(DON THOMPSON / iNFOnews.ca)

OPINION

On paper, it’s a walkover. Not even a drunken gambler with a fondness for long-shots would take odds on Ukraine winning a war with Russia. Nothing - not a single thing by any metric - might convince you that Ukrainians would last more than a few weeks.

Consider for a moment that Russia has 900,000 active military personnel, with another two million reservists. Ukraine has 196,000 active military, and 900,000 reservists, most of them between 45 and 60 years old. Russia has 15,857 armoured fighting vehicles…Ukraine has 3,309. Russia has 1,391 fixed-wing aircraft…Ukraine has 128. Russia has 821 helicopters…Ukraine has 55.

But no one - least of all Vladimir Putin - figured Ukrainian grandmothers would be filling Molotov Cocktail bottles. No one - least of all Vladimir Putin - figured Ukravtodor, Ukraine's government agency for roads, would change road signs…mile-marker all across the country…to confuse invading Russian troops. An electronic billboard along Victory Avenue just outside the capital now flashes: "Russian soldiers, go f*** yourselves.”

No one - least of all Vladimir Putin - figured Ukraine had a fighting chance. Of course, no one - least of all Vladimir Putin - asked the more than 40 million Ukrainian patriots whether they would fight Russian aggression to the very end. Oops.

Russian President Vladimir Putin - a man so hated by his peers in school that he earned the nickname “The Cockroach” - made a strategic error in invading Ukraine…underestimating the most important resource in any endeavour…people.

You see such miscalculations most often in a far less important endeavour…sports. It is how a team that looks overpowering in every category…somehow loses to an obviously weaker opponent. People rise to the occasion. In sports…it’s interesting. In matters of life and death…both human and democratic…it’s epic.

Putin’s invading force - both foreign mercenaries and conscripted Russians - were and will likely continue to be in the dark…most thinking they were headed toward military exercises in Belarus. It is so like Putin…so like any autocrat…they lie.

Of course, Putin is trying his best to keep the bad news - that thousands of Russian soldiers died in the first 13 days of fighting - from Russian citizens. This deception won’t work, of course, and eventually even Russians who support Putin will have to face the facts…something authoritarians hate because it almost always signals the beginning of the end.

Putin claims just 500 Russian deaths the first week…Ukraine claims 5,300 Russians have died. In the decade Russia occupied Afghanistan in the 1980s, about 15,000 Russian soldiers died. Welcome, Vladimir, to your Afghanistan.

But it could very likely be even worse. Military tacticians and combat veterans will tell you…guerrilla warfare is not the kind of fight you want…and in urban settings…it’s almost impossible for the invader to ever win as long as people resist. The Ukrainian people are the face of resistance…and guerrilla warfare it shall be.

When tens of millions of Ukrainians become the Ukrainian Underground…do the math…Russia doesn’t have enough military to occupy the country long term. But things will unravel long before enough Russians ever set foot in Ukraine.

Putin claimed Russia needed to “de-Nazify” and free Ukraine. But obviously, Ukraine - which lost as many as eight million lives in the Second World War and has a Jewish president - does not need to be freed from Nazis. Freedom and democracy will do just fine. President Volodymyr Zelensky - a 44-year-old leader who could probably win election anywhere - is a lawyer, comedian and is admired by hundreds of millions of people worldwide who oppose Russian aggression.

In perhaps the greatest example ever of life imitating art, Zelensky, in a 2015 television sit-com, played a teacher who was elected president in a country plagued by corruption. Nine years earlier in Ukraine’s version of “Dancing with the Stars”…he won. If you’re up against this guy in any endeavour…pack a lunch. It’s going to take time and time seems always to favour him.

Sanctions that will cripple the Russian economy are in place…and more are coming. The entire world - save China - has condemned Russia and supports Zelensky and Ukraine. Switzerland for God’s sake - a country that didn’t even fight Adolph Hitler - broke its long-standing position of neutrality by condemning Russia.

Putin can’t do what he wanted to do: invade, install a puppet government and basically go home. If he installs a puppet, he’s going to have troops there for a decade. Putin has four choices…and all involve losing... lose early, lose late, lose big or lose small. But those are his only real choices.

His ego can’t take losing, so in the coming days his army will fire thousands of artillery rounds each day into buildings…government, residential, hospitals…reducing them to rubble and killing thousands of Ukraines. All he can do then is leave…not exactly a winner. And he’ll wait in Moscow until the truths the world knows catch up to the Russian people.

That’s why he appears increasingly unhinged. No one comes within 35 feet of him. Most dictators are taken down by those closest to them - former confidants, advisers and top military officials. In Russia, it’s a group of elite billionaires, technocrats and high government officials who will eventually turn against Putin. It doesn’t take all of them…it never does. When his cronies and the public feel the pressure…it will be like a run on the banks in ‘29.

Speaking of which, banking in Russia is becoming much tougher for the government and the people. The Russian ruble is dropping value daily. Nothing is easy in Russia for its citizens…not banking, not buying groceries, nothing. And it’s going to get worse.

And while anyone with a brain fears use of nuclear weapons by Putin…consider that Russia, too, has people in place to moderate craziness…just as there were responsible people in the U.S. between an autocratic Donald Trump and atomic weapons.

More than one million women and children are refugees…many will never see their husbands, brothers, uncles and cousins - left at home to fight - again. Make no mistake…many Ukrainians are going to die…men, women, children, the infirm…all innocent.

Putin is a heartless son-of-a-bitch and he has no problem killing…anyone. But even if he kills President Zelensky…Putin loses. With every passing day Ukrainian resolve stiffens…and even as a martyr Zelensky will continue to lead his countrymen.

There is only one righteous side in this…and it’s with the millions of brave Ukrainians willing to die for freedom…who will sooner or later have the final say.

— Don Thompson, an American awaiting Canadian citizenship, lives in Vernon and in Florida. In a career that spans more than 40 years, Don has been a working journalist, a speechwriter and the CEO of an advertising and public relations firm. A passionate and compassionate man, he loves the written word as much as fine dinners with great wines.

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