[stnikolauswagne]

If this is not a strategic defeat then I struggle to think of what a defeat would actually look like. Ukrainian Troops entering the Kremlim?

They managed to: -get Sweden and Finland to finally join Nato

-completely demolish their entire military export potential

-lose half their warchest because they kept it in foreign banks

-lose all kinds of prestige the „mighty“ russian military had

-severely diminish the arms stocks they had left over from the soviet union

-lose the flagship of one of their fleets to a nation without a navy

-publically had one of their mercenary companies march on their capital in revolt

In exchange the land might gain from this is going to be completely devastated from the war.

Compare all of this to the 2014 fiasco where they ended up with crimea in exchange for some minor-ish sanctions,

[RandomThoughts3]

> -completely demolish their entire military export potential

Which buyer have they lost? I fail to see any. Most of their customers distrust the US and Turkey didn’t denounce their contracts as far as I know.

> -lose all kinds of prestige the „mighty“ russian military had

Did they? That’s unclear to me. Wagner is in more countries than ever.

> -severely diminish the arms stocks they had left over from the Soviet Union

Their defence industry output is the highest it has ever been and wasn’t stopped by the various embargo they are under.

> -publically had one of their mercenary companies march on their capital in revolt

Before Putin very publicly showing that he is still the sole master of the country. With Russian propaganda on the ground, it wasn’t ever a minor setback for them.

Plus, give it six months more and they might have humiliated the west by actually mostly winning the war with Ukraine which everyone say they would never win.

I know the western media needs to parrot that Russian is the complete loser here to keep support high but the reality doesn’t seem that clear to me.

Don’t get me wrong I’m not saying it’s an overwhelming victory from Russia. I’m saying that if you look at it like if Russia had overwhelming lost, you will completely misanalyse both the situation today and its implication for the future.

[klibertp]

> Plus, give it six months more [...] mostly winning the war

I'd agree even two weeks ago, but then Kursk happened. So far, Russia's response to that has been weak. While it will be hard for Ukraine to use that as a foothold to advance deeper into Russia due to geography (mountains and rivers, I'm told), it will also be challenging for Russia to take back the territory. It's also not a big enough threat to "endanger the existence of the Russian state", so they probably won't be using tactical nukes there. With that, "winning" is going to be very hard - it looks much more like a tie now. What are your thoughts on that?