Strawmen do not become you. No one is saying Russia’s military might will make the USA tremble. They are tiny. The point is that, like other tiny enemies the USA has faced down, the USA will lose, because despite their clear dominance in size, scale, supply chains, etc, they’re still losing.
Yes, it is possible to say that Russia had it’s economic capabilities completely ransacked by the West during liberalization and also that Russia is winning this proxy war and the USA can’t do anything about despite spending the equivalent of the entire Russian military budget on it in a single year.
And, despite them spending that amount, Russia’s entire military budget did not get spent on Ukraine. Again, Russia has not deployed half of its military to Ukraine (it can’t because if it overextended itself like that it would be too vulnerable), so no, Russia did not spend the equivalent amount of money to occupy Eastern Ukraine and destroy most of Ukrainian production, it spent a fraction of its military budget on it, while the entirety of the aid that was equivalent to their entire budget was spent on defense and failed.
As for being “stuck on the border” you keep assuming their objectives and their strategy and then judging by those assumptions. It’s pretty clear to most observers that Russia is simply not advancing rapidly and they have stated they don’t intend to advance rapidly. And if you look at the terrain, there’s good reason for it - it would require very long vulnerable supply chains in completely open fields. It’s precisely why both the Germans and the French attempted to invade Russia through Ukraine. Russia is holding a position that prevents that kind of invasion, with a fraction of its force and it is growing it’s total military size while doing it and it’s doing it under massive sanctions.
As for Vietnam, you can easily see who’s bleeding whom by looking at the maths of attrition. Russia is growing faster than the most powerful economies in the world, while increasing the size of its military (UK dropped swimming tests for its navy to bolster the ranks) and while outproducing all of NATO. The trap is for the USA, just like it was in Vietnam and like it was in Afghanistan. This time, however, the USA invasion didn’t look like invasion because it was NATO expansion, which is physically just moving soldiers, bases, and weapons platforms into a sovereign nation in order to threaten the next neighbor. Russia sparked the conflict to stop that expansion and call the bluff of the NATO nations, and it looks like it was a bluff because, here we are.
As for Ukraine in the North, again, tactical gains are not changing the collapsing line nor shooting down missiles landing in Kiev. The North has been shown to be immaterial.
As for the economic might point missing the entire to topic, if Russia’s economy grows its people and institutions will benefit. If NATO countries economies contract, its people and institutions will suffer, despite the dollar values being higher.
Strawmen do not become you. No one is saying Russia’s military might will make the USA tremble. They are tiny. The point is that, like other tiny enemies the USA has faced down, the USA will lose, because despite their clear dominance in size, scale, supply chains, etc, they’re still losing.
Yes, it is possible to say that Russia had it’s economic capabilities completely ransacked by the West during liberalization and also that Russia is winning this proxy war and the USA can’t do anything about despite spending the equivalent of the entire Russian military budget on it in a single year.
And, despite them spending that amount, Russia’s entire military budget did not get spent on Ukraine. Again, Russia has not deployed half of its military to Ukraine (it can’t because if it overextended itself like that it would be too vulnerable), so no, Russia did not spend the equivalent amount of money to occupy Eastern Ukraine and destroy most of Ukrainian production, it spent a fraction of its military budget on it, while the entirety of the aid that was equivalent to their entire budget was spent on defense and failed.
As for being “stuck on the border” you keep assuming their objectives and their strategy and then judging by those assumptions. It’s pretty clear to most observers that Russia is simply not advancing rapidly and they have stated they don’t intend to advance rapidly. And if you look at the terrain, there’s good reason for it - it would require very long vulnerable supply chains in completely open fields. It’s precisely why both the Germans and the French attempted to invade Russia through Ukraine. Russia is holding a position that prevents that kind of invasion, with a fraction of its force and it is growing it’s total military size while doing it and it’s doing it under massive sanctions.
As for Vietnam, you can easily see who’s bleeding whom by looking at the maths of attrition. Russia is growing faster than the most powerful economies in the world, while increasing the size of its military (UK dropped swimming tests for its navy to bolster the ranks) and while outproducing all of NATO. The trap is for the USA, just like it was in Vietnam and like it was in Afghanistan. This time, however, the USA invasion didn’t look like invasion because it was NATO expansion, which is physically just moving soldiers, bases, and weapons platforms into a sovereign nation in order to threaten the next neighbor. Russia sparked the conflict to stop that expansion and call the bluff of the NATO nations, and it looks like it was a bluff because, here we are.
As for Ukraine in the North, again, tactical gains are not changing the collapsing line nor shooting down missiles landing in Kiev. The North has been shown to be immaterial.
As for the economic might point missing the entire to topic, if Russia’s economy grows its people and institutions will benefit. If NATO countries economies contract, its people and institutions will suffer, despite the dollar values being higher.