by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
The thing about Putin’s Russia is in real terms, the election of Trump gives us a real sense of their power as opposed to what they would like us to think they can do. Electing Trump was the softest, cheapest form of geopolitical ratfucking possible. It was cheap and nearly value free.
Meanwhile, two major issues on Russia’s border remain unsolved, at least to date. While Russia would love to gobble up most of Ukraine and all of Belarus, as of right now, they’ve just been all talk outside of moving troops around now and then. But current reports of growing protests in Belarus just might be something Putin can use as a springboard to taking the country.
Belarus is small and poor and Russia could probably actually gobble up if the timing us right. Not that it wouldn’t be pretty bloody, but Russia could swoop in as “liberators” things get too bad in Belarus and then, well, never leave.
One sign, at least to me, that Putin is quite confident that Trump is going to successfully steal the election is there’s not been a major land grab of eastern Ukraine by the Russians. Putin feels confident that ultimately Trump will leave NATO in his second term and, as such, Russia will be in a much better position to eat as much of Ukraine as it likes.
Russia is a unique geopolitical player because geographically it’s huge and it has a shit ton of nuclear weapons, but on the ground, it’s economy is so small that Putin knows he would just be setting himself up for his own downfall if he simply attacked Ukraine in a general war. Hence, Putin simply lurks on the border and waits for just the right moment to strike.
As such, it’s far more possible Belarus might be gobble up sooner rather than later than Ukraine. If that should change, should Russia rather abruptly move on Ukraine late this year, then something pretty fucking dramatic would have had happened to Trump’s chances of stealing the election.
I don’t see that happening, however.
