Zim,
Thanks for the response. I expect we are going to find out, eventually, whether Ukraine retains the Donbass or not, Crimea, or not. If Ukraine retains, we will say Ukraine "won" - even if it costs them 3/4 of their population. If Donbass either joins Russia or becomes an independent country or countries, can we agree Russia won? Probably not. And the US media and US military-industrial complex, certainly not, because that might discourage the next war.
And, certainly, no matter the casualties on both sides, we in the West can celebrate "our" win. We were so clever "only" investing money and marketing. We are all Rothschilds, now! ;-)
The thing is, or at least as I would argue, we are probably PAST the point where Ukraine can win, no matter if they retain the territory or not; because the “country” is more than the territory. Indeed, the territory is the most irrelevant aspect of what makes a people...a home. The Jewish people evidence that, by the way, as do arguably the Gypsies.
I can see clearly the US has LOST, the more wars we have fought. I can't think of anything much we have actually won from any of them except the Revolutionary War...even in the wars we didn't technically lose. WW2? Maybe. Maybe "we" won when we took Hawaii from the Hawaiians, but were generous enough to leave them their grass skirts and dances. That is my perspective, anyway.
I think similarly about war as I do about investment: once you lay out ALL the investments and minus ALL the losses, was it a good trade? Would you do it again? If you can say enthusiastically "cheap at twice the price!" then you won. Else, you made a bad investment, all in.
I suspect you look more at the label the media gives at the end, even if the participants are broken and sterile, dispirited, and psychologically twisted hulks at the end?
Also, coming from economics (and common sense) is a critical concept known as as "opportunity cost". What could have been, INSTEAD...and now can never be. It is very worth considering, except to shallow and dark souls. If you "made" money, and "became" someone via the participation, but it was at the cost of something better you COULD have made, and could have become...well, you lost an opportunity.
Did you “win”? I think what you don't seem to value at all is that part of what “costs” us the Southern border, and social cohesion, and the Constitutional Republic, are the forever wars. You ought to study Rome's arc perhaps more deeply, looking at the five hundred years before the empire. Once the forever wars started, it was over for the Roman Republic...and soon enough after for the culture, as well.
I would also say that Russia would have lost if they had NOT, in the end, responded to US/NATO provocation and weaponizations of the Donbass. We didn't really leave the Russian culture a choice, if they had any honor and identity. It was sort of their WW2. NEVER back a bear into a corner, unless you want a fight. Again, the actual territory is pretty much replaceable; the culture, the religion, the language, the identification? Not so much.
I think you are a NeoCon; I'm not calling you a name, I am just applying a predictive label based on what I notice. Neocons are so clever – or think they are. Because they next to never actually go and take a bullet, but they profit in career and money or belonging, the more wars there are the more they like it.
One could say NeoCons are always "winners" in war; at least other NeoCons would probably say that. It helps that they don't identify with their home culture too much, of course. That way they can't lose that "home" feeling no matter how screwed up things get where they live.
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?" -Matthew 16:26 Legacy Standard Bible
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