Behold, a pale horse

"And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. " Revelations 6:7-8 

I'm thinking tonight of the Ukraine Russia War -- once again, history is "galloping riderless across the landscape" with no direction and no control. The possibility of nuclear war has reared its ugly head, and we don't know whether it will happen or not.   

With Ukraine's recent success in pushing back Russian occupation, Putin seems terrified that Ukraine is winning. So he is doubling down - mobilizing more Russian soldiers, setting up sham referenda to create a phony pretext to claim that Occupied Ukraine belongs to Russia, and threatening a nuclear response if the Ukraine military continues fighting to liberate this so-called "Russian" territory. I expect Putin also thinks he can frighten Europe and NATO into forcing Ukraine to agree to a ceasefire. 

NATO and European leaders are having none of it.

The sham referenda initiated today by Russia and its proxies have no legal effect or legitimacy. They represent in no way the will of the Ukrainian people, who have consistently resisted Russian efforts to change borders by force. Read the #G7 statement: https://t.co/mCFwGcqxws

— CanadianPM (@CanadianPM) September 23, 2022

Catastrophic consequences. https://t.co/E0bXLTuU9M

— Viktor Kovalenko🇺🇲🇺🇦 (@MrKovalenko) September 26, 2022

Putin is no longer able to end the conflict and spin the defeat as a successful "denazification" of Ukraine.

After the annexation there will be no way to spin future Ukrainian offensives to liberate the occupied regions. Any territory liberated will be a direct lost to Russia.

— Oliver Alexander (@OAlexanderDK) September 26, 2022

If this fails, we are moving towards a scenario that only has two realistic outcomes:

1. Internal pressure in Russia causes a governmental collapse of some kind, allowing the new leadership to proceed to deescalate the war.

— Oliver Alexander (@OAlexanderDK) September 26, 2022

We are nearing a situation of the unstoppable force and the immovable object.

Ukraine is rightfully insistent on liberating all of its occupied territory.

At the same time the current Russian government will not survive the loss of this (especially Crimea).

— Oliver Alexander (@OAlexanderDK) September 26, 2022

I am not saying that the risk of non-conventional weapons is just around the corner, but it is down the street if the mobilization does not stabilize the frontlines.

The mobilization was an extremely risky political move and a decision not taken lightly by Putin.

— Oliver Alexander (@OAlexanderDK) September 26, 2022

It seems highly likely that the Chinese have also told Putin to keep it in his trousers.

— Dr David Baird (@DavidBa35992616) September 25, 2022

Here is the bottom line:

And what is the end game here? How does this stop?

— Dana Lewis (@Danaslewis) September 25, 2022

Dana, it stops when Ukraine has restored Sovereignty over all of its territory incl Crimea and when the 1M(+) deported Ukrainian citizens incl 250K children are returned home to Ukraine. https://t.co/zoWTZohjX9

— Ben Hodges (@general_ben) September 26, 2022

And this is terrible.

Olha Stefanishyna, Ukraine’s deputy prime minister for European integration, said that about 1.5 million Ukrainian citizens, mostly women and children, are currently in Russia without the possibility of returning home, and their relatives can’t contact them.

— The Kyiv Independent (@KyivIndependent) September 26, 2022

When this war is over, it will take years to recover.