Frontline medics and soldiers near Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine tell World Affairs Editor Sam Kiley how Nato is far from ready for war with Russia – and is training for a bygone era
This is a bit of an idealistic take that arguably doesn’t reflect reality.
A russian invasion would initially be small in the Baltic nations and follow a more expansionary route after that. Beyond direct military action, the overall approach would focus on exploiting corruption, complacency and cowardice [*] in Europe and the US.
There is a solid chance that the Americans will exit. Their culture as it stands today is focused on business ventures, nihilism and corruption. A significant portion of Americans are too ignorant to contemplate geopolitical realities (even if it will affect them in the long term) and their civil society and professional administrative corps have been debased by years of corruption. How did the wunderkind, the magical black man of the American centre right, Barack Obama react to the annexation of Crimea? I believe it was something along the lines of “a small regional conflict of no real importance”.
Hungary is de facto a russian satellite in the vein of Warsaw pact (but with a focus on corruption, plausible deniability and triangulation). Slovakia, Czechia and Austria have a large proportion of supporters of russian genocidal imperialism.
Germany would sell out the Baltics, no question. We’ve seen this attitude with Schroder and Merkel. You could probably bribe Schroder to support anything with some cultural acceptability. Merkel is a committed supporter of russian genocidal imperialism. Even from retirement she is pushing russian narratives about how the full scale invasion is the fault of the Baltic nations and Poland.
The Balts, the Scandinavians and the Poles would likely be willing to fight though. But their military alone is unlikely to be able to implement the scenario that you described. The approach used to take down the drone incursion in Poland suggests that they are not really ready (and the russians are).
[*] When I say cowardice, I don’t mean in a polemical way (Hollywood movies, Saving Private Ryan), but in a practical manner. E.g. Refusal to arm Ukraine after 2014. Refusal to provide long range strike capability in the first 3 years of the full scale invasion. Scholz being afraid of sending tanks (!!!) to Ukraine. Real world issues, not only a person willing to fight.
Europe as it stands today would find it extremely hard to push back the russians if the Americans exit (which I think will).
In 2014 most of the west assumed Ukraine was even more corrupt than Russia. We thought Russia had a functional corruption where the top brass got rich but they kept the military in more or less fighting shape, (similar to the US. The contractors get rich but the military can still fight like hell) but Ukraine they stole everything. The Ukrainian response to the little green men in the donbas supported this narrative. Western news outlets were reporting food drives by Ukrainian grandmothers to supply the troops because the central government under (Litvenyanko? The guy before Zelenski) was too busy building a palace on a lake to feed the soldiers.
We would have assumed any arms sent to Ukraine would be sold to African warlords. We only found out in 2022 that the Ukrainians had grit and the Russians stole everything not nailed down.
This is a bit of an idealistic take that arguably doesn’t reflect reality.
A russian invasion would initially be small in the Baltic nations and follow a more expansionary route after that. Beyond direct military action, the overall approach would focus on exploiting corruption, complacency and cowardice [*] in Europe and the US.
There is a solid chance that the Americans will exit. Their culture as it stands today is focused on business ventures, nihilism and corruption. A significant portion of Americans are too ignorant to contemplate geopolitical realities (even if it will affect them in the long term) and their civil society and professional administrative corps have been debased by years of corruption. How did the wunderkind, the magical black man of the American centre right, Barack Obama react to the annexation of Crimea? I believe it was something along the lines of “a small regional conflict of no real importance”.
Hungary is de facto a russian satellite in the vein of Warsaw pact (but with a focus on corruption, plausible deniability and triangulation). Slovakia, Czechia and Austria have a large proportion of supporters of russian genocidal imperialism.
Germany would sell out the Baltics, no question. We’ve seen this attitude with Schroder and Merkel. You could probably bribe Schroder to support anything with some cultural acceptability. Merkel is a committed supporter of russian genocidal imperialism. Even from retirement she is pushing russian narratives about how the full scale invasion is the fault of the Baltic nations and Poland.
The Balts, the Scandinavians and the Poles would likely be willing to fight though. But their military alone is unlikely to be able to implement the scenario that you described. The approach used to take down the drone incursion in Poland suggests that they are not really ready (and the russians are).
[*] When I say cowardice, I don’t mean in a polemical way (Hollywood movies, Saving Private Ryan), but in a practical manner. E.g. Refusal to arm Ukraine after 2014. Refusal to provide long range strike capability in the first 3 years of the full scale invasion. Scholz being afraid of sending tanks (!!!) to Ukraine. Real world issues, not only a person willing to fight.
Europe as it stands today would find it extremely hard to push back the russians if the Americans exit (which I think will).
In 2014 most of the west assumed Ukraine was even more corrupt than Russia. We thought Russia had a functional corruption where the top brass got rich but they kept the military in more or less fighting shape, (similar to the US. The contractors get rich but the military can still fight like hell) but Ukraine they stole everything. The Ukrainian response to the little green men in the donbas supported this narrative. Western news outlets were reporting food drives by Ukrainian grandmothers to supply the troops because the central government under (Litvenyanko? The guy before Zelenski) was too busy building a palace on a lake to feed the soldiers.
We would have assumed any arms sent to Ukraine would be sold to African warlords. We only found out in 2022 that the Ukrainians had grit and the Russians stole everything not nailed down.