Out of curiosity, what do you think should precipitate a war between nuclear powers? I mean, applying this principle consistently would mean that Russia can take whatever it wants in Europe, except for UK and France.
Well UK and France are both nuclear powers, so that would be war between nuclear powers. And they're NATO members, so that would be war with another nuclear power, the US, as well. Probably more, I can't remember other nuclear powers in NATO off the top of my head, but probably more again. There's no "deciding not to be at war or to go to war" in the case you present.
I'm not advocating absolutist pacifism in any way. But a nuclear exchange could conceivably end advanced civilization on Earth. There are very few test cases in history for direct armed conflict between nuclear capable forces. The only one I can think of is the Cuban missile crisis, where we were 1 out of 3 Soviet sub commanders away from a nuclear tipped torpedo being launched at a US coastal city (they were being buffeted by depth charges, so arguably under attack, and out of communication with command). I don't like those odds.
If dealing with a mostly rational and consistent nuclear opposition, it is perfectly sensible accept certain compromises in order to avoid direct conflict. If you pay attention and read history, you'll see various instances of this happening on both the NATO and Soviet (and then Russian) side over the years.
That's why I said "except UK and France". The rest of Europe doesn't have any nukes. If Russia decides to steamroll it with conventional firepower, at what point should NATO push back?
(Article 5 is not automatic, either - if some NATO country invokes it, the rest will still have to decide if they are actually willing to risk a nuclear conflict to defend against a conventional invasion.)
Speaking of paying attention and reading history, I'd say 1938-39 is the more relevant period right now.
I've been wrong about how far Putin would go before, so I won't make any predictions. I think it's too early to call this a "lebensraum" maneuver, and as I keep saying, the costs of conflict are so high, that it's perfectly sensible to pursue a cautious approach, even at some cost (even to human life). Minsk 2 was somewhat dictated by Russia, but it wasn't a hugely onerous protocol, and the causes of its failure don't lie entirely with Putin -- meaning this invasion was not a fait accompli. Also, let the dust settle and see if it's more like the 1st Iraq War/Gulf War, where "just" the military and infrastructure are cruelly decapitated.
And Russia today is a middle power like the UK or France, not a great power like the US. If your analogy is apt, it could be soundly defeated in a conventional war.
It's not a Lebensraum maneuver, of course. It's reclaiming their Sudetenland, almost explicitly so if you've read the essay Putin published about Ukraine.
That’s fair, I have read that and he is pretty explicit so that analogy is appropriate. I still think Minsk 2 had a decent chance of success though.
And my experience has been that when people make allusions to Hitler, even if giving specific time ranges before his worst actions, they are making the analogy in order to say that “whatever has happened so far, it is only the beginning”. I still don’t think it will develop into “lebensraum”. Maybe you didn’t imply that, but that was largely what I thought I was responding to.
I don't think it'll develop into "lebensraum" for the simple reason that Russia doesn't have a shortage of land - on the contrary, it has a shortage of people to develop the land that it already has. Far East and Siberia offer a vast frontier for expansion, and will continue to do so for many decades to come.
What Russia is doing is reassembling its historical empire - and this is an ideological goal, not an economic one. But if it does that, it'll also want Eastern Europe as a buffer, for the same exact reason Soviets did.
The main reason why I brought up 1938 is not because I think that Russia is ideologically similar to the Nazis here, but rather that the immediate consequences will be similar to what happened back then: if Russia is allowed to invade and occupy Ukraine, it has a long list of other territories it has issues with, and there's no clear reason why it shouldn't just keep ticking things off it.
