The War over Ukraine, the War among the Oligarchs?

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Boiling the Frog says:

I was sympathetic to this argument earlier in the war, but not any more. Putin’s ‘merciful’ conduct of the war is prolonging it and causing more death on both sides. Furthermore, his “red lines” have become a joke both in the West and inside Russia (Strelkov is in jail for saying so). Every time Putin draws one the enemy crosses it and nothing happens. This projects weakness almost as much as battlefield defeat would and it further encourages the enemy (NATO) to go further. Daily drone attacks on Russia’s critical energy infrastructure are now commonplace. Russians want to know why, in return, the Kremlin has not ordered the annihilation of Ukraine’s.

It seems inevitable that NATO forces will become involved directly in the war. My expectation, based on what has gone before, is that yet more Russian red lines will be drawn and then ignored. More importantly, NATO commanders are being encouraged to think this way by the precedent set so far. Ukraine will therefore likely end up flooded with NATO troops. At this point Russia is certain to lose the war according to the war aims Putin outlined almost 3 years ago. Putin has said that war with the whole of NATO would inevitably lead to the use of nuclear weapons, as Russia could not possibly win a conventional war. Why should NATO commanders not think this in not yet another meaningless red line?

Helmer’s latest piece seems an accurate description of the real decision-making structures in this war – one side’s oligarchs against the others’. The little people dying on both sides are irrelevant. Peace will come when the oligarchs decide among themselves that it should. The sad truth is Putin is not, as he is portrayed in the West, a nationalist leader who represents the interests of Russian patriots. He has always represented the oligarchs’ interests and short of a military coup, which seems an extremely remote possibility, the peace that comes will not be one that ordinary Russians will benefit from. Of course the same is true on the other side. An independent Ukraine was always an impossibility. BlackRock owns the country formerly known as Ukraine now.

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