Where is This Ukraine Train Headed?
Authored by GoldFix ZH Edit
Bottom Line:
- There's no chance of a meaningful peace agreement
- The Russians are going to win the war
From the Site:
The Biden Administration is engulfed in a staggeringly expensive folly in Ukraine with no foreseeable good outcomes. The Committee hosted University of Chicago Professor John Mearsheimer the week after the Russian invasion fourteen months ago. That zoom salon had 1,136,000 views.
Mearsheimer will argue twin themes:
First, we are in a war where both sides – Ukraine and the West versus Russia – see the other as an existential threat. That makes a workable peace agreement beyond reach. The best possible outcome is a frozen conflict that is likely to have a variety of terrible consequences. The worst possible outcome is a nuclear war, which is unlikely but cannot be ruled out.
Second, Russia is going to win the war, although it is not going to decisively defeat Ukraine. It will end up, however, conquering a large swath of Ukrainian territory and making it part of Russia, while at the same time turning Ukraine into a dysfunctional rump state.
Notable
- Ukraine, Russia, and the USA are the players that matter most
- What is each Player’s threats (risks) and goals are
- Whether Russia wins or loses, they will turn Ukraine into a “rump state”, uninhabitable or governable and useless to NATO as an ally.
- Russia hasn’t even used their real troops. Ukraine however has used theirs up
- This is worse than the Iraq war
- Europe is no longer our focus, Asia is
About: Mearsheimer is best known for developing the theory of offensive realism, which describes the interaction between great powers as being primarily driven by the rational desire to achieve regional hegemony in an anarchic international system. In accordance with his theory, Mearsheimer believes that China's growing power will likely bring it into conflict with the United States.
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