12 Mar 2022

Fukuyama Predicts Russian Defeat

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Francis Fukuyama, of “End of History” fame, again climbs out on the predicting limb and tells us: Russia’s going to lose.

I’ll stick my neck out and make several prognostications:

Russia is heading for an outright defeat in Ukraine. Russian planning was incompetent, based on a flawed assumption that Ukrainians were favorable to Russia and that their military would collapse immediately following an invasion. Russian soldiers were evidently carrying dress uniforms for their victory parade in Kyiv rather than extra ammo and rations. Putin at this point has committed the bulk of his entire military to this operation—there are no vast reserves of forces he can call up to add to the battle. Russian troops are stuck outside various Ukrainian cities where they face huge supply problems and constant Ukrainian attacks.

The collapse of their position could be sudden and catastrophic, rather than happening slowly through a war of attrition. The army in the field will reach a point where it can neither be supplied nor withdrawn, and morale will vaporize. This is at least true in the north; the Russians are doing better in the south, but those positions would be hard to maintain if the north collapses.

There is no diplomatic solution to the war possible prior to this happening. There is no conceivable compromise that would be acceptable to both Russia and Ukraine given the losses they have taken at this point. …

Putin will not survive the defeat of his army. He gets support because he is perceived to be a strongman; what does he have to offer once he demonstrates incompetence and is stripped of his coercive power? …

The war to this point has been a good lesson for China. Like Russia, China has built up seemingly high-tech military forces in the past decade, but they have no combat experience. The miserable performance of the Russian air force would likely be replicated by the People’s Liberation Army Air Force, which similarly has no experience managing complex air operations. We may hope that the Chinese leadership will not delude itself as to its own capabilities the way the Russians did when contemplating a future move against Taiwan.

Hopefully Taiwan itself will wake up as to the need to prepare to fight as the Ukrainians have done, and restore conscription. Let’s not be prematurely defeatist.
Turkish drones will become bestsellers.

A Russian defeat will make possible a “new birth of freedom,” and get us out of our funk about the declining state of global democracy. The spirit of 1989 will live on, thanks to a bunch of brave Ukrainians.

RTWT

I hope he’s right this time.

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4 Feedbacks on "Fukuyama Predicts Russian Defeat"

Fusil Darne

Francis has a unique way of casually missing Biden’s disasters in Afghanistan, on the border, and with nonstop printing of money, actually everything he has touched has gone to hell, while being incredibly upset by the riot on January 6th, 2021. If he ever mentioned the riot that took place a year prior, at Trump’s inauguration, much less voiced an opinion about it, I missed it. He is part of a cartel that screams polarization is the main problem in the US today, and ignores that one side refers to everybody on the other side as racists, homophobes, bigots, white supremacists, nazis and whatever else is the slander de jour.
Sorry, not interested in hearing that before political discussion.
Polarization is what it will be, thank you very much. At least until the bloodbath that is the mid term elections this year, at which point I pray for vengeance.



Steverino

I agree that the MiG-29 deal would not help Ukraine much. The MiG-29 is an air-to-air fighter, but the Russians have not established air superiority in Ukraine out of incompetence. When you consider that big fat Russian convoy, thirty miles long, stopped dead, it’s obvious that a squadron of A-10 ground attack jets would make mincemeat of that.

That said, the convoy is also a feast for Javelin anti-tank missiles. Hit the vanguard and rear guard, preferably at a choke point where the road traverses a swamp or at a bridge over a ravine. Then, pick off the trapped body of the convoy at your leisure.

Such a strategy would replicate the Battle of Teutoburg Forest (aka Battle of Varus), in 9 AD, when a force of German barbarians annihilated three Roman legions marching, stretched out on a forest trail.



Mike-SMO

It probably would have been nice to take over the cities and infrastructure of the Ukraine but that bit of turf is too important for Putin’s dreams of European domination for him to back off.

https://neveryetmelted.com/2022/03/07/russias-motivations/

The invasion force seems to be made of expendable conscripts. If they fail, there is always the traditional Russian tactic of massed artillery and rocket fire. Then Putin gets to purge the incompetents in the military. Unless somebody really smart comes up with something, there is a blood bath coming. Ignore the theatrical wailing about NATO, missiles and Russian history, we are talking money and power. The climate fantasy crew will probably be happy with high fuel costs and fuel restrictions, but that will destroy Europe as a significant society.



Fusil Darne

There is a rather serious requirement for a squadron, or, even one, A10 to be used in theater, and that is absolute air superiority. An A10 is ungainly and slow, and not an air to air combat platform. So, you can forget that.
I am completely disturbed that anyone can believe that Joe Biden has done a “masterful” job at this. He has not. If he had, special operations people would have been on the ground in the Ukraine about the time of Biden’s Afghanistan debacle, teaching the army there about asymmetrical warfare.They were not. Javelin and Stinger missiles would have been in place for months. They were not. The internet and secure communications would have been in place, and hardened against disruption. They were not. NATO would not have been caught so completely off guard at such an obvious development.
No matter what Francis believes, Biden is a failure, at anything he touches.



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