Comrade Putin probably expected that his military would be greeted as liberators, and that he would be viewed as the Great Unifier of the Slavic peoples. Oops. That is what happens when you believe your own propaganda. This has been a terrible miscalculation and the world is suffering the consequences.
As a former military guy, I wondered why he did not follow the plan of US General Colin Powell versus Iraq in Desert Storm. That war was for totally bogus purposes (there were no weapons of mass destruction, okay?) but my point in bringing it up is to ask how does a superpower take down a formidable opponent? First, you bomb the hell out of him for about a month, destroy his capability to resist and THEN send the ground forces in to do battle. The Americans respected the ability of the Iraqi military to fight back and destroyed it. It is horrifying to say so, but American leadership was not that concerned about preserving the economy of the country or its people. The main task was to destroy the military and its ability to resist.
As for Comrade Putin, a few days before the attack, he first lectured the West about our ignorance of the history of the Russian and Ukrainian peoples. He told us all about how the Russians and Ukrainians are essentially one people and the boundaries and creation of the Ukrainian state are essentially a sham imposed by outsiders. It seems that he wanted to be friends when this process is over. Hence, he did not want to cause great destruction. He wanted to move in, achieve an easy occupation, and achieve a joyful reunion with his lost Ukrainian brothers and sisters and overcome the painfully incompetent leadership of the Communists of the past, replacing it with the brilliant leadership of... himself. He would be greeted as a liberator, and the great unifier of the Slavic people.
Okay, all this is fine, and you can tell all the ignorant West all about how it should be. But you know what? The Ukrainians ain't buying it either, Volodya. I don't think the Russian people hold much actual hatred for the Ukrainians (especially prior to the 2014 war of Crimean annexation), but if the Ukrainians didn't hate the Russians before this war, they do now.
It is probably easier to take over Ukraine than to administer it. As long as firearms can be smuggled into the country, no Russian administrator will ever be safe, because any Ukrainian with the ability to operate a firearm, will be a threat to shoot the administrator on sight.
This is a disaster. Ironically, Putin was probably correct in some of what he said, prior to starting the war. Long term, Ukrainians and Russians are basically friendly to one another on a personal level, and can understand each other's language and share common history and religion. But on a governmental level, Ukrainians and other nationalities of the former Soviet Union have no affinity for Putin's control. In fact Russian people may not be all that wild about him, either, but they can't get rid of him since their elections are not real.
So now we are on nuclear alert to preserve his sense of power. I am a bit concerned about that since I live a few miles away from an Air Force base and I am sure that several bombs have targeted us. Regardless, however, I am sure that the world will oppose Putin by any means necessary.
