That is an absolutely retarded statement unless by "destroy" you mean "nuke with no regard for the consequences of using nukes". You'd need Olympic-level mental gymnastics to honestly believe that a country would prefer losing large numbers of their troops and heavily damaging their economy to drag a out a conflict over weeks and even months instead of just steamrolling the enemy in less than a day.
"Destroy" is fairly ambiguous. Russia could do a LOT more with conventional weapons if they wanted to actually hurt Ukrainians. As a random example, all their rail lines, roads, power stations, water stations, etc etc etc, are all still up and working. It wouldn't take nukes for Russia to destroy it all, and it's only because this isn't an actual war that any of those things are still working.
There is a massive difference between trying to remove a political group vs actually "destroying" a country. Your argument mostly just makes you look like the retard here. Did the US need nukes to destroy Iraq or Libya, or do you think Libya is doing fine and dandy?
They do not want to destroy their enemy in a day, that is not the goal. The only thing that would do is make it difficult to control after the war. The objective here is not land. It is winning the population over.
Okay how about this: pretend you are a country that wants to invade a much smaller and weaker country. Your generals are confident in your military’s ability to quickly overpower the enemy with very little effort and gain control in less than a day. Do you:
A) Steamroll the enemy with your vastly superior military. The fight is over before the enemy could even react or mobilize a defense. There is very little damage to residential areas and minimal loss of life on both sides, because you moved so quickly that the enemy would have needed to fire on their own population to get to you. Obviously there will still be resistance into the foreseeable future, but the strength and totality of your occupation make quick work of them. Your trade partners can’t even sanction you for your actions because they would by extension be sanctioning the citizens of the country you invaded as well.
B) Send in a smaller force and drag the conflict out over the course of weeks and months. Both you and the enemy sustain losses. Residential areas are evacuated and leveled as the conflict drags on. Your trade partners sanction you for your continued assault. Friends and family of your soldiers become resentful of your slow progress. Friends and family of enemy soldiers become angry and vengeful and have a tangible cause to rally behind. You eventually declare victory and finally secure your new wasteland of bodies and unexploded ordinance.
The other guy stated it better: "There is a massive difference between trying to remove a political group vs actually "destroying" a country."
They could easily destroy Ukraine in one afternoon without nukes. They could bombard with non-nuclear warheads.
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