Thread by @ThreshedThought

Ukraine and the West (and, let's face it, Ukraine is in the Western alliance) need to start thinking about their strategic end state.

A thread.

It seems clear to me that the Russians have bitten off more than they can chew. The Ukrainians were ready and they've fought valiantly.

https://twitter.com/ThreshedThought/status/1497304143836454921?s=20&t=vswB_0XhtBZOTgFU-qEEfg

This has significantly narrowed Putin's options - he is now in a salvage operation to get out of Ukraine and save some face

https://twitter.com/ThreshedThought/status/1497512270104084483?s=20&t=vswB_0XhtBZOTgFU-qEEfg

(this assertion relies on him receiving truthful information about what is going on - which is not a given when we consider he has surrounded himself by yesmen.)

But basically Putin has achieved the opposite of what he wanted.

NATO is cohesive and responding.
The Ukrainians are a real country.
There are bank runs starting in Russia, and they are facing huge cyber attacks.
They have totally lost the info war. Zelinsky is a G!
etc.

But Putin clearly stated that he wanted something else:

A redesign of the European Security order.

And this is what I think the West should focus on ... we need a redesign of the European security order ... just not the way that Putin wanted.

(I am not saying the West/Ukraine shouldn't also continue to think very hard about winning the current war - there are lots of difficult times still to come ...

... like how to continue supplying the Ukrainians with the materiel that they need - and how to stop Putin escalating and causing massive civilian casualties.)

But we need to lift our eyes to the horizon and think about the end game.

Let's have a go at sketching out the strategic options.

Firstly - Putin has gambled on this war & lost.

This will make it much more difficult for him to cont leading Russia.

This is a good thing, but incredibly dangerous - he cld escalate in Ukraine, & power sqaubbles in Moscow would b incredibly dangerous

We must think about this

Yes, the West needs to think about how to get to a post-Putin Russia safely. It should think about what that Russia looks like.

I think in concert with this, Russian gangterism needs to be rolled back in Belarus, the Balkans, the Sahel, Georgia etc.

Ah but this is what caused this war in the first place - I hear you say. Russians felt that their traditional sphere of influence was being encroached on.

Well, its 2022, not 1822.

If those regions and countries don't want to ally with Russia they shouldn't have to.

But there is something huge that the West can do to help this transition.

The West needs to make a big-hearted, open and sincere offer to Russia. Join our clubs. Revitalise your European side. Bit like they did to Eastern Germany and Eastern Europe.

The point of this is to ally the West with Russia, against China, with whom Russia has a very skin-deep relationship with multiple strategic fracture points (central asia, sibera, the arctic etc).

So that's what I think the end state is: a post-putin russia, possibly demcratic, but with its influence rolled back, and allied to the West against China.

The War in Ukraine will redraw the European/Eurasian security order. Let us make sure that we have a clear vision of what it should look like.