, and has even spoken sharply against Putin when his forces bombed Kyiv last month just as Trump thought they were on the verge of a ceasefire.  Still, Trump levels as much abuse at Zelenskyy as he does Putin, considering them both to blame for the stalemate.  Yet, only one can stop the war any time he likes, as it was Putin who started World War Z.  Not Zelenskyy.

One of the thorny issues Trump has had to deal with is that most of his MAGA faithful support Ukraine.  Most of my conservative friends on FB support Ukraine.  Few have any love for Russia despite the massive attempt over the years to embrace Russia as a "fellow traveler" in their fundamentalist religious zeal and war on trans rights.  The conservative news channels have all spoken favorably and at times warmly of Putin, even after the war broke out in February, 2022. Tucker Carlson traveled to Moscow to stage an interview with Vlad in 2024, marking the two-year anniversary of the war.  Carlson was effusive in his praise of Putin and Moscow grocery stores with their moving ramps.  However, this attempt to condition MAGA minds has failed, miserably in fact as 60% of Republicans support continued military aid to Ukraine under certain conditions.

Trump is not one to go down with a sinking ship.  Seeing that his faithful have little or no love for Putin, he too has begun to show his displeasure with the Russian autocrat. This is good news for the conservative "war hawks" on Capitol Hill, who have long supported Ukraine, dating back to 2014 when Russia first invaded Crimea. Lindsey Graham, who has never had any love for Russia, is one of the major proponents of increasing military aid to Ukraine.  At the very least, Graham wants heavier economic sanctions on Russia.  We are not likely to see any major increase in military support or sanctions, nor are we likely to see Trump try to curb Ukraine's war effort any more.  He doesn't like losers, and this massive strike on Russia's airfields makes Putin look more and more like a loser.

Of course, a war like this can turn at a moment's notice.  Putin may very well opt for the nuclear option, most likely blowing up the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant, rendering yet another region of Ukraine largely uninhabitable.  In this way he can keep the nuclear fallout localized. He's already blown up dams in an effort to flood whole regions of Ukraine, making it difficult for Ukrainian forces to reclaim lost territory.  

This is the way Russia fights.  It's the same way they were able to repel Napoleon by adopting a scorched earth policy.  Russian generals literally burned Moscow to the ground rather than allow Napoleon victory.  With his Grand Armee trapped inside the vast territory, Russian forces were able to beat back starving soldiers all the way to Vilnius and other cities in the "Pale of Russia," where many of them died from hypothermia, starvation and disease.  Putin is adopting the same strategy.

Putin doesn't care how he achieves his objectives.  He could lose ten million soldiers and it still wouldn't matter to him as long as he is able to reclaim Ukraine as part of the reconstructed Russian empire.  He had hoped to take Ukraine peacefully as he had Belarus.  Alas, Ukrainians have too many bitter memories of Russian and Soviet occupation, not least of all the theft of their identity in the name of Russia.  Back in the 17th century, Russia moved the Patriarch from Kyiv to Moscow, a so-called temporary measure that Ukraine annulled in 2018, re-establishing the Orthodox Church of Ukraine.  Something Putin didn't take lightly.

He sees Russia only through the prism of imperial Russia.  He has no interest in any previous claims to sovereignty by these former Soviet Republics.  For years, Russia tried to exercise his influence politically by supporting politicians favorable to Russian interests, but as many of these countries joined the EU and NATO that political power began to wane.  There has been some resurgence of Pro-Soviet sentimentality in Eastern Europe, but the recent election of Nawrocki as Poland's president is not the "win" the Kremlin imagines.  The young "historian" is from the same party as former President Duda, and has no interest in breaking ties with the EU, NATO or Ukraine, not that he has the power to do so.  Most of his concerns are internal. 

Meanwhile, the pro-Russian presidential candidate lost in Romania and Moscow now finds itself at odds with Serbian President Vucic, who the Kremlin alleges has been supplying artillery to Ukraine under their noses.  FTR, Vucic attended the Victory Day parade in Moscow last month and said that the artillery was earmarked for African countries, not Ukraine.

Things had been shaping up so well for Vlad with the election of Trump in November, 2024, and the loss of confidence among NATO nations that ensued.  However, the return of the Christian Democratic Union in Germany, led by hawkish Friedrich Merz, and the formation of a "coalition of the willing" that includes all the heavy-hitters in Europe, has isolated Putin once again.  He has no one to turn to except China to continue to underwrite his war efforts.  However, China doesn't want to jeopardize its economic ties with the EU, so there is a limit to how far they will go to support Russia, especially in what more and more looks like a losing effort.

Whereas Pearl Harbor changed WWII in that it spurred the United States to enter the wars in Europe and the Pacific, the Russian "Pearl Harbor" only serves to illustrate how weak Russia has become.  There will be no one coming to the aid of Russia, certainly not Trump who has no affinity for losers.