(January 15, 2024 at 2:17 pm)Anomalocaris Wrote: Ukraine on the other hand lacks every aspect of political maturity, intellectual honesty, sincerity of political parties, avoidance of ideological showboating, to be able to form such a sophisticate and realistic national outlook and follow its dictates. So a Necessary Russophile government in Ukraine, unlike a finlandized government in Finland, will be a kleptocratic government that domestically aligns with Moscow and uses threat, coercion, and corruption in handing out rewards to sustain its own power.
What Ukraine does have is a deep and abiding hatred for Russia due to its long history of mistreatment of Ukrainians, including the starving of millions of Ukrainians less than a century ago.
Even if Russia were to defeat the regular Ukrainian forces, I'm pretty sure civilians would take up arms in an insurgency. The west and northwestern sectors of Ukraine were ideal sectors for partisan ops in WWII, and they would have the advantage of a land border with Poland to facilitate supplies.
We saw what a motivated insurgency did to a much more powerful USSR in 1989 -- which eventually resulted in regime change and national breakup. Putin runs a real risk of repeating history even if the Russian "military" <harrumph> wins out, which I don't believe it will. That's because in battle, motivation matters as much as anything else, and the Russians are poorly-motivated, poorly-led, and poorly-supplied. The Ukrainians, if nothing else, have motivation in spades; it's called revenge.
