Glenn Greenwald Pretty Sure Putin Winning So Much He's Gonna Get Sick Of Winning

Heckuva job?

We're hearing a lot right now about so-called peace negotiations between Ukraine and Russia. Ukraine may be ready to call itself "neutral" and maybe make a couple other concessions, in order to get Russia to stop murdering it. Everybody's pretty skeptical of claims that Russia is really truly pulling back "to increase trust" in the peace talks. Meanwhile, Ukraine is telling its own peace negotiators to make sure not to eat or drink anything or touch any handrails when they meet with the Russians, since it's always likely Russia is in the mood to be poison-y. ( There have been reports that Ukrainian negotiators and Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich were poisoned in earlier negotiations.)

But regardless, on day 34, this war is clearly in a different place from where Vladimir Putin and his defenders thought it would be at this point. Hell, even western intelligence thought Kyiv would probably fall to the Russians within the first few days. Ukraine still has Kyiv, and says it's pushing Russians further and further back now.

In terms of where Russia finds itself right now, and what it's given up, this thread David Frum posted today is excellent. Here are just a few of the highlights:  

5) National unity, anti-Russian animus, and sudden new self-confidence in the Ukrainian people. 6) New skepticism about Russian power and credibility in hoped-for allies, China/India etc. 7) New respect for US/NATO military technique and technology China/India/ etc.

— David Frum (@David Frum) 1648658754 

Of course, Putin has lost thousands upon thousands of military personnel, including a number of top commanders, and god knows how much materiel.

Russia had to announce the other day that on second or third thought, it's going to just focus on the eastern sections of Ukraine, and maybe not focus so much on Kyiv or other parts of the country. Oh no, were Putin's eyes bigger than his stomach?

As the New York Times put it:

[T]he statement amounted to the most direct acknowledgment yet that Russia may be unable to take full control of Ukraine and would instead target the Donbas region, where Russia has recognized the independence of two Kremlin-backed separatist areas that it calls the “Donetsk People’s Republic” and the “Luhansk People’s Republic.”

Hard to say anything beyond heckuva job, Putin.

But for Putin apologists like Glenn Greenwald, it's time to rewrite currently ongoing history and say Putin meant to do all of this, because obviously Putin never wanted to conquer Ukraine anyway.

The propaganda in the West about this war is like nothing seen since 2001, arguably even worse. The day before invading, Putin said the goal was to ensure the independence of two regions of Eastern Ukraine from Kyiv, along with Crimea, along with Ukrainian neutrality.https: //twitter.com/michaelbd/status/1508828148649058305 …

— Glenn Greenwald (@Glenn Greenwald) 1648568442 

Yes, we remember when Putin declared independence on behalf of Donetsk and Luhansk, right before he started bombing the shit out of the entire country and heading toward Kyiv. Of course, we weren't dense enough to believe Putin at the time. Glenn bought it, though. Strange, considering the number of times Putin has said out loud that his real goal is to take all of Ukraine, since he considers the fall of the Soviet Union the worst thing that ever happened in the history of the world. Hell, the day the Kremlin announced Putin's very limited and surgical "peacekeeping" operation in eastern Ukraine, Putin called the very existence of Ukraine a "fiction."

But sure, Glenn, tell us about how Putin just wanted these few little places in eastern Ukraine in the first place, and how efficiently he's accomplished that task in the last 34 days of bloodshed. It sure is clever how Putin is making sure to murder all those civilians in Russian-speaking areas of Ukraine, the very people he's pretending to "liberate" from "genocide" committed by "Ukraine." All part of his master plan, we bet.

 Glenn added, "Zelensky is already suggesting Ukraine would accept neutrality (with a security guarantee), and accepts it can't reclaim those parts of Eastern Ukraine, let alone Crimea. Trying to depict that as some grave humiliating loss for Russia will work only with NBC, CNN & BBC viewers." We guess NBC, CNN and BBC viewers are unique among media consumers in that they think when countries declare wars, the plan is to win them.

What's that, Michael Tracey? 

When endless US and “Western” commentators claim Russia’s war hasn’t gone “according to plan,” they never seem to clarify how they miraculously obtained a copy of this “plan.” Can they please post the PDF?

— Michael Tracey (@Michael Tracey) 1648211530 

As we were saying.

As Jonathan Last notes at the Bulwark, there is a "serious version" of the question Glenn is asking in these tweets, and amazingly enough, it's asked by Bret Stephens in yesterday's New York Times . Spoiler: Bret Stephens's article is not a picture of Glenn Greenwald with his hand on his hip saying Putin meant to do all this.

Of course, Last examines all the available evidence and finds that Stephens and other conservatives asking the "serious version" of Glenn's question are also wrong.

Also, there's this:  

US official says Putin is being misinformed about how poorly Russian military is doing because advisers "are too afraid to tell him the truth.” Putin "didn’t even know his military was using and losing conscripts...showing a clear breakdown in the flow of accurate information."

— Kaitlan Collins (@Kaitlan Collins)1648647432 

 Sounds familiar. 

Elsewhere in News Of Glenn, he's mad that liberals always say his tweets probably sounded better in the original Russian:

Do liberals think it's healthy that there are literally millions of Americans who now walk around talking as if they're the love child of Joseph McCarthy and J. Edgar Hoover, conditioned to believe their American adversaries are clandestine Kremlin agents? Seems unhealthy.https: //twitter.com/mikescottyy/status/1509187048363634689 …

— Glenn Greenwald (@Glenn Greenwald) 1648653416 

That would be a good tweet if "literally millions" wasn't doing the same work as it did when it was used to describe the 12 dumpy tourists who stumbled upon Donald Trump's inauguration and decided to sit a spell.

Also he's throwing out hot takes about how ACTUALLY "many Americans" don't want the war on Ukraine to end and ACTUALLY the media wants it to keep going because of something Adam Smith wrote in 1776.

Also he's really excited about the ruble rebounding against the dollar.

Also he's babbling about Hunter Biden's laptop.

Also fuck it, this post is over.

OPEN THREAD.

[ New York Times ]

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