The use of hard power ...

A Russian convoy headed toward Georgia in 2008.

Credit...Louisa Gouliamaki/Agence France-Presse -- Getty Images

Friends in the past have accused yours truly being a pessimist based on takes on AI, the environment, inequality and incompetency on the part of America's so-called leaders, entities bought and paid for by the MIC and significant others. Seems the opinions of this rube has been fairly accurate guesstimates based on what's happening in the world today.

The betting pool of civilizations such as ours surviving is 50/50 at best based on the aformentioned state of affairs stated above and we haven even discussed The Art of War and how it applies to the situation today in Europe as the West is rotten from the inside out and Putin understands the tenets of The Art of War without question.

The beginning of The Art of War in a classical bamboo book from the reign of the Qianlong Emperor

There is no world leader today with a better track record when it comes to using military power than President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia. Whether against Georgia in 2008, Ukraine in 2014, or in Syria since 2015, the Russian military has repeatedly converted battlefield success into political victories. Russia’s rearmament over the past decade and a half has been unmatched by a comparable increase in Western capabilities. So it is no surprise why Russia feels emboldened to use its military power while the West stands by.

In the modernization of Russia's Military, something done at a tiny fraction of the waste and incompetency of the Pentagon, said country's armed to the teeth and has the advantage of ground when waging war against the Ukraine. In the long run, however, Putin now has his Vietnam as indigenous fighters don't have to win but rather, outlast.

“We are 50 percent plus of global G.D.P.,” Jake Sullivan, President Biden’s national security adviser, argued recently, contrasting this to Russia’s unimpressive 3 percent share of the world’s economic output. However, economies don’t fight wars; militaries do. America’s economic power was tested when Mr. Biden threatened tough sanctions if Russia were to invade Ukraine; Mr. Putin did so anyway, betting that hard power would carry the day.

Summing it up ...

The U.S. strategy of making public intelligence about Russia’s military buildup around Ukraine was clever, but Mr. Putin has called our bluff. It was once popular to mock the Russian president for his 19th-century worldview, but his use of military power to bolster Russia’s influence has worked in the 21st century, too. The West’s assumption that the arc of history naturally bends in its direction is looking naïve. So, too, is the decision to let our military advantage slip. Soft power and economic influence are fine capabilities to have, but they cannot stop Russian armor as it rolls toward Kyiv.

As for the rest of the guesstimates, AI looms in the background as per a BRT post titled Why the Future Doesn't Need Us - 2022 while the specter of GW and the future of the world will be discussed in another blurb containing "salacious" material of another kind. :)