You know, one of the thing I noted and debated ferociously in another thread against
@schuimpjes is that democracy is a system inherently designed so that imbeciles could climb to the top.
People who would otherwise unable to run a kindergarten would now find themselves in charge of the affairs of a whole country.
This is why democracies came up with the likes of Ben Gvir, Smotrich, Trump, Farage etc. Because it's a system that rewards rhetorics on top of fine statecraft, an anti-thesis of what democracies insist they are not (they relegate this to the likes of Iran, North Korea).
Athens, the home origin of representative democracies succumbed TWICE over its history that could be contributed to its democratic process.
The first is during the Peloponesian war. Pericles, a strategos, a military general, for 20 straight years, was credited with turning the Damian league into the Athenian empire. Using his unmatched rhetorical skill to command the assembly, Pericles became the de facto ruler of Athens. His time is a time of great power and wealth for Athens.
Think about Pericles as the ancient Greek equivalent of Ronald Reagan. Everyone wants to emulate him and associate with him. After his death, the Athenian assembly members, as Thucydides noted
would 'try to emulate him' by not being an actual fine statesman, but by championing rhetorics that that succumb to people's base desire and whims.
One of those men is Pericles's nephew, Alcibiades. Who gains the top spot by bullshitting the masses the same way modern 'elected leaders (think Trump, Farage) secure their seats. He advocated for the resumption of wars against Sparta that had just concluded with the Peace of Nicias.
en.wikipedia.org
Athens (with the advocacy of Alcibiades) allied with another city-state, Argos. To incite a democratic revolution against Sparta. The plot was discovered, Sparta defeated Athens in the Battle of Mantinea and the alliance was broken. The Peloponnesian war resumed. If anyone asked where modern democracies came up with the idea of color revolutions, like in Hong Kong against China or open statements to democratize Russia by breaking it into smaller pieces like Kaja Kallas wished, there's where it originally came from.
while at war with Sparta, you would've thought that these fine men, these 'elected leaders' would use the so-called superior democratic process to make the war as efficient and as rational as possible, but you could've not been more wrong.
The war witnessed the failure of the Sicilian expedition, where 60.000 Athenians died in vain for an expedition that was initiated by Alcibiades' political whims, not by an actual military value, where he ironically defected to Sparta to avoid trial in Athens for the disaster.
en.wikipedia.org
The ever-shifting assembly of Athens meant that after a few years, Sparta, a land power was now powerful enough to create a navy on par with Athens.
To maintain naval supremacy and command of the seas, the assembly once again resorted to classic democracy-style populism. They came up with the idea that rowers, who were most often slaves (because traditional Greek ships are heavily dependent on oars) would be granted citizenship and given freedom from slavery if the enlisted. This fleet, manned by inexperienced slaves and opportunist won the naval battle against Sparta in Arginusae, due to first and foremost the tactical prowess of Athenian admirals.
en.wikipedia.org
the Athenians assembled a scratch force composed largely of newly-constructed ships manned by inexperienced crews. The inexperienced fleet was thus tactically inferior to the Spartans, but its commanders circumvented the problem by employing new and unorthodox tactics, which allowed the Athenians to secure a dramatic and unexpected victory. Slaves and metics who participated in the battle may have been granted Athenian citizenship.
So now that these slaves are now Athenian citizens, they could participate in the 'democratic process'. And do you know what they came up with?
A public trial against the generals and admirals. Whom the new citizens accuse of not collecting the bodies of their dead. Peter Hunt suggest that the issue was brought to light by greedy Athenian politicians that lamented the loss of slaves and put the blame squarely on the generals.
So the assembly held trial, and the generals were condemned to death. The
creme de la creme of Athens was wiped out, getting rid of by Athens themselves. Just 2 years later (404 BC), Sparta would conquer Athens.
You would've thought that the failure of democracy that turned Athens from a hegemon into a loser in a span of just 50 years, would've thought the AThenians a lesson to learn. But it couldn't be more false. Athens using the same democratic process that rewards imbeciles would again succumb to defeat by the sheer stupidity of its politicians, enabled by the democracy itself.
Athens would spend the centuries after the death of Socrates electing political demagogue after political demagogue until finally things came to a head in 323 BC, when Alexander the Great died. Athens, eager to avenge past losses elected to go to war. Only one person in the assembly, Phocion is sane enough to understand why going to war with Macedonian empire, prolly the greatest power to emerge on planet earth up to that point is at best suicidal.
But Athens go to war anyway, and got defeated, this time permanently as Macedonia strips them of their democratic power and institutons.
Now back to Kaja Kallas, one must not be a political expert to tell that the country where Kaja Kallas rules, Estonia which has less population than Jakarta and simply exists because they're fortunate enough that the Cold War goes the American way and not the other way shall not be the one who poke Russia, a country many times its size and happens to have nukes.
But Kaja simply don't care, because hating Russia and coming up with outrageous statements is so popular in that part of the West (Eastern Europe), Kaja could afford this demagoguery up until a certain point where Estonia and Estonian themselves will be forced to face the consequence of her action.
The Americans will not be there forever, already we are witnessing the signs of a declining empire, and Kaja choose this time to come up full force against a neighbor that would stay there when the American were packing back.
Then there's simply the democratic process that is naturally inclined to reward imbeciles and tadaaaa
announced that they are sending a new batch of YPR-765 IFVs to Ukraine. They sent 207 units earlier in the war, and the Ukrainians have used them consistently. Attrition has taken a toll however, with 76 units destroyed or damaged according to Oryx, leaving Ukraine with approximately 130 units left. This batch (numbers have not been released) will serve to replace many if the lost units. 
www.defensie.nl
mil.in.ua
is so imporant for Ukraine. 
