They don’t have the people or morale for a full-on meat grinder war over the next decade.
Russia doesn’t have the people or morale. Ukrainians are defending their homes with outside support, Russians are being dragged kicking and screaming into war with blocking troops behind them so they can’t turn and run.
Russia had a major demographic problem before any of this started, then a bunch of young men fled mobilization, now thousands are dying every week. The Kremlin’s last mobilization was deeply unpopular.
This isn’t the combined power of the USSR driven by an ideological hope for a better future, it’s a shrinking country with an unstable economy run by the Mafia.
Russia doesn’t have the people or morale. Ukrainians are defending their homes with outside support, Russians are being dragged kicking and screaming into war with blocking troops behind them so they can’t turn and run.
Russia had a major demographic problem before any of this started, then a bunch of young men fled mobilization, now thousands are dying every week. The Kremlin’s last mobilization was deeply unpopular.
This isn’t the combined power of the USSR driven by an ideological hope for a better future, it’s a shrinking country with an unstable economy run by the Mafia.