When he launched his invasion of Ukraine over two weeks ago, Russian President Vladimir Putin appeared like a man who knew what he was doing. In his televised session with the High Council of National Security, he gave the impression that he had a precise war plan with clear objectives.
Now, however, the possibility of that impression having been wrong cannot be dismissed. In other words: What if the Great Vladimir doesn’t know what he is doing or, worse still, doesn’t know what he wants?
During WW II Soviet generals would ask one another about their typically substantial losses in such callous terms of “How many pencils did you break.” Putin may have suffered up to 10K in deaths so far in a war he didn’t have to fight. He was winning by posturing and would have been rewarded for his patience.
