Frankly, Biden’s address to the US nation (the first one in his life) was probably the lamest most clueless political speech I ever heard.  And I am not referring to Biden calling Putin “Clutin” or confusing “deescalation” with “vaccination”, I am talking about the actual contents of his speech.  I would sum it up as so: we will continue to constantly hurt and humiliate you, we will treat you like a misbehaving 10 year old in need of a good spanking, but we do want peace and good relations.  Clearly, Biden has zero understanding of things Russian.  But for “Biden” (collective “Biden”, not the confused veggie) does have a plan.  What could it be?

I already explained what the US plan for the Ukraine is: to encourage the Ukronazis to attack Russia while not involving the USA in a shooting war with Russia.

How would the US do that?  One example:

First announce with great fanfare that the US is sending 2 (according to some version 5!) USN ship into the Black Sea to “deter” Russia, show “support” to the Ukies and give them the feeling that when they attack they would be under US “cover”.  This is not unlike what the USA did with Saakashvili in 08.08.08 or what the USA did during the “Prague Spring”.  Frankly, this is an old trick the West has used innumerable times in its history.  And once the Ukies feel elated from being under Uncle Shmuel’s protection, quietly withdraw your plan to send any ships into what is de facto a Russian lake.

The US is walking a fine line here – they need to egg on the Ukies to attack, but the Ukies are terrified, so they have to give them as sense of “the world is with you!!”, “we will protect you”, “we will fight with you” and then when things appear to be coming to a head, ditch the Ukies and run to safety.  Of course, the united West will support the Ukronazis politically and economically (just to keep the Ukie economy barely alive), but most definitely not militarily as that would create a risk of a devastating war which the US+NATO would either lose or decide to go nuclear, which would be simply suicidal.

There is a chorus profoundly misguided opinions in both Russia and the West which now declares that Biden “blinked”, Russia won and peace will now break out.  That is a very naive point of view which mostly comes from not understanding the nature of modern warfare and psychological operations.

Again, what some can see as a zig-zagging “Biden” policy towards Russia mistakenly think that since “Biden” did not promise fire and brimstone for Russia that means that “Biden” folded.  That is an extremely dangerous misconception and I am confident that the Russian decision-makers see through this ruse (even while they say nothing about it, at least, those in office and, at least, so far).

Putin has still not announced what counter-measures (I prefer that notion to the idea of counter-sanctions, which are symmetrical) Russia will take next (against the US, UK and Poland primarily).  I have no idea what the Kremlin might decide, but I do observe very high levels of outrage and determination in the Russian media (both in the traditional media and the Runet).  The Russian society is clearly fed up and, again, Putin is facing a mounting levels of criticisms for being too soft and indecisive.  I hope and expect that Russia’s response this time around will be much less meek (and, therefore, ambiguous) than in the past.   We will soon find out.

The Saker

UPDATE: just as I was posting this, I saw the Sputnik article about the Russian counter-measures.  Frankly, I am utterly unimpressed and I believe that most Russians will feel the same way.  Of course, we don’t know what is going on behind the scenes and the Russians are under no obligation to divulge what else they might be doing.  However, I believe that measures such as closing the Kerch strait is a much better approach.  Let’s wait a few days before passing a final judgement on the quality of the Russian counter measures.