Iraq WMD[0] were moved from Iraq to Syria by air bridge[1], where they are used frequently[2].
USA spent lot of effort to strip Ukraine from nuclear weapons and other military tech which can be used to harm USA, see Budapest memorandum. Just year ago, USA predicted that Ukraine will fall in two weeks, but Ukraine refused to comply with that.
You're right. Both USA and Russia had terribly miscalculated, while they were both arming terrorists and ramping up the proxy war in Ukraine.
If Russia attacked Ukraine's capital the way USA attacked Iraq and other countries ("shock and awe" and carpet bombing) then yes they would have surrendered. Russia did this in Syria (Aleppo, Homs) and Chechnya (Grozny) where the entire city was razed to the ground. There, they were fighting anti-government forces, and just like in Afghanistan etc. they were very brutal.
It had all the same elements: NATO welcoming Georgia, two breakaway republics who wanted independence, Russia intervening on their behalf, Russia sending a slow-moving convoy of tanks to the capitol to intimidate them and force them to agree to stop shelling these breakaway regions forever. (Russia of course would station peacekeepers there to make sure of that, and also to protect their black sea fleet / military interests).
The difference is, in that war, they reached an agreement in a week, and the war was over. Nicolas Sarkozy helped make that happen.
This time around, Ukraine was too far into NATO + CIA arming and training their army and irregulars (far-right batallions) all over the country, for it to have ended that way. Russia had hoped that it would all be over by the time the tanks reached Kyiv. But that never happened.
Here is a lot of evidence for this:
1) Russia already had done this exact thing with Georgia. It's more reasonable to expect them to want to do the same thing and expect a similar result. After the agreement, Russia never went further to take over all of Georgia nor since 2008 went beyond stationing peacekeepers in the breakaway republics, so all the breathless claims that if peace agreement is reached, Russia will continue invading Europe, seem to be totally contradicted in the case of Georgia.
2) All military experts were baffled why Russia didn't use its air superiority to decisively win in a few days
They badly miscalculated, yes, but even if they hadn't -- doing a Desert Storm was never an option. Two primary reasons.
If Russia attacked Ukraine's capital the way USA attacked
Iraq and other countries ("shock and awe" and carpet
bombing) then yes they would have surrendered.
One: Russia never had the option of carrying out that sort of attack because they have repeatedly demonstrated that their military isn't capable of carrying out those sorts of ultra high tempo, synchronized, combined arms operations. Russia has some modern toys, but their ability to actually conduct a war is essentially WWII (if not WWI) era attacks with artillery and human waves.
Two: Anti-tank and anti-aircraft defenses are more potent and more plentiful than they were in the conflicts you named. I'm not even sure that the US could pull a Desert Storm these days in an era of S300/S400 air defenses and anti-tank Javelins.
This time around, Ukraine was too far into NATO + CIA arming
and training their army and irregulars (far-right batallions)
all over the country, for it to have ended that way. Russia
had hoped that it would all be over by the time the tanks
reached Kyiv. But that never happened.
I don't know that we need conspiracy thinking here. After Georgia and Crimea it wasn't exactly rocket science to see that Putin was going to keep snatching up territory every few years. Yes, NATO attempted appeasement in the past... it clearly. did. not. work.
NATO needed to draw a line in the sand, and Ukraine was willing to fight.
I'm also curious about this statement:
Both USA and Russia had terribly miscalculated
How has the USA miscalculated? They have a partner in Ukraine who is willing to fight like a demon to hold back Putin and dissuade him from attempting more of this in the future. All NATO has to do is send toys and money. The strategic value NATO is getting here is tremendous, and most of the world seems to think that stopping Putin is a just cause.
All military experts were baffled why Russia didn't use its air
superiority to decisively win in a few days
Really? Not the ones I follow. This is pretty cut and dried. Air superiority against Ukraine's air defenses would require some really hellacious SEAD (suppression of enemy air defenses) operations and a willingness to sustain some shocking and expensive (by modern standards) losses of fighter aircraft.
Russia has the ability to do neither of those things. They don't have stealthy aircraft, they don't have a lot of aircraft in general, and they can't afford those losses. I'm actually surprised that anybody would be surprised.
They clearly miscalculated since they thought Ukraine would surrender in days, and offered Zelensky a plane to fly out of there. They had expected to sacrifice the Ukrainian people by waging a years-long guerilla war arming neo-nazi groups with stingers and so on, just as they did the Mujahideen in Afghanistan. Just for reference 2 million civilians died in the Afghan war we perpetuated just to stick it to the Soviets and “make them bleed for as long and as hard as possible”.
Whenever governments try to force others, it backfires:
1) Ukraine tried to force Donetsk and Luhansk to submit, bombed them and didn’t want to give them autonomy. Russia got involved and now Ukraine is in much worse shape.
2) Russia tried to force Ukraine to submit, stop bombing Donetsk and not join NATO. They rolled in with tanks, but USA and NATO got involved, and now Russia is stuck in a quagmire and is economically isolated from the West. Putin got the very NATO unity and expansion he feared.
3) The USA tried to force Europe and the rest of the world to sanction Russia “or else” economically, even (likely) blew up the gas pipelines so there would be no temptation to renew relations with Russia. Now US dollar hegemony is increasingly under threat, and going down from its peak. USA gets the very exodus from the dollar that it feared.
BRICS is an expanding economic alliance against USA just like NATO is a military alliance against Russia (and soon, QUAD will be a military alliance against China).
China is taking a leadership position in the world, it will likele reconcile Saudi Arabia and Iran (sunnis and shiites), end the war in Yemen, and take them both into BRICS. It will own the Middle East. BRICS already rivals G7 in economic size and far exceeds it in population but they are now working on bilateral trade and a basket of currencies to exit US dollar.
That means all that free stuff from abroad will be coming to an end and the dollar’s purchssing power will be lower, and less H1B visa scientists coming to boost our ranks.
It always backfires when you try to push people around. Better to simply listen to them and care about their issues.
They clearly miscalculated since they thought Ukraine
would surrender in days, and offered Zelensky a plane
to fly out of there
That's a contingency plan, not a miscalculation. Of course it makes sense to be prepared for as many possible outcomes as possible.
If Zelensky was willing to fight, we were ready to arm him. If Zelensky was not willing to fight, we were willing to offer him safety because he would be much more useful in American hands than Russian ones, and we would have armed insurgents.
To call this a "miscalculation" makes about as much sense as calling it a "miscalculation" to have fire extinguishers in your house if a fire never actually occurs.
They had expected to sacrifice the Ukrainian people
"Sacrificing" implies we're merely using them. This is a mutual arrangement. Nobody is forcing Ukraine to fight. They are willing, and we are arming and assisting them. No, it's not idealistic altruism but we share common goals.
It always backfires when you try to push people around.
Better to simply listen to them and care about their issues.
I don't disagree with the second half of your post, but it's a massive non-sequitur. Nobody is pushing Ukraine into fighting.
You logic is hard to follow. Can you explain why Ukraine suddenly invaded Ukraine, annexed Crimea, started to bomb Ukrainian cities and how Russia was involved into all that?
Iraq WMD[0] were moved from Iraq to Syria by air bridge[1], where they are used frequently[2].
USA spent lot of effort to strip Ukraine from nuclear weapons and other military tech which can be used to harm USA, see Budapest memorandum. Just year ago, USA predicted that Ukraine will fall in two weeks, but Ukraine refused to comply with that.
[0]: https://2001-2009.state.gov/r/pa/ei/rls/18714.htm [1]: https://www.foxnews.com/story/exclusive-former-top-military-... [2]: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-23927399