What I think Putin's game is

[edhopper]

I don't think his plans are to take the whole country of Ukraine.. He will invade into Eastern Ukraine. His forces in Belarus are there to hold Ukraine's forces defending Kyiv. Meanwhile he will take the so called pro-Russian districts in the East. Then he will agree to talk peace. He will end the aggression as long as he keeps some of the territory he occupies.
It's a land grab to make him a hero at home. It's just old Soviet behavior.

Once he has the area, he will flood it with Russians so that returning it to Ukraine will be that much harder.

[Hoyt]

1. Hard to tell what will happen, but that is definitely plausible.

[Walleye]

2. Russia will always try to take territory, it's what they do

I once heard Henry Kissinger say that and I haven’t forgotten it

[Midnight Writer]

3. I think so, too. He doesn't want to occupy a hostile nation. He'll just take pro-Russian parts.

[Calista241]

4. Taking the Russian districts doesn't win him anything he doesn't already have.

It's certainly not worth the financial price he's going to pay. Getting 50 miles of territory, maybe a few roads to make travel more convenient, that's not worth it.

What I think he wants is farmland. The price of oil is going to drop precipitously in the next 10 years as more and more cars go electric, and Russia's economy is built entirely on being a petro-state at the moment. Ukraine is one of the top 3 breadbaskets in the world, along with the central US and Australia.

With Ukraine, he could feed his country in perpetuity and have enough food to sell the excess to other countries.

[edhopper]

5. So you think

He is taking the whole country?

[radius777]

6. No, but he wants to install a puppet gov't

and 'cleanse' the current one of any pro-West elements.

Vindman said their likely goal is to take control of the cities and the capital. They will try to claim that Zelensky was doing a genocide against Donbas and that Russia had to 'liberate' them.

[C_U_L8R]

9. Yes. Seize the capital and install a puppet regime.

And Ukrainians will have none if it. It could be a quagmire for Putin and all of Russia will be outcast from the world.

[radius777]

10. Yep, most of them hate Putin with a passion.

The Ukrainians will simply wage a guerrilla war that the West would likely assist with covertly for years if necessary. Russia has no way to win this.

[edhopper]

16. In this case

I don't think they need to do it covertly. The west can openly support the resistance to such an invasion.

[Calista241]

7. I think he'll take Kiev and install a puppet government.

And leave his troops there. They’ll have a Ukrainian politician as President, but he’ll be 100% controlled by Putin.

[UTUSN]

8. Wants to resurrect the USSR. Make USSR Great Again.

[underpants]

11. Yep that's the goal.

I can’t see him backing down now regardless of his control on the state media there.

Oh, and got the joke

[Quixote1818]

12. This video has some of Russia's battle plans intercepted by the CIA

It talks of three different phases with diplomatic concessions coming between each phase.

[roamer65]

13. Watch President Macron of France.

👍

[Walleye]

14. Don't forget Paul Manafort was instrumental in trying to install a puppet government there

In fact he started the whole “lock her up” thing over there against the democratically elected government

[FakeNoose]

19. Yes I believe it was Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch

Wikipedia link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie_Yovanovitch

She was appointed as US Ambassador to Ukraine by Obama in 2016, as the presidential election was heating up. Yovanovitch was definitely targeted by Paul Manafort (and later by Rudy Giuliani) due to the fact that she had no loyalty to Putin and no reason to comply with Russian objectives. Manafort's 2016 smear campaign against Yovanovitch included the "Lock her up" slogan and she was eventually ousted by Chump in May 2019.

I hope she writes a book and trashes all of them.

[Walleye]

20. Thanks for that background. I wasn't real clear on who the object of that was

Maybe someday we’ll find out why Manafort wanted Pence to be Vice President

[Straw Man]

15. Quite likely.

It's what Stalin did to Finland in 1939-1941. The eastern part of the Karelia province was ceded to Russia. There was no effort by Finland to reclaim it after the collapse of the Soviet Union because there were no Finns left there.

[many a good man]

17. That's my thinking, too

He can claim victory and save face with a mini buffer state. He'll continue trying to subvert democracy in Ukraine.

I don't think it will lessen the sanctions, however.

[Hotler]

18. I read somewhere that this might be about fresh water to Crimea.

Ukraine controls the pipeline supplying fresh water to Crimea. Ukraine has stop most of the water and farming is suffering.
Just saying.