Putin unwittingly exposed Russia's weakness

 Richard Fernandez:

...

Once Putin showed his hand and it proved a bust, he would lose all power to bluff (just like movie monsters made with cheap special effects become ridiculous when finally shown onscreen), and the myth of the mighty Red Army would be dispelled for decades. I wrote that “if he actually invades in a recognizable way the uncertainty is removed and the West knows what to do about aging overreaching dictators who’ve started something they can’t afford. By preserving ambiguity Putin has Biden spellbound.” I was right about the strategic situation but wrong about Putin. He actually did do the stupid thing and dug himself a hole that he will be a long time getting out of.

In a counterfactual world where the Russian president agreed with this site and continued to feint, where NATO was still in awe of the supposedly unstoppable Russian army and Putin still hitting Biden up for nickles and dimes to keep him from unleashing it, the Kremlin might still be the capital of a great power. But it would be no more substantial than a fleet-in-being that is nine tenths shadow and one part solid is; a thing powerful only in narrative. For in truth Russia fell a long time ago with its crashing demography; its uncompetitive, oligarch-ridden industries; its incompetent autocratic leadership. Ukraine was a mirror into which Putin dared look, when a man of his mein ought not. But whether he looked or not he was ugly just the same.

...

Putin believed his own BS and is now having Russian troops pay for his mistake in blood.  He has also lost the ability to project Russia as a major power.  What has also been exposed in this country is the incompetence of the woke pronoun crowd at the CIA that misread events in Afghanistan when Biden pushed his bug-out and then followed that up with a miscalculation of Putin's strength as badly as he did.  They both thought the war would be over in less than a week.

See, also:

'We've been thrown into the s**t! Our rifles don't f***ing fire!' Young Russian conscripts complain they have been given 1940s guns and are suffering heavy losses against Ukraine

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