Damn

The endgame? Further ally himself with China and challenge the dollar's status as the world's reserve currency.

I'm concerned about Sweden. They need to be in NATO asap

I don’t see how the current situation is a step towards that. If anything, it’s a step back.

ktt verdict in? nuke war? putin worse than skete??

i mean, they've surrounded all the major cities already and are just shipping more guys and supplies in as we speak, all with not a lot of resistance. When u are Ukrainian leadership and ur forced outside of ur country, and are aware that every major population center in ur control has already been surrounded, ur gonna be pretty willing to fold in peace talks, no?

Again, Putin does not need to officially annex before they stop fighting. What's much more likely is that Russia keeps a strong military presence in the country until Zelensky or some Pro-Russia puppet propped up as his replacement "choose" to become part of the Russian federation. Annihilation of Ukraine's cities is not the goal. The goal is just to let Zelensky know that Russia could annihilate these cities if they chose to do so, and that's kind of already where we are at.

In short, de-escalation will likely come before Ukraine is officially part of Russia. Putin's job is almost done already, now that Ukraine is in a chokehold. Fighting can relax and cities can catch their breath as "peace" talks ensure eventual Russian annexation.

well. i mean the real endgame is just more power

but those two things are two ways Russia hopes more power will manifest

This is literally how i feel about Putin's reason behind all of this... panic about his time being up, within Russia.

It seemed too abrupt and brazen to be strategic

lol i mean it's been like what a week? and Zelensky is already sitting down for "peace talks"?

honestly this seems to be going Putin's way. And again let me remind u that Dugin's book calls for the taking of Ukraine by whatever means necessary whenever the opportunity presents itself. Everything is going according to plan.

To a regular person it seems bizarre and pointless, but to a Russian leader who's well read on Dugin, this is exactly the right move. Oh and it's totally a success so far as well

Obviously Putin has imperialistic visions first and foremost, but the massive disruption in the financial markets and his crippled economy could potentially lead to teaming up with China and others to create a monetary system outside the dollar. I don't think China and many others would be so opposed.

I honestly don't believe Putin didn't throughly think this out, tbh. But that's just me..

Who's Dugin?

lmao exactly Ukraine has no choice

Zelensky can't sit down and refuse Putin's demands, or his s*** gets sent back to the stone age.

All he can rlly do at this point is hope that the conflict can end as quickly as possible with minimal deaths. And that's probably going to mean agreeing to s*** that will eventually lead to Ukraine getting annexed by Russia.

The thing is, Russia doesn't need to gain any ground, they've already surrounded all the major cities lol. Now they can just sit pretty until Zelensky folds.

A philosopher and neo-Nazi/fascist

Damn, scum. What he say in his book though?

Aleksandr Dugin. Russian Political theorist, and author of "foundations of Geopolitics".

As far as I know, his important work is not translated into English, but there are plenty of videos on youtube breaking it down

So like a Russian equivalent of Kissinger?