re: If Putin is victorious in Ukraine, what is his next move?

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If this was an actual war Kyiv would be flat.

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Maybe at the start of the war. Not anymore.

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This whole thing was to push nato back and was started because NATO & US.

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Partially true. But you’ve missed the mark.

Russia has a history of being invaded from almost every direction for millennia. They have few defense-able natural boarders. Their national psyche is paranoia. So the history of the Russian Empire and the Russian dominated USSR was to push their boarders outward in all directions to defense-able terrain. After the breakup of the USSR much of the conquered border peoples gained their independence.

They therefore fear their neighbors, and Europe and America are the most powerful of them. They have been trying to reconnect these territories back under their control through alliances or armed intervention. Two Chechen wars, invasion of Georgia, and two invasions of Ukraine are the result.

NATO was no threat to them, but because of their past history, their paranoia is their reality. Poland and other Eastern Europeans, the Baltics, and the Balkans joined NATO for defense against their past history of occupation and domination by the Russian Empire and the USSR. NATO never planned on invading Russia, because trading with Russia was lucrative and Russia has enough nukes to effectively destroy NATO. But Russian paranoia will never allow them to believe this.

So yes, Russia blames NATO intentions, but the reality is Russian paranoia not NATO intentions caused this war.

Unfortunately for Russia, even if they manage to occupy every square inch of Ukraine, they have lost this war.

Their paranoia of NATO has backfired. Their NATO border has expanded to Finland that was neutral but deferential to Russia, and Sweden that had dropped their centuries old neutrality. The explanation of NATO into Scandinavia is a devastating strategic defeat that worsened their paranoid situation overall including a potential complete victory in Ukraine.

Economically they are devastated. They have lost their lucrative trade with the West. Europe will replace their energy purchases from Russia. Western investment of capital, technology, and management is over. Putin’s nationalization of Western firms is the period at the end of this sentence. Their largest current trade partners China and India are buying fuel at a discounted rate and are forcing Russia to trade with their currencies. This is greatly pressuring the Ruble! Also this opens up a new problem as Chinese and Indian former suppliers switch their full priced products to the former customers of Russia. Russia has further lost potential arms exports due to the perceived poor performance of their weapons.

Politically, Russian prestige has crashed internationally because of their inept military performance. An alliance with them is now less valuable. Their arms are less valuable, their military power is less valuable, and their economic aid is less valuable.