Can’t Win for Losing

Mr. Putin has already lost the war.

He just doesn’t realize it yet.

Vladimir is in that unique but awkward place where even if you win, you lose. We’ve all been there though the stakes for the Russian leader, any World leader really, are a scale of magnitude greater than they would be for simple folk like you and me. 

In underestimating the determination and resolve of both the Ukrainian people as well as most of the world community it may still come to pass that Mr. Putin does in fact physically control the land that was the sovereign country of Ukraine. In that sense he may think he has won what he set out to accomplish. But in doing so he las lost far more than he gained:

- The Ukrainian people will never accept the yoke of Russian tyranny. Any sense of kinship that purportedly existed between Ukrainians and Russians (part of the pretext for Mr. Putin’s action) has evaporated as rapidly as the oxygen in a Russian cluster bomb blast

- The Russian people will come to realize the yoke of Putin’s tyranny akin to Lenin, Stalin, etc. Maria Ovsyannikova, pictured left, interrupting a live Russian newscast may have sacrificed her life but it will be her image, not yours Mr. Putin, that will hang in the Halls of Freedom for eternity

- The World community (save possibly for China, North Korea, Bulgaria and a handful of other outliers) will consider Russia a pariah for at least as long as Mr. Putin draws breath

- Any legitimacy Russia had gained since Ronald Reagan told Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987 to “Tear down this wall” and… the wall actually came down, has now been squandered to no one’s benefit

- For Russia to seemingly control Ukraine it seems as if it will have to destroy the country town by town, city by city. What will be left after such mad destruction Mr. Putin and what good will what remains do you?

- It is anticipated that as many as 80,000 Ukrainian babies will be born over the next several months to mothers who were already pregnant when the Russian invasion began. Many will be born as refugees who no longer have a home, many will never know their fathers as Russia continues to crush Ukraine’s brave defenders. They will grow to hate you Mr. Putin as their mothers relate what you did to their country, their homes, and their families. Your legacy will indeed long outlive you but it may not be the legacy you had aspired to

- President Zelenskyy may win the Nobel Peace Prize as proxy for his brave people; Mr. Putin will possibly face charges brought by the International Criminal Court joining a long (too, too long) list of global who’s who guilty of things like Genocide, Crimes Against Humanity, War Crimes, and Crimes of Aggression

It is the nature of the world that events must unfold as they will. In the short term the atrocity that is War will continue. Seemingly, Mr. Putin is impervious to anyone other than his own demons so those demons will have their day, their pound of flesh. But he will eventually come to learn a simple lesson most of us learned way before our 70th birthday - sometimes you can’t win for losing.

Joe Biden, speaking to Vladimir Putin in 2011: “Mr. Prime Minister, I’m looking into your eyes, and I don’t think you have a soul.”

Mr. Putin’s response: “We understand each other.”