The Good News and the Bad News

Actually, it’s all bad news. Always.

But bad news can become good news if you have a plan. I encourage you guys to think about how the various scenarios will affect you in your country.

So let’s look at the first scenario here: the status quo.

Russia doesn’t achieve any breakthroughs in Donbass. The positions remain more or less unchanged. A few villages and towns change hands, maybe the DNR is fully liberated, but summer becomes fall becomes winter and we’re still looking at the same map hitting f5 to refresh it hoping for a change that doesn’t come.

A stalled out war means no rapprochement with Russia anytime soon because there is very little to indicate that either side will come to an agreement seeing as Ukraine wants all of Donbass and Crimea back and Russia won’t ever agree to that. Short of a coup and a new ruler coming to power and signing the equivalent of a Brest-Litovsk that is. So, with that in mind, “Putinflation” will continue in the West. Energy prices will stay high - maybe even go higher. Dissidents will continue to be accused of being Russian spies and the secret police will be very busy indeed.

In short, financial austerity, soaring prices, heavier censorship and a transition to a bug-fueled economy so on. Also, the West will, presumably, keep sending aid to Ukraine and you’re going to be left footing the bill. The cherry on top.

Is there a way to leverage this to weaken the ruling regime in the West? Maybe. Only if you have a plan that is. The plan would have to include doing something about the secret police working overtime to foil any attempt to fight back against the ruling regime. Does such a plan exist?

So far I don’t think it does. The slow drift into anarcho-tyranny will continue and the next hoax will come along soon enough to distract the peasantry and strip them of even more of their assets and freedoms.

Let’s look at another scenario: partial Russian breakthrough

Should Russia somehow break through the Ukrainian defenses in the Donbass and make significant gains again, there may be, as the President of Serbia surmised, an attempt to negotiate a cease-fire. If, at the moment, neither side is happy with the status quo, the new scenario will see Russia with a stronger position and enough of a victory to save face on the international stage and at home. Both sides, perhaps eager for a reprieve and concerned about the burden of continuing this showdown in Ukraine might decide to take some time to lick their wounds, rearm and prepare for the next bout.

This will split the politically active community in Russia. The patriots in Russia will start baying for the blood of chinovniks, siloviks and politicians. Another betrayal, they will say. The mainstream voices will do their best to explain that this was the right course of action and that the people who wanted total victory are malcontents and saboteurs.

The West will also claim victory, say that they achieved their objectives and refocus on their own kook domestic agenda. Another bout of medical tyranny? Seems likely. Also a pivot to, say, Iran or China instead seems very likely. The financial austerity will no doubt remain in place regardless, but they’ll have a harder time explaining it away as “the price that we had to pay to support international, totalitarian Liberal Democracy against the threat of nationalist, isolationist Authoritarianism.”

No real change in the status quo in the West can be expected.

The final scenario: Russian retreat.

Let’s say that NATO supplies and mercenaries turn the tide or make the cost too high to bear for Russia. Perhaps a palace coup in the Kremlin occurs. You never know.

Domestically, this will lead to massive unrest. If there is anything that undermines the faith and obedience to a reigning government, it is a lost war. A lost war, even a small one, is a profound legitimacy crisis. Massive street actions will ensue and a power shake-up will occur. Perhaps this will turn out in the favor of the patriotic faction. Perhaps it will be hijacked and a pro-West government will take power. This is a very tricky and unstable scenario to be sure. The silver lining is that it would be very interesting, at the very least.

In the West, the status quo will remain unchanged. I suppose the looming threat of Russia will dissipate and they’ll have to pivot to another hoax sooner than expected. Possibly Iran or China or they’ll refocus on the looming, non-existent nativist insurgency threat at home.

Conclusions

I ordered the scenarios in order of probability.

I did have one new insight to share which was the political implications of a lost war at home. A lost war is a profound legitimacy crisis because it undermines the faith that the “conservative” - that is the large mass of right-leaning but otherwise inert masses - have in the security institutions. Nothing else seems to stir this large segment of the population up. Some journalist getting assassinated might get the big city lefties all stirred up, sure. An offensive war will bother people, maybe, but that large inert mass won’t be bothered much by it … so long as it goes well.

History shows us that losing a serious war that should have been won gets that large populist-right bloc riled up and politically active demanding change. This is because these people understand strength and power and, if the ruling regime doesn’t have it, they lose legitimacy.

A serious failed war would probably be the only thing that could shake-up the status quo in the West. The same applies for Russia.

Someone’s going to end up losing this war in Ukraine eventually.