Russia's Vladimir Putin claims that the west has already lost in Ukraine and that the US led international order is over.

 

Vladimir Putin. Newsweek/Getty.

Russia's Vladimir Putin claimed in a speech to Russian lawmakers that the west has already lost in Ukraine and that the US led international order is over. Newsweek. Putin said that the west lost as soon as the war in Ukraine started. He also said that there will be a transition from a unipolar US led world to a multipolar one and that the process has already begun. Putin also blamed the war in Ukraine on the United States and other western countries and said that they had been trying to interfere with Russia for years. 

 

Putin says the West already lost its confrontation with Russia, and now a fundamental and irreversible breakdown of the American-led liberal order is well under way. pic.twitter.com/OBFGh01SYc

— AZ 🛰🌏🌍🌎 (@AZmilitary1) July 12, 2022

My Comment:

I don't agree with everything Putin said here but much of it is spot on. My biggest disagreement with Putin is that the west alone started the war. Though I do think they deserve a large amount of the blame for the war the fact is that Russia didn't have to invade and could have used other means to accomplish their goals. Putin will always have responsibility for the war.  

I also don't think that Ukraine ever could have won the war unless it was a full scale war with US and other allies directly participating in combat. Russia always had way more troops than Ukraine and they also have better technology than Ukraine, and increasingly, the west. 

But that wasn't really why I wanted to make a post about this speech that Putin gave last week. The biggest takeaway is not something I disagree with at all. It's the idea that the American led hegemony is on the way out. That much seems obvious and I can't disagree with Putin there. 

Putin cites western failures in Ukraine as evidence of this and I can't disagree. After the initial missteps in the war and the failure to capture Kiev, Russia has turned things around there and now controls all of Luhansk and much of the rest of Donbass. The billions of dollars in weapons and support we have given Ukraine has not significantly changed the outcome of the war. Sure, the proliferation of western anti-tank and anti-air missiles made the Russians switch tactics from tank warfare to World War I style artillery duels, but that's about all it accomplished. 

In addition the United States mostly failed to get the rest of the world onboard with western sanctions against Russia. Europe went along with it but that's about it. Asia, Africa and South America told us to pound sand. Speaking of pounding sand, when Biden wanted to get more oil from the Middle East they wouldn't even take his calls. I know Biden is going to visit Saudi Arabia soon but I doubt much will be accomplished. 

It is also important to note how little Western sanctions did to Russia. Sure, they have had some problems and economic issues but for the most part they have survived. The west is not doing anywhere near as well with prices on just about everything exploding and Europe seriously wondering if they are going to be able to heat their homes this winter. 

Another good example of our failure recently is the fall of Afghanistan. Though the event has largely been memoryholed, it can't be understated how embarrassing the event was. Our withdrawal was an absolute disaster and it left us with a lot of dead soldiers and little else. We were there for 20 years and the end of the war and the beginning ended the same way. With the Taliban in power. 

Russia and China are also obviously a lot more powerful now than they have been in years. And they are gaining allies while the west is losing them. They are creating parallel networks to avoid western sanctions and generally succeeding. With the United States waning in power there will be a vacuum that will be filled.  

Is this outcome set in stone? Probably. If Joe Biden wasn't in power right now much of the damage he has done could be reversed. But Biden, or Kamala Harris if something happens to him, will be in power until 2024. And at that point I think it will be too late. Russia will likely have won the war in Ukraine by then and then our credibility will be shot. 

I would say that Russia should remember that just because America seems to be on the way out that does not mean that Russia will be the one in charge next. Indeed, I think the best thing that Russia will get is as a junior partner to China. But that's if they are lucky. In a China dominated world, China will likely take whatever they want from Russia after they don't have to worry about the United States anymore...