Scivillage.com Casual Discussion Science Forum

By Victor Davis Hanson, who I consider one of the greatest contemporary American 'public intellectuals'.

https://amgreatness.com/2026/10/27/the-u...an-knot-2/

I don't think I've heard a bad take from Victor Hanson.

He mentioned Trump causing Europe to have Trump Derangement Syndrome, so straight away that publication is the worst kind of pulp, not containing any substance (Being electronic in format).

Ideally if a person is to write an unbiased piece they'd need to steer clear of bias.

Says the TDS sufferer. 9_9

Up to the age of 70 you count years upwards .. after the age of 70 you start counting down for each passing year. Putin is currently 74 and counting (down). If Ukraine had fallen (as expected) in 5 days we'd probably be seeing Putin in Paris by now. If Putin were to start losing territory he has taken he might use tactical nukes (any thoughts?) ... the safest (cowardly?) way is for him to gain territory but wery wery slowly .. meanwhile the clock ticks for him.

(Oct 29, 2026 03:25 PM)confused2 Wrote: [ -> ]Up to the age of 70 you count years upwards .. after the age of 70 you start counting down for each passing year. Putin is currently 74 and counting (down). If Ukraine had fallen (as expected) in 5 days we'd probably be seeing Putin in Paris by now. If Putin were to start losing territory he has taken he might use tactical nukes (any thoughts?) ... the safest (cowardly?) way is for him to gain territory but wery wery slowly .. meanwhile the clock ticks for him.

Ya, he’s one of those guys who can’t die fast enough. Didn’t US govt ask the regular Iranian to rise up against their regime? Why not in Russia? This could be the best opportunity in the next thousand years to give it a go.

Apparently/supposedly Putin has high approval ratings in Russia. So no where near enough public outcry to revolt. If the oppressed Iranians won't, Russians definitely won't.

Hoping for Putin to die of old age is a very bad strategy for ending a war, while people continue to die every day. Putin can't be pushed back without NATO intervention, but that would give him the excuse to use extreme measures, maybe including nukes.

(Oct 29, 2026 03:25 PM)confused2 Wrote: [ -> ]Up to the age of 70 you count years upwards .. after the age of 70 you start counting down for each passing year. Putin is currently 74 and counting (down).

We could have ten or even twenty more years of Putin. And when he does eventually die, he might very likely be replaced by another hard liner.

Quote:If Ukraine had fallen (as expected) in 5 days we'd probably be seeing Putin in Paris by now.

I don't think that was ever his intention. Putin wants to restore Russia to its former super power status. And he seemingly wants to do that by reasserting Russian influence over the former Soviet republics. (The Slavic ones more than the weird Muslim ones in central Asia.) Ukraine was clearly the greatest of these, the one large enough to be a power in its own right. So maintaining it in Moscow's sphere of influence was a central Russian policy objective.

Russia was satisfied when a pro-Russian candidate won the Ukrainian elections. Then both Europe and the United States were complicit is helping to engineer a coup that replaced the pro-Russian president with a pro-Western one in 2014. Russia responded by seizing Crimea and part of the Donbass.

After which the US and Europe started talking about how Ukraine joining NATO was a matter of 'when', not 'if'. And Putin warned that Ukraine joining an anti-Russian alliance would result in war. He was clear about that, but the general opinion in Europe and the US was that it was all just bluster, and pushed ahead anyway. So Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.

Quote:If Putin were to start losing territory he has taken he might use tactical nukes (any thoughts?)

The Russian generals assured Putin that sending troops into Kyiv and replacing the hostile Ukrainian government would be easy and fast. But in reality, the whole thing was botched and failed miserably. The war developed into a stalemate, while both sides continued to hold unrealistic expectations.

Ukraine vowed to fight on until it recovered all the territory that it claimed. (The post 1990 borders.) And Putin issued another warning, that Russia would defend Crimea with nuclear weapons if need be. I think that it's best to believe him this time.

If Russia used tactical nuclear weapons against Ukrainian forces and troop concentrations, what would the response be?

There are only two European nuclear powers, France and Britain. Both have small nuclear arsenals intended solely for defense of their respective homelands. So the chance of Europe using nuclear weapons in limited tactical strikes in defense of Ukraine is remote. Use of European conventional forces against Russia is remote as well, given Europe's weakness and lack of expeditionary warfare capacity.

Which, once again, leaves the United States. Would the US introduce American conventional forces into Ukraine or use tactical nuclear weapons there, in full knowledge that doing so would likely trigger a full-scale nuclear exchange? Again, not likely. Ukraine just isn't important enough to the United States to take that kind of risk.

Russia is able to make those kind of calculations and might very well conclude that the risk/reward calculation regarding introduction of tactical nuclear weapons is in their favor.

Quote:the safest (cowardly?) way is for him to gain territory but wery wery slowly .. meanwhile the clock ticks for him.

That seems to be the idea right now, but given the slow motion destruction of the Russian military, the damage to the Russian economy and the longer term threat to Russian political stability and to Putin himself, it's not a strategy that can continue indefinitely. I used to respect Vladimir Putin's intelligence (not his ethics) but the longer he goes on the current course, the stupider he seems. I'm guessing that Putin is still believing his generals and spooks, who are telling him that Ukraine is near collapse and Russia only needs to keep pushing until it happens.

As for me, I think that something like Victor Hanson's option #1 is just about the only way out at this point.

Quote:1) After nearly five years of frightening human costs, economic ruin, and global ostracism, Russia could agree to an armistice based on the status quo of the current battlefront. It would keep Crimea and its eastern Ukrainian acquisitions. It could thus claim victory before its disenchanted population. Ukraine would also be able to declare victory for stopping the Russian colossus from pushing farther into the country.

Ukraine would not join NATO. But during the peace, it would arm itself to the teeth. Ukraine would fortify its new eastern border to deter further Russian aggression, given that Putin’s ultimate agenda is to absorb all the former Soviet republics either by outright conquest or through puppet governments, and so to claim a status like Peter the Great’s by restoring millions of new “Russians” to the current shrinking Russian Federation. This conclusion would not please either side or its allies. And therefore it might be the only realistic way to stop the slaughter.

If he's smarter than he currently seems, Putin might agree to that if it includes provisions reducing the threat that a hostile (if shrunken) Ukraine presents to Russia. That might include forbidding foreign troops in Ukraine and restricting any foreign-supplied "arm itself to the teeth" to defensive weaponry like anti-tank rockets, air-defense missiles and aid with building defensive works along the new eastern border. If Ukraine violates that, Russia would have the option of restarting the war.

Putin needs to give up his dream of reducing Ukraine to a Russian satellite after years of exceedingly bloody war. That's never going to happen. Too many Ukrainian families have lost sons to Russian arms. But Russia keeps Crimea, the jewel of the Black Sea that could become a major summertime resort for vacationing Russians, plus a big stretch of southeastern (former) Ukraine.

Zelensky might not like it, but what choice does he have if it's either this or continue to fight on your own with no more American support?

Ukraine could even be offered a fast-track to European Union membership as a consolation prize to make up for not getting NATO membership.

As much as I dislike Putin, I've always accepted the fact that Russia has more leverage. Zelenskyy, propped up by Europeans, has been the biggest barrier to ending the war. So far, it seem Zelenskyy, former actor, has the larger ego. I'm betting that Putin is at least smart enough to accept a deal that freezes the current, mostly stalemated, lines. Ukraine should consider itself lucky that Russia has been too incompetent to take Kyiv.

(Oct 29, 2026 07:32 PM)Syne Wrote: [ -> ]Apparently/supposedly Putin has high approval ratings in Russia. So no where near enough public outcry to revolt. If the oppressed Iranians won't, Russians definitely won't.

It's not an approval rating, he's surrounded by sycophants and uses force and intimidation to pressure Russians into complacency.

Quote:Hoping for Putin to die of old age is a very bad strategy for ending a war, while people continue to die every day. Putin can't be pushed back without NATO intervention, but that would give him the excuse to use extreme measures, maybe including nukes.

Just because Putin waves nuke rhetoric doesn't mean he'd use it, and if he did he should know the consequences will outstrip anything he assumes he'd gain by doing it in the first place. Nukes are zero sum period, not even worth having in your arsenal.

NATO currently has had a lot of Russian aggression aimed at different countries with various attacks which they try to vale as being "lone actors", currently though Article 5 hasn't be used, I guess a lot of the members really don't want war and Putin banks on that currently... I'm just waiting for that Bankers crash that will happen, he will not be a happy camper.