NOTE: Americans tend to think in terms of absolute victory and unconditional surrender. That rarely happens in the real world, even in American history, and it won’t happen in Ukraine, where Russia will surely hold onto some territory it did not before 2014. But its war aims have been completely defeated.
Russia wanted to conquer Ukraine whole (and within a week!). Three years later, that will clearly never happen. It also sought to prove it was still a great power, but its performance has proved the exact opposite: without nuclear weapons, no one would now take its military seriously at all.
All of this will have stark post-war consequences inside Russia. George Friedman explains. — RDM
