> And here we go...... Correct hottake. This is the u.s. *daring* russia to do something. If russia does something, they're fucked. If they do nothing, they're a paper tiger, again fucked. But the u.s. action in poland rather than ukraine, is the *key* to translating the motivating factor here: The u.s. is in poland, not as staging, but as a backstop *to* the ukrainian conflict. Which tells you we have *no intention at all* of genuinely entering ukraine. If this is true, then the taking of the island isn't just to embarrass russia, but to *duplicate* the ukrainian issue elsewhere, *geopolitically*. The u.s. is probably thinking that by creating "many fronts *potentially* leading to ww3", it can reverse the position of the *u.s.* being perceived as aggressor, to that of *russia* being perceived as an aggressor. The correct response, despite this being a no-win situation, is then for russia to *do nothing*. Yes, its not a good place to be. And yes it may look like, to some of the russian government, they are losing. Trust that they are not. They are winning. The u.s. economically is more fragile than russia. This is a matter of *attrition*. And right now the optics, despite *all the media* hype, are still against the u.s. It's hard to perceive and parse, but this is the exact and correct interpretation of the scenarios currently unfolding. This is not a war of "who can win", this is a war of "who can survive and hold out the longest." The u.s. and its cities guarantee it loses, because these cities are huge unproductive burdens, with lots of dissatisfied and easily agitated inhabitants.