The media in the English speaking countries always seem to have an agenda that defies reasonable analysis. 54 million people in the USA still believe that the last election was stolen from Trump, a line propagated by print, radio and television. British media promoted an anti EU and Single EU market agenda during the Brexit campaign which all sane economists agreed would be an act of self-harm, but the government went through with it anyway.
Now the media in the West is pumping out a version of the Russian Ukrainian war which doesn’t necessarily correspond to the facts, but which suits the narrative that they are trying to set. A consistent accusation against The Kremlin is that Russian media is feeding the Russian people disinformation, indulging in propaganda and manipulating public opinion. As if this did not happen in the west during the American-British invasion of Iraq when the accepted narrative was that invading a sovereign country was a good thing if a threat was perceived.
Western governments and media wrote the playbook that the Russian media has adopted. Invaded countries somehow deserve to be invaded because they have WMD (not true in the case of Iraq) or are all unrepentant Nazis (not true in the case of Ukraine)
The narrative currently propagated in Western print media is that Ukraine could win this war, and that the Russians are spectacularly disorganised and inefficient. That Putin is a sick man, and that the Hawks are circulating to replace his toxic presence in the Kremlin. All of this comes from so-called inside information, much of it is wishful thinking and speculation, or web sites looking to monetarise their content with click bait.
The reality is that Russia, after a really dodgy start in 2022, is in prime position to win this war. It can divide Ukrainian forces by invading from Belarus. Putin is all in. Russian has its own network of allies to call on for arms. There is very little option for Ukraine but to take the fight to Putin, but their troops are running out of ammunition. And so is Europe. Western support has been useful against a disorganised Russian army. But with potential mass mobilisation in Russia of half a million people, with more on the cards if things go badly this spring, Ukraine cannot compete either in numbers or equipment.
Cheap drones are causing immense damage to Ukrainian infrastructure, and the tide will eventually turn in Russia’s favour. Yes, France and Germany are sending support but they too are short of the equipment needed to make a significant difference. Britain sends a few tanks and politicians make PR trips to Kiev, but this is far short of the support needed to beat back Russia next year.
The one country that could make a decisive intervention is the USA and they have very little incentive to do so. Apart from a Republican party, now controlling Congress, which has a beef against Zelensky, as he did not dish the dirt on Hunter Biden, the Pentagon is reluctant to export valuable equipment to Ukraine. The US strategy anyway seems to consider the Russian war as some kind of war game which they can evaluate their arch enemy’s military capability. What they have seen has not impressed the US and it is unlikely they will want to lay all their cards on the table unnecessarily to defend a country that is a long way away.
USA has also China to consider. They may need all their weapons in case China goes for Taiwan, and they do not want to expose their current military tactics in a war which does not effect them much strategically.
The Russian economy is relatively sound and autonomous, not crashing as some media outlets say. Their inflation is now 4% , below the inflation rate of Europe which is struggling with higher energy costs. The high price of oil and gas as a result of EU sanctions has benefited the Russian balance of payments. Russia is indeed lacking US tech but this is a war of attrition, not a particularly sophisticated one. Much of the weaponry is from the Soviet era, on the Russian side, and the Ukrainians have been given a lot of outdated stuff that was sitting in warehouses in the US and Europe, bargain basement, cut-price and mostly useful for slogging it out with Russia in the mud. Very little of the shiny hi-tech stuff is going to Ukraine.
While some Western politicians like to insult the Russian economy by saying the Russia is little more than a gas station, the truth is that Putin seems to believe the dismantling of the Soviet empire was totally unnecessary because the West was and is dependent upon Russian energy. That Russia’s natural resources in the Soviet era were defined by economic incompetence did not necessarily mean the Empire had to be deconstructed. The oligarchs may have helped themselves to the economy, but it is an economy that works and is relatively efficient, not a basket case as the Western media describes it.
Russians have had designs on Ukraine and further afield since the Viking days, and Putin has a belief in Russian destiny. This is for many Russians a holy war of sorts – fuelled by the same fervour that motivated the patriots who stormed congress or voted for Brexit. This patriotic zealotry is not going to dissipate any time soon.
It could be argued that the West had an opportunity to stop this war if they had armed the Ukrainians properly in the early days of the war. But that would have not checked Putin’s ambition. He is motivated by more than ideology – a messianic self belief that this is good for his people. A few tanks and 4000 helmets was never going to stop that.
This is Putin’s war to lose. If not in 2023, which is likely, with horrendous civilian and military bloodshed on both sides, or 2024, a Russian victory seems inevitable. The West is ill-equipped to do anything to stop this, and a Russian victory would leave Europe with the moral dilemma on how to deal with a regime that controls most of the grain and natural resources their people and industries are dependent on.
And if Putin goes further and attacks Estonia or even Poland, is an unanimous response by NATO likely, with Turkey playing both sides, and Hungary pro Russia? We in the West have to be prepared psychologically that the country that we are backing most likely looks as if its days are numbered in the short term. The invasion of Ukraine has been sold in our media that West and the Ukraine are the good guys and the Russians are the bad guys, good against evil. But we have to be prepared for the eventuality that evil might well prevail. In that case, it is more likely than not our leaders will do a deal with the devil himself.
What will our media say then?
