If Syria was a preview, settle in. That started in 2011 and still hasn’t sorted itself out. Ukraine might take less time since it’s a bigger country in a simpler environment but with higher contagion risks. I’ll guess 5y minimum.
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At some level I think the rest of the world kinda treats the Middle East as a special case. You expect it to be a permanent mess as it has been for 3000 years. Wars elsewhere feel more exceptional and riskier for the world at large somehow.
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Afghanistan: 20 years, Iraq: 7y. Syria: 11y. Note that none of these is actually over. They’ve just reached endemic-but-contained-meltdown state. Wars these days take long to stabilize. Peace isn’t even the goal. Stable Hobbesian endgames are.
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Maybe this is how the Westphalian state ends. As a slow dissolution into stable conflict with half ass endless peace processes. Starting in margins, moving to civilizational cores.
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Everyone is hoping for this war to go just go away after 6 months. And I suspect that’s what will happen. It will recede from headlines. The period a conflict spends in western headlines is merely a phase with known dynamics.
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I think there has been exactly such a loss of willpower. Geriatric societies around the world just want to retire in prosperous peace, not fight wars of destitution.
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If the breakdowns aren't contained, that seems plausible. I'm hopeful that there can be a resolution in Ukraine, and even in Syria, but I worry that you're right, and this is a symptom of a loss of willpower to maintain the international order, rather than a strategic retreat.
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Well no, because Syria is a civil war. Ukraine was invaded by an outside power, with no sign of it developing into a civil war.
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That, and Russia’s involvement in Syria was a tiny fraction of its involvement in Ukraine. Eventually it’s going to need to end that somehow - and not too long from now.
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an necessary condition for the war lasting more than a few months is Russia trying something Different presumably
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That's what I'm afraid of :/
But I have doubts if that situation is sustainable on Russia's side - possibly only with Chinese support.
But what is in it for them that they did not already get?





