Anne ApplebaumUkraine's survival, Zelensky's triumphant speech - none of this was inevitable. Let's try to imagine what would have happened if the US and Europe had not helped Ukraine, if Russia had occupied the country, if the Ukrainian political class and creative class had been wiped out, if Russian troops were now based along the Polish border. What would the world look like now?
Miguel Duarte@anneapplebaum we don't know what would have happened of course.
But a lot of the western reactions we saw would have been inevitable, like cutting oil and gas from Russia and army building in Europe. Putin regime would have lost credibility as a commercial partner with the west and it was a failure for him not to understand that.
I don't believe Russia would invade a NATO country however. But believe all other countries in the region would have been considered fair game by Putin.