"So, Musk may not be too wide of the mark after all": Politico. Something which could hardly be imagined a year ago or even six months ago has happened this week: a Politico op-ed voices agreement with Elon Musk on Ukraine.
Of course, the Wednesday piece still takes customary shots at the "wayward" billionaire and owner of X:
Wayward entrepreneur Elon Musk’s latest pronouncements regarding the war in Ukraine set teeth on edge, as he warned that even though Moscow has "no chance" of conquering all of Ukraine, "the longer the war goes on, the more territory Russia will gain until they hit the Dnipro, which is tough to overcome."
"However, if the war lasts long enough, Odesa will fall too," he cautioned.
Statements like these, and Musk's supposedly 'alternative' view of the crisis in general, have long invoked the wrath of mainstream media pundits. Yet publications like Politico now sing a different tune, but only after President Zelensky himself has signaled just how dire the battlefield situation actually is for his forces.
Politico has previously featured headlines like ‘Elon Musk Is Transmitting a Message for Putin’. Musk in his recent Odesa commentary did no such thing, but merely urged the Ukrainians to find a way forward towards peace at the negotiating table before it's too late.
Again, lines such as the below coming out of the heart of the media establishment would have been impossible to come across a year ago... from Politico:
With a history of urging Ukraine to agree to territorial concessions — and his opposition to the $60 billion U.S. military aid package snarled on Capitol Hill amid partisan wrangling — Musk isn’t Ukraine’s favorite commentator, to say the least. And his remarks received predictable pushback.
But the billionaire entrepreneur’s forecast isn’t actually all that different from the dire warnings Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy made in the last few days. According to Zelenskyy, unless the stalled multibillion-dollar package is approved soon, his forces will have to “go back, retreat, step by step, in small steps.” He also warned that some major cities could be at risk of falling.
But we should point out that Musk has been a realist from the start, more in line with analysts such as John Mearsheimer, voicing positions which have proven right time and again, despite contradicting the bandwagon mainstream consensus at every turn.
And here's the kicker in the conclusion, from the Politico op-ed...
"We don’t only have a military crisis — we have a political one," one of the officers said. While Ukraine shies away from a big draft, "Russia is now gathering resources and will be ready to launch a big attack around August, and maybe sooner."
So, Musk may not be too wide of the mark after all.
Of course, it's more convenient at this moment to make such admissions. To review, not only has last summer's Ukrainian counteroffensive been universally acknowledged as a failure, but more grim developments for Kiev have emerged just this week, seen in some of the following fresh headlines:
- Zelensky Signs Law Lowering Conscription Age to 25
- Ukraine loses 80,000 soldiers since January, Kremlin claims
- Ukraine losing so many troops can't retrieve bodies, soldier says
Elon Musk says "the longer the war goes on, the more territory Russia will gain."
— BRICS News (@BRICSinfo) March 31, 2024
"Ukraine tragically wasted the lives of soldiers by attacking a larger army with deep defenses, minefields and more powerful artillery, while lacking armor and lacking air superiority! Any fool… pic.twitter.com/gz3JIF4WH2
Yet still, Washington is pressing forward (or rather throwing more Ukrainian troops to needless, tragic slaughter by promising things it can't deliver), with US top diplomat Antony Blinken on Thursday saying from Brussels...
"Ukraine will become a member of NATO. Our purpose at the summit is to help build a bridge to that membership" — in reference to NATO's annual meeting set for July. Sadly, things are set to get bloodier and more unpredictable, raising the spectre of a WW3 scenario, before they get better.