The war in Ukraine is on. Now the fighting is concentrated in the Donbass. The region is less talked about than when the skirmishes continued around Kyiv.. This may be due to the fact that the war is now more kinetic and open and very different from the spectacular ambushes in the first weeks..

It looks like there will be more large-scale clashes of large formations ahead.. But while Russia is trying to achieve its limited goals in the east, it has already lost so much in this war that it is already a disaster for the Russian national strength.. Of course, experts believe that Ukraine can win this war.. But even if Russia can hold onto chunks of Ukrainian territory in the east and south, the losses of this war already exceed such gains..

Professor of International Relations at Busan National University Robert Kelly writes about this on the pages of Business Insider.. He lists a number of results of Russia's ill-advised invasion of Ukraine that were definitely not part of the Kremlin's plans..

APU will soon become the best army in Europe.

And this is the most ironic result of the Russian invasion. Vladimir Putin hoped for a " He thought his army would enter Ukrainian territory, replace President Volodymyr Zelensky with a pro-Russian puppet, and return home.. Everything had to take place faster than the West would gather strength. It looks like Putin believed his own propaganda that Ukraine was supposedly a “fake country”. Instead, he faced a wall of patriotic Ukrainian soldiers and civilians.. They were able to hold out long enough for the West to support their resistance..

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“Now Russia is dealing with a well-armed, well-trained, battle-tested army with good command, deep legitimacy and the backing of wealthy foreign supporters.. Russia will never be able to subjugate Ukraine. If the Russian army does not win in the next few months, it will lose the whole war,” the author believes..

NATO will expand.

Alliance expansion allegedly was Putin's main reason for invading Ukraine. Of course it's not true. But Russian propaganda repeats this " This is another big ironic result of this war. It is quite possible that Ukraine will abandon its intentions to become a member of NATO within the framework of some kind of peace agreement.. But Sweden and Finland will definitely become allies of the alliance.

Finnish accession to NATO is a special defeat for Russia. The Nordic country has a very long border line with the Russian Federation. Finland remained neutral throughout the Cold War.. And it says a lot that Putin has become too dangerous, even more dangerous than the USSR, if Helsinki decided to abandon its long-standing neutral status..

Russia will be heavily isolated.

Any peace agreement will formally restore Russian relations with the world. Sanctions will ease. Russian elites will be able to cross the border again. The interwar period in the 20th century and the history of Germany's fall under Nazi rule teaches that if the side that lost the war is punished too hard, it can become an even worse revanchist.. But even if formal restrictions disappear, normal diplomatic and economic interaction with Russia will definitely not be restored until Putin loses power.. Western companies will not be allowed to return to Russia. Everyone who left the Russian market: Apple, Netflix, Honda, and so on, will not return quickly. And the lifting of sanctions will not make them do it.. Also, the lifting of the travel ban does not mean that world leaders will be required to meet with Russian elites.. Stories of Russian war crimes are on the rise. Therefore, Russia will be informally isolated for many years..

NATO's new mission.

After the end of the Cold War, the alliance was for decades an organization in search of a new purpose.. After the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, he began to experiment with operations " But this role of NATO was not popular. Many rejoiced when the alliance finally left Afghan territory last year.. French President Emmanuel Macron spoke about NATO's " Former President Donald Trump has repeatedly hinted at a desire to withdraw the United States from the alliance..

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Russian aggression against Ukraine ended these conversations. Most likely, the US will now place its bases in Eastern Europe. Germany began to build up military strength. UK after Brexit again cooperates with European neighbors.

Putin-loyal American critics like Tucker Carlson or Glen Greenwald have lost the attention of the American public that supports Ukraine in the war..

All these losses and consequences in many ways exceed anything that Putin can win in the Donbass.. Ukraine will survive and become capable of military resistance to Russian pressure. NATO will get bigger and stronger. Russia will find itself in uncomfortable isolation and complete dependence on China. This is a rather bitter result for an operation that was supposed to be a "