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On the contrary, Europe (I mean EU, Britain is a different story) is probably the biggest and the only true winner. Russia may get what it wants, but Europe al
by ivan_gammel 1y ago
On the contrary, Europe (I mean EU, Britain is a different story) is probably the biggest and the only true winner.
Russia may get what it wants, but Europe already got something from it too.
1. Major influx of workforce - many Ukrainians do not intend to go home according to polls
2. Push to a stronger union less dependent on America for defense
3. Push to less dependency on Russian oil and gas (yes, gas could have helped with transition to cleaner energy, but we may be doing well even without it)
Eventually - soon enough - Russian gas will be back. But Europe will come from this war stronger both militarily and politically and more united.
America is clear loser: what a mess it has become. Not being able to do anything with this conflict, it demonstrated that nuclear non-proliferation is dead. Nobody will give up their nuclear weapons now as Ukraine did in 1990s in exchange for empty promises of security guarantees.
Ukraine may have won some political independence at a very high cost and with some strings attached, but it has lost one third of its population and significant part of its territory - forever. And it is likely that it’s not going to get NATO membership. Was all of it worth it?..
Russia is an interesting case here. It‘s going to win. Sanctions don’t work. Foreign reserves are all time high. The economy is suffering mainly from self-inflicted damage, not for external reasons: enormous military budget and insufficient workforce (not least because Central Asian workers are hesitant to work in Russia now and their number was bigger than war casualties). Western brands left the country temporarily and many will come back. It has acquired new territories and will be actively spending there on reconstruction — that’s going to add extra points to GDP. It is hard to say, if the combined economic outcome will be positive or negative. Was it worth it?… It depends who answers. Politically it’s more stable than ever with national-conservatives in power, which is very important, because by 2030s it will be busy with the transition of power (and certainly not attacking NATO in Baltics as some delusional hotheads think). When the war ends it will be able to shift spending to social topics, which + the victory will give the necessary political capital for the transition.