Russia may well bring not just Ukraine, or Europe - but the entire debt-saturated western global financial system to its knees this winter. It may do so without sending in its 300,000 mobilized troops at all, but rather simply holding them in the wings as Ukraine punches itself out, its critical dual-use infrastructure is destroyed, its patrons bankrupted, NATO weapons exports and financial assistance dr ied up. A cold, hungry, broke Europe will turn against the Ukraine war and the growing flood of Ukrainian refugees. Civil unrest and street demonstrations will grow, the police (now also suffering) will refuse to crush these protests violently. Major banks (Credit Suisse and Deutschebank) as well as pension funds will collapse. Government bonds and sovereign instruments (Treasuries) will go without buyers. All Russian oil, gas, and uranium sales to the west stop. Oil prices steadily climb towards $150/bl. Interest rates head to 10%. Inflation heads to 20% while unemployment jumps to 40%. The Global South suspends debt repayments to Western financial institutions and insists on being paid in gold for nonrenewable resources...
A few things – first: NATO/US can see all the Russian troops amassing at the borders, all the train compositions moving equipment etc. Not rolling into Ukraine immediately may be the last attempt by Putin to give them a chance to see what is coming and relay that to the Ukrainians in the realization that “game over” is about to happen. The gradual partial mobilization may be Putin’s last negotiation/offer/chance to the West to instruct the Ukrainians to surrender the territories they have lost. It will be the last chance to save face (or for U.S. to save face before elections). Putin doesn’t have to say anything publicly - the satellite and video images say it for him.
Second: we don’t really know the positions of western intelligence services in Russia and how much they actually know. Judging by how well the sanctions are going and other isolated tidbits of information (like western media being unable to name a single Russian general in the operations theater for example, or western governments not anticipating the “rubles for gas” scheme or the size of the rebellion in the global south led by Russia and China), it all points to the fact that the ex-KGB man (Putin) has been running this operation like the whole thing is the KGB.
This means that the west actually has no idea what Russia's plan is. For all we know the “Putin is in trouble domestically” discourse - in addition to “Russians are losing territory in disarray” - may be an elaborate ploy to project weakness and “bait” more investment into the conflict by NATO/USA. At the end of the day, beating the snot out of Ukrainians is just a small part of this conflict, the bigger goal (in my mind) would be to inflict lasting lack of desire to meddle with Russia onto the collective West. I think Putin would be happy with that – he does not strike me as someone who is out to pulverize everything. Instead, he strikes me as a responsible leader who wants to do business with the West tomorrow, only he wants to do it on an equal footing.
Finally, patience shows you are in control and have options. Yes, it could be all theater and Putin could internally be loading up on daily xanax in panic caused by the situation on the ground (“general” Petraeus has been paid to say as much) but a person has to ask themselves – how likely is this? Russia is a vast country with virtually unlimited resources and Putin has spent the last 20+ years preparing for this conflict. Look at all the military equipment rolling on the trails – it looks brand spanking shiny new! To think that he and his strategists have not considered the possibility that they would be fighting NATO/USA/EU on all fronts at the end – well, it sounds amateurish for a guy who is running the whole place like it is the KGB's Berlin directorate.
What is more likely is that here in the West we have gotten accustomed to everything being done for PR and optics. We simply cannot fathom that a leader might run his operations in secrecy without any theater on TV/Twitter and with the goal of just getting stuff done METHODICALLY for his country. This doesn’t mean Putin doesn’t care about public opinion – he has engineered it to the point where the roles are reversed – there is so much desire in Russia (and the global south and even among many western citizens!) to pulverize Ukraine and teach the West a lesson that he could be riding on that wave into Paris. The real mastery on his part is that he doesn’t have to slime his way around the TV camera every 5 minutes saying things and then have Karin Jean Pierre pathetically try to "clarify” wtf he was mumbling about. Putin has run his operation like a real leader – because he can.
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