Now THIS Is How You Use Intelligence!

What a difference a little thing like intelligent leadership makes, huh? For four long years Vlad the Imp ran around like a kid when the teacher leaves the room, doing whatever he wanted while his useful idiot looked on approvingly, wishing it was him. Now Putin has an opponent who knows him better than anybody else, because he’s been around just as long.

For the last four long years, we were allegedly led by a moron so paranoid that he tears up his own shopping lists so that nobody knows what size Depends he takes. (Hint. 3XL) He spent four years believing Putin over his own intelligence services. Now we have a President who not only believes his intelligence services, he’s actually declassifying shit just so he can share it with the rest of us!

This kind of world class political chess is one of the reasons it made so much sense for Obama to choose him in the first place. If it happened in the last 40 years, Biden was around in congress for it, and catalogued it for future use. He has been dealing off and on with Putin since he came to power, and while Presidents may come and go, Senators are around for a lot longer.

Look, there is no question that Putin wants to go into Ukraine, if for no other reason than to shore up his support at home. He had more than 100,000 troops massed on the border awaiting orders. And then Biden caught him by surprise. He played the Diplomacy card. And he played it publicly, forcing Putin into a corner. And while Putin was playing diplomacy, the US and NATO were pumping tens, if not hundreds of thousands of tons of defensive firepower into Ukraine, making a potential Russian incursion much more costly for the Russian military.

And while Putin might want to shore up his support at home, he can’t be a bully. Who cares what the world thinks, the Russians have to think that Putin was was either provoked or goaded into the act, either in Ukraine itself, or by the US and NATO. He needs a scapegoat.

And Biden keeps fucking his shit up! A few weeks ago, the government declassified and released intelligence showing that Putin was preparing to quickly install a puppet government in Kiev, and have them invite the Russian troops in. Putin ranted and rages that it was a total lie, and a direct provocation, but whether it was true or not, the cat was out of the bag.

If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. A week or so later, the Biden administration declassified another little golden intelligence nugget. This one had Russian special forces actually sneaking over the border into Ukraine, and firing back on their own troops on the Russian side of the border, giving Putin his needed claim of naked aggression against Russia. Once again Putin screamed bloody murder, calling it shameless propaganda, but this time we had a couple of maps. And once again, whether he would have done it or not, the mere exposure took it off of the table as a viable option.

Nope, the machine is still working fine. They saved the best for last. Putin was actually going to sneak troops and a video crew into Ukraine, and stage a fake atrocity. It was exquisitely planned. They even planned to have wounded, bloody dead bodies, and tearful interviews with peaceful Russians living in Ukraine, crying about how Ukrainian soldiers showed up to massacre them. This time a Ukrainian television went to the reputed village, and found that if the slaughter had taken place, the whole village slept through it. Once again, Putin screamed propaganda, but once again, another option was off of the table.

The pattern is clear, and the execution so far has been flawless. Putin needs an excuse to invade Ukraine. And as long as the US and NATO intelligence agencies can keep uncovering these things, the Russian troops are stuck at the border. And from what I can see, winter on the Russia-Ukraine border isn’t much more pleasant than winter in the wilds of Montana. It’s snowy, cold, and windy as hell.

I have no idea of how this all finally plays out, but I have an educated guess. Putin is in over his head. Surprise is gone, Ukraine is now better equipped, and his excuses keep getting blown out of the water. The last time that SOS Blinken met with Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign ministry said that there were actually constructive things to build on. Of course, none of them are Putin’s outrageous demands, but they are common ground that both sides would like to work on. Over the next couple of weeks, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Kremlin announced a partial draw down on the Ukraine as a gesture of good faith while the negotiations continue. Putin is on the end of a branch, and cracking is going on behind him. Time to save face and skedaddle.