The Biden administration didn't in any way distinguish itself on foreign & security matters (well, on anything really) but here's a great quotation from the outgoing National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan.
If I had told you three years ago that Joe Biden was going to announce a special military operation to take Ottawa in a week and three years later that he was in the wheat fields of Manitoba losing thousands of soldiers a month with inflation over 10% and interest rates in America over 20%, 600,000 Americans either dead or wounded, and we're inching out little Canadian town by little Canadian town, you wouldn't sit here saying, 'Wow, America's really winning this war in a big way, that’s great for America'. You would never say that. But somehow we're saying, 'oh the Russians there doing great'. They are not doing great: They set out on a strategic objective … and they have failed in that.
It's from an interview here. He wants to be careful not to give Trump any ideas ...
ND
6 comments:
Would it not rather depend on whether the Chinese were playing stupid buggers with the US using Canada as a proxy as to how sensible this scenario would be?
The casualty rates are at least 5-to-1 in Russia's favour. However bad Russia's real figures are, (probably 120,000 dead), Ukraine's are far, far worse.
A senior Ukrainian General has just been leaked as admitting that if they don't start negotiations within 6 months the Ukrainian state will cease to exist.
It might not be great for Russia, but it is a Hell of a lot worse for Ukraine. There are no "winners" in a War - but there are certainly big losers.
Again off piste but if we are to have small nukes at existing nodes on transmission system why are they demolishing perfectly good cooling towers. Rerun of the clowns not keeping easements when railway lines shut down !!!
'If' is doing a lot of duty here, Anon. Genuine SMRs require significantly more enrichment of their uranium fuel than the run-of-the-mill Big Nukes, and where does highly enriched uranium (in large quantities) come from? Russia.
Which reminds me to ask a question I’ve been meaning to ask, but haven’t had a suitable opportunity.
Namely, if Ukraine really was being a proxy for some nefariousness or other, why didn’t Russia simply offer the terrible, awful, no good corruption-riddled Ukraine more money than the other guy was (supposedly) offering? That’s what I would have done. Whatever it was that Ukraine was asking, it can’t possibly be more than Russia has sunk into its, ah-hem, investment, so far anyway.
Did anyone in the Russian Government ever actually say the SMO was three days or a week?
Or is it up there with the Ghost Of Kiev, granny with her pickle jars (was it missiles or aircraft she downed?), the thousands of North Koreans etc?
AFAIK Russia are a long way from their strategic objectives, but still heading in the right direction. No doubt they made a lot of errors in the opening stages - just like the previous time.
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