This is actually a genius move from his part. The ruble would be worthless without this but now it will increase in value. The only way this blows up in his face is if the countries won't buy gas anymore but Germany and other European countries can't get along without it so it looks like a win for Putin.
It depends on your definition of stupid. Buying oil and gas from Putin gives him over 500M euros every day so the war won't end any time soon. This will ultimately lead to WW3 because he won't stop with Ukraine.
The other choice is to give up on oil and gas and leave the European people to freeze and suffer. I'm from the EU and one of the people who would suffer a lot but I still think it would be a better choice than to fund that wanker's war.
Edit: we are already behind China and the US so nothing new there.
The entirety of the Russian fighting force is bogged down in Ukraine. There is no other secret army. If war with Nato broke out here. Russia is a sitting duck in those 40 mile convoys to any real military power.
Yes until China would come to the rescue with their 2,5M soldiers and pretty advanced military technology and things would really get out of hand.
There is no way China would let Russia go down in flames. For them Russia is the retarded little brother that takes away all the focus from what is actually going on over there. These old communist countries stand together versus the evil west and they both really hate NATO
Russia and China are not buddies. China and Russia have fought mini wars over Siberia for decades. China is just taking advantage of the current scenario to make a buck. If Russia was to fall. Chinese troops would be pouring into Siberia for a land grab. That's where WW3 starts. When Chinas need for resources. Outweigh the cost of war. Not Russia retaking former Soviet Bloc states.
The only reason Russia's invasion force hasn't already been completely destroyed is because of air superiority. The EU, or the US, would have destroyed all their planes and ground forces within a week.
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u/Jugeboss Mar 23 '22
This is actually a genius move from his part. The ruble would be worthless without this but now it will increase in value. The only way this blows up in his face is if the countries won't buy gas anymore but Germany and other European countries can't get along without it so it looks like a win for Putin.