The purpose of CIA Director John Ratcliffe’s visit to Moscow this week was to warn Russia not to attack NATO member states, according to multiple people familiar with the matter, amid U.S. intelligence assessments that Russia could try to test NATO.
The purpose of CIA Director John Ratcliffe’s visit to Moscow this week was to warn Russia not to attack NATO member states, according to multiple people familiar with the matter, amid U.S. intelligence assessments that Russia could try to test NATO.
Here’s the thing: Putin genuinely believes the West is hedonistic and degenerate. His view, which is enforced by the people around him, is that we will avoid war at all costs.
Putin’s logic therefore is that he doesn’t actually have to defeat NATO on the battlefield, but that he simply needs to scare and intimidate us enough for us to break cohesion and back down.
In other words, with every single month that goes by without the EU withdrawing their support, Putin will be tempted to escalate further, hoping with each new provocation that this will will finally be the one that breaks the West’s defiance.
This is laughable offcourse, as many EU countries are directly being threatened by Russia’s aggression and thus have a vested interest not just in defended themselves, but in having Russia choke itself on Ukraine.
In other words, yes Russia’s army can’t stand toe to toe with NATO but Putin’s misguided beliefs and strategic incompetence are nonetheless increasing the chances of this war spilling over into a full scale war between NATO and Russia.