If you think Europe is the biggest loser, you need to dig a bit deeper on the state of Russia... I might be wrong, but there's no recovery from this blunder for many, many years - if it manages to stay a Federation, that's yet to be seen, but my guess is China will take a chunk out of Russia eventually.
Remember Russia in 3 years had:
- 1 Military coup;
- Lost 50% of the Black Sea Fleet and it's now unusable;
- 1.000.000+ casualties (dead and severely wounded)
- Mass exodus of qualified young people;
- Lost Military allies from CSTO and rendered the alliance into a joke;
- Completely lost presence in the Middle East (I don't see how they will recover from it);
- Losing influence in neighboring countries;
The list goes on, like demographic collapse, etc
So, I find it hard to see Europe as the loser here; at worst, Europe is doing "ok".
Europe's entire future is on the line right now. Forget many years..
Higher energy prices, and increased defence spending (from a low starting point) to meet the new US governments requirements are exacerbating the cost of living crisis continent wide. Europe already wasn't innovating, and is now losing the small amount of industry it does have, to energy prices, to China's entry into EV production, and EU regulation. The demands to spend more on our own defence by the US administration comes from a US administration which has flirted with the idea of not even defending NATO.
The cost of living crisis, coupled with "AI" (LLM) is hollowing out an already pretty hollow service economy across Europe, and is creating disillusionment which is causing Europeans to shift to either extreme side of the political spectrum. In my country, the UK, Reform, a politically inept and untested party is currently leading in the polls for the next election. This party, as well as many like it in Europe, is even leading in the polls despite well known Russian political influence in them.
On top of this, the demographic crisis, while not made worse by tons of dead men sent off to war and exodus, is still affecting Europe and the only reason it isn't notable to many people is due to immigration filling the gaps. Immigration, which is lowering wages and in many peoples eyes, changing their cultural landscape for the worse, increasing their likelihood in voting for fringe political parties.
As much as Russia might lose from this war, they'll probably rebuild their army to a higher degree than European forces are right now. We hear constantly about ammunition and weapons shortages across Europe, failure to meet requirements for what Ukraine needs to fight back, and a general unwillingness from the population to even fight. Russia has oil, gas, and mineral wealth, which will always be of importance to Europe whenever this war does end. Europe is so reliant, that whatever words are spoken, the EU has spent more on Russian energy than it has sent in aid to Ukraine.
> Higher energy prices, and increased defence spending
Energy prices are going down, and have been going down consistently ( https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/crude-oil ) and the new US Admin wants them even lower, and they're not alone. So that's settled. Defense spending will also be met with investment, jobs, etc.
But if you think Europe is having it bad in terms of using taxpayers money to fund wars... what do you think is happening to Russian taxpayers money, with a much smaller economy?
> The cost of living crisis, coupled with "AI" (LLM) is hollowing out an already pretty hollow service economy across Europe, and is creating disillusionment which is causing Europeans to shift to either extreme side of the political spectrum.
Inflation is affecting everyone. Not Europe in any particular way.
Again, if you think that's bad for Europe, you look at Russia is being completely destroyed with inflation. I don't even think they're reporting the fake numbers of how bad things are, every quarter they prohibit more data from coming out...
> On top of this, the demographic crisis, while not made worse by tons of dead men sent off to war and exodus, is still affecting Europe and the only reason it isn't notable to many people is due to immigration filling the gaps.
Again, if you think that's a problem in Europe... how does Russia compare with qualified people leaving, 1.000.000 young men casualties, low birth rates, aging population? Europe isn't speedrunning its demographic collapse like Russia is.
> As much as Russia might lose from this war, they'll probably rebuild their army to a higher degree than European forces are right now.
So, to sum it up, you highlighted a few points that are by many orders of magnitude worse in Russia. Even counting energy, since Ukraine has been taking out distribution and refining capacity (and my guess is that it will get worse) - somehow you still think Europe is in a worse shape and position.
And a lot of your claims don't make much logical sense: "Europe is in bad shape, they can't even properly help Ukraine", in a context of Russia with 1.000.000+ casualties, max military production capacity, using North Korean Army help, and failing to make any meaningful gains at heavy costs...
I'm not even stating the fact that Russia will inevitably have to surrender that territory back to Ukraine, in the future anyway, because no country will ever recognize their occupied territory as part of Russia.
So to sum up your "Europe is unable, and Russia is giving their max" scope doesn't help your case at all, just shows that Russia has massive unrecoverable problems, even trying with everything they have...
You ended up supporting what I said. Europe is OK, while Russia can collapse at any moment - that's being on the line.
Just to bring you back to reality: no European country had part of their military going on a straight line to its capital to take down the government, and that happened to Russia around 2 years ago - that's not a good sign.
I think you are exaggerating Russian problems quite a bit. It’s certainly more stable than in 1990s or early 2000s. The peace deal will very likely force Ukraine and consequently its allies to recognize acquisitions at least de facto (Crimea may get formal recognition). Even if they won’t, there’s no plausible scenario in which Russia will lose this territory. Demographics — yes, but immigration may solve it for a while. 1 million people „brain drain“ wasn’t the right number anyway and there’s ongoing correction: many continued to work for Russian companies, some are returning back now disillusioned by the West,
> Even if they won’t, there’s no plausible scenario in which Russia will lose this territory.
Didn't the brightest minds in the Kremlin believe that the last time too?
There are many plausible scenarios, such as the worsening of socio-economic conditions, to the point where local governments stop following the central government and begin implementing their own policies shaped by local grassroots movements, leading to the total loss of control by Moscow. A repeat of 1989-1991. In that turmoil, nobody will care about Donbas or Crimea, as long as they can have food on their table.
We seem to be seeing the same recipe in action: extremely costly war for no clear purpose, economic stagnation, de facto bankruptcies of entire large sectors like mining and metallurgy.
Missing ingredients: low oil prices over extended time periods (6 years in the 1980s).
I'm not sure all of the previous posters points were thought out.
The 1,000,000 casualties thing keeps popping up, but nobody can confirm this. We have to take Ukrainian sources at their word. Regardless of who you support, during a conflict you have to take BOTH sides claims with a pinch of salt. They are both producing fanatical numbers right now, because those numbers have the dual purpose of inspiring morale amongst those still fighting.
The brain drain caused by the mass exodus of Russians fearing conscription isn't permanent. Already many of these people have returned.
The Wagner Coup didn't amount to much. It got half way before they worked out they didn't have the means, stopped, and the leader was killed and the group restructured within the Russian military.
They lost influence with neighbours, but honestly did they ever really have much in Europe anyway?
In my view Europe loses, because it's completely beholden to Russian energy interests. Now that those are gone, they are paying higher back-marked rates for the same oil and gas (via other routes), or more expensive American energy. This is exacerbating cost of living crises continent wide and is boosting fringe political parties who will cascade the damage (and who are also, in many cases, Russian influenced and funded).
I don't have any stake or real investment in this (although I don't think invading forces should get what they want), but I feel the other poster does.
Agree on most of that. However, I do not think energy is the European problem. It's painful, for sure, but migration is something bigger politically (and see recent Economist on that). Russia did play a role in that, but it's the flawed system with which nobody is happy that drives the fringe parties to success.
As for housing crisis, that's something that is defined by how markets work currently - where political influence buys squeeze in building permits and good profits from speculating on this market buy political influence. And of course, there's dual market structure in many cities with subsidized housing that reduces pressure for reform for significant number of voters. We need a big political reboot to overcome that and transition from old party structure practically everywhere, it is already happening, it is uncomfortable to see due to uncertainties in this process, but it is good. The war may have some effect on that, accelerating the process.
There will be one at some point. There is no plausible scenario in which it will be favorable for Ukraine: the West missed the moment to build up military production to match and surpass Russian capacity, so there is zero chance that there will be any military wins. And sanctions don’t work, that should have been pretty clear by now to anyone who sees the numbers. It is all about damage control and how many Ukrainians will have to die before Western politicians will accept inevitable.
Even if that's true, the content you assume will be in it (even before considering the probability of your predicted content being wrong) may have as much bearing for Russia (or any othe nation’s) near term prospects as the eventual content of the peace deals ending the Israeli-Palestinian war or the US-North Korea war have on any nation’s near-term prospects.
Russia can sustain this war for 4 years more politically (they probably have to finish by 2029, a year before elections), maybe 2-3 years more militarily and economically. I won’t be so sure that Ukraine can last that long, because Ukraine does have people problem and Russia does not. Ukraine even with Western supplies gets a fraction of what Russia currently produces in ammo, missiles, tanks etc. So there is no reason for Russia to accept shitty terms. They may pay 200-300B from the frozen money in „reconstruction support“, but that’s it.
If there was any significant difference in their combination of industrial supply and battlefield effectiveness, the front line wouldn't be so slow-moving.
> There is no plausible scenario in which it will be favorable for Ukraine
If this is true, we're doomed. Everyone will want to have nuclear weapons in order not to end up like Ukraine. After that point it's just a matter of time until something goes wrong.
It is unlikely that we will see new nuclear powers. It's not an easy job. We can be sure that Israel or North Korea won't give up, but that does not mean they are going to use the weapons or there will be a full-blown intercontinental war. Looking at current progress in space tech, in 30-40 years the ultimate WMD will be kinetic space weapons anyway.
North Korea and South Africa* getting nukes are both independent proofs that it's not hard for a nation to get nukes. I've seen credible commentators suggesting Ukraine itself is only months away, if it chooses that path.
Less credibly, because the Russian government says a lot that isn't really true, Medvedev has been quoted saying "a number of countries are ready to directly supply Iran with their own nuclear warheads".
Once you've got a fission bomb, by all accounts it's not that hard to use it as a primary to power a fusion bomb.
A single 1 MT bomb detonating at low orbital altitude above central USA would likely cause enough physical damage to the power grid to kill 60-90% of the population within a year, even with no shockwave getting anywhere near the ground.
> North Korea and South Africa* getting nukes are both independent proofs that it's not hard for a nation to get nukes
Define „hard“ then. Both started early in 1960s, both had access to uranium (North Korea is actually mining it - not every country can do that), both used foreign support for their nuclear programs. Neither achieved ICBM range to deliver nuclear warheads to any location on this planet or had submarine component. Ukraine may have theoretical ability to design and produce nuclear weapons, but it is a technologically advanced nation far ahead of many developing countries and it is not going to have resources for a nuclear program any time soon being heavily dependent on foreign aid.
There was no military coup 2 years ago, just a failed mercenary raid in which the army was not even involved. Leaders of that raid are now dead. It was an interesting moment in history, but it actually demonstrated resilience of the regime.
>the regime can collapse at any moment
How exactly? What evidence do you have for it? All even marginally visible opposition is pushed out of the country and became irrelevant, some are dead, many convicted in absentia to decade-long prison sentences. Mass protests are rare and practically never challenge the order, mainly aiming at some local problems. From economic perspective there are some problems, but as a matter of fact inequality is now lower than before the war thanks to generous payouts to veterans and their families, who may have never seen that money in their life.
Remember Russia in 3 years had: - 1 Military coup;
- Lost 50% of the Black Sea Fleet and it's now unusable;
- 1.000.000+ casualties (dead and severely wounded)
- Mass exodus of qualified young people;
- Lost Military allies from CSTO and rendered the alliance into a joke;
- Completely lost presence in the Middle East (I don't see how they will recover from it);
- Losing influence in neighboring countries;
The list goes on, like demographic collapse, etc
So, I find it hard to see Europe as the loser here; at worst, Europe is doing "ok".