You see, in 2001 in Afghanistan, no one in the U.S will ever imagine that in 20 years time they have to flee the country humiliated...at the time the general wisdom is, we got it under control, we just put a loyalist government in Afghanistan and they're going to fight there instead of us, what could possibly go wrong ? The same naiveness shown today for what appears to be a young war.
Again, you are comparing two very different wars that have nothing in common. In Afghanistan, the US went without local allies to topple a regime and impose a friendly one (something very similar to what Russia tried initially in Ukraine). The US had to create a friendly Afghan regime from scratch, and their “nation building” project failed, as the cultural differences were just too much to overcome. The US thought that with the same strategy they used in Europe to convert former dictatorships into prosperous democracy, they would be able to create a westernized Afghan state. Of course, 20 years were nowhere near enough for something like this. Such a process would probably take more than a century in a country so culturally different such as Afghanistan.
In Ukraine, Russia is trying to make the impossible (erasing Ukrainian identity and culturally erase them). The US has the much easier mission of simply supporting the status qvo, which is an independent Ukraine.
The thing is for Russia, whatever the scenario is, the West is never in the game of Endurance, they got tired, bored, lose interests and so on.
This is a grave misunderstanding and underestimation of the West. By all accounts, the West is playing a long term game of Endurance. Take the EU for example. This is a long term project with objectives lasting decades. The slow expansion and integration of new countries is a process that takes time and endurance. The EU is in it for the long haul. Make no mistake about that. Long term, the EU plans to absorb all the European countries, including the likes of Serbia, Albania, Ukraine or Belarus.
Now that Europeans have an opening at taking Ukraine out of the Russia sphere of influence, they will not give up the opportunity. Even if the US loses interest in the conflict, the EU will not, and the EU has the resources to outlast Russia in any long term conflict.
U.S losses is only piecemeal in number, but again persist long enough (add that to domestic problems) and people will start looking for answer. People will start dumb question like, why are we spending so much abroad, and not build schools instead blah blah blah...and in return the Politicians (who needed their vote) will naturally start to cease support gradually.
The thing is, he benefit of ruining Russia far outweights the cost for the US. Even if the public would get bored of this, the political establishment knows too well that this war is too effective for the US in ruining Russia on the cheap. Remember that the US did not lose interest in arming the Afghan mujahedeen when they fought the Soviet Union. It was the Soviets who decided to pull out and cut the losses.
Motivated yes, but the numbers will not be their advantage...in Afghanistan and Viet Nam the two underdogs understand their weakness and goes underground, Ukraine on the other hand is going head on knee to knee which will gradually scrape their overall power.
Ukraine doesn’t need to go underground because it receives high tech military equipment and can pound Russian forces from a position of strength. By all credible accounts, Ukraine is inflicting more pain to Russia than Russia is to Ukraine on the battlefield. The casuality ratio favors Ukraine, and the weapons depletion ratio also favors them, because the replenishment capacity of the West is much stronger than Russia’s.
Motivation on Ukraine's side would only be effective with continuing support by their Western allies, lose that support and there's no point for Igor to be motivated because there's nothing left to fight Russia with.
This is why Western support will continue. The EU will not stop supporting Ukraine. This is an existential fight from the perspective of Eastern European countries that happen to be part of the EU, and they will continue to push for support. Defeating Russia will resolve many problems for the EU, and will allow it to accelerate the process of expanding in the Balkans and Eastern Europe.
The war is like a year long and Bali is getting flooded by men of fighting age from Ukraine (and Russia)
Yes, lots of men will flee the conflict, for good reasons, but this is an issue for both Ukraine and Russia. Ukrainians have more reasons to fight because they are in an existential war. For the Russians, it’s just a useless war that doesn’t serve any purpose.
Yes, that's why they only likely have to wait long enough until that very support scraped thin enough over time. They have the industry, and more importantly population to sustain this. 142 million vs 40 million its very clear who will run out of men early. Especially when the casualty ratio on both side are humongous.
If Ukraine inflicts casualties at a higher than 1:4 rate, Russia would run out of men first. If Russia runs out of modern equipment first, the casuality rate will greatly increase in the favor of Ukraine. There are many reports saying the Russians are losing men at a 7:1 ratio in Bakhmut, because of their human wave tactics and lack of precision ammunition.
Just in case anyone forget, Ukraine is 2nd rate in importance to other more pressing issues (like Taiwan).
For the US, yes. For the EU, no. And the EU has enough resources to sustain Ukraine until it wins the war. Russia has no way of outlasting the EU economically or industrially.
The war in Afghanistan and Viet Nam is also tiny both from monetary and manpower and loss perspective, but their gradual tiredness is always there and it repeats again and again, either in Viet Nam, Afghanistan, Iraq and later on probably Ukraine.
The wars in Viet Nam and Afghanistan did not serve the purpose of eliminating a major geopolitical threat like Russia. The war in Ukraine has more benefits and much lower costs. The cost/reward ratio of this war is much better for the West.
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