While both Moscow and Kiev think they will benefit from continued fighting, such a turn of events does not serve Washington's best interests, the Pentagon's think tank RAND Corporation argues in a new report published on Friday.
Authored by Samuel Charap and Miranda Priebe, "Avoiding a Long War" accepts the prevailing premises about the conflict, but notes that US interests "often align with but are not synonymous with Ukrainian interests."
According to the authors, the conflict has already inflicted significant economic, military and reputational damage on Russia, so its "further incremental weakening is arguably no longer as significant a benefit for US interests."
The price to the West has not been insignificant either, from the disruption to energy, food and fertilizer markets to the cost of "keeping the Ukrainian state economically solvent," which will only "multiply over time."
NATO's military aid to Ukraine "could also become unsustainable after a certain period," while Russia may "reverse Ukrainian battlefield gains," they said. The conflict is "absorbing senior policymakers' time and US military resources," distracting Washington from other global priorities, such as China, while pushing Moscow closer to Beijing.
"In short, the consequences of a long war - ranging from persistent elevated escalation risks to economic damage - far outweigh the possible benefits."The study describes President Vladimir Zelensky's vision of victory, in which Ukraine would recover all the territories it lays claim to and force Russia to submit to war crimes trials and reparations, as "optimistic" and "improbable."
Moscow, "perceives this war to be near existential" and has signaled "a high level of resolve," the authors caution, raising the probability it might use nuclear weapons if it feels threatened.
Prospects for some kind of negotiated peace are "poor in the near term," the report acknowledges, as Kiev believes Western support will continue indefinitely, while Moscow has been given no reason to believe the sanctions will ever be lifted.
The US could "condition future military aid on a Ukrainian commitment to negotiations," while giving Kiev security commitments, but "not as binding as US mutual defense treaties" or NATO membership, the report suggested. Washington should also give Moscow assurances regarding Ukraine's neutrality and set "conditions for sanctions relief."
Founded in 1948 by the US military-industrial complex, RAND has provided the Pentagon with policy advice for decades. In 2019, the think tank provided a blueprint for "overextending and unbalancing" Russia that included economic sanctions, sending weapons to Ukraine, promoting uprisings in Central Asia and even deploying more nuclear weapons to Europe. By contrast, the advice on how to avoid escalation with Moscow while arming Kiev, from July last year, seems to have had little to no effect.
And there it is the pivot after the US/NAZI NATO bluff got called.
Conclusion;
”The debate in Washington and other Western capitals over the future of the Russia-Ukraine war privileges the issue of territorial control. Hawkish voices argue for using increased military assistance to facilitate the Ukrainian military’s reconquest of the entirety of the country’s terri- tory.71 Their opponents urge the United States to adopt the pre-February 2022 line of control as the objective, citing the escalation risks of pushing further.72 Secretary of State Antony Blinken has stated that the goal of U.S. policy is to enable Ukraine “to take back territory that’s been seized from it since February 24. ”73.
Our analysis suggests that this debate is too narrowly focused on one dimension of the war’s trajectory. Territorial control, although immensely important to Ukraine, is not the most important dimension of the war’s future for the United States. We conclude that, in addition to averting possible escalation to a Russia-NATO war or Russian nuclear use, avoiding a long war is also a higher priority for the United States than facilitating significantly more Ukrainian territorial control. Furthermore, the U.S. ability to micromanage where the line is ultimately drawn is highly constrained since the U.S. military is not directly involvedin the fighting. Enabling Ukraine’s territorial control is also far from the only instrument available to the United States to affect the trajectory of the war. We have highlighted several other tools—potentially more potent ones—that Washington can use to steer the war toward a trajectory that better promotes U.S. interests. Whereas the United States cannot determine the territorial outcome of the war directly, it will not have direct control over these policies.”
Translated ;
We completely fooked up, over estimated the entire World View situation, got caught in multiple lies again & got our asses handed to us, lost our hegemony & ability to dictate control over the planet’s multipolar powers. We let our Alligator
JewsJaws talk out our Canary asses.What a shameful display of geopolitical shameless arrogance, hubris, tyranny, failed Nazi NATO Operation Gladio part 3 Junta ideology & wasted sacrifice & unnecessary deaths of so many Ukrainians & Poles. Zionazilensky got “punked”. He should kill himself & do humanity a solid.