So much winning by Putin

Not

So much winning by Putin.

Lost Crimea as safe base for BSF;

Lost sense of security in Russia itself after drone attacks on Moscow et al and Russian opposition cross border attacks;

Lost half of his conventional military in Ukraine;

Lost 100k plus troops dead in Ukraine, many more injured;

Lost European gas market - €50bn a year business;

Lost $400bn in frozen Russian assets now in Western jurisdictions. Guys like me will make sure it ain’t coming back and hopefully will be used for Ukraine’s reconstruction;

Lost access to international capital markets, thrown out of international investment indices. An international economic pariah.

Lost $350bn in capital flight - the CBR suggests the current account surplus has been around $300bn since the full scale invasion, FX reserves since then are down by $50bn, so the conclusion is that Russians have pulled $350bn out of the country. That is funds not available to the Putin regime - well hopefully if Western sanctions offshore work.

Lost $600bn in forgone GDP, based on my assumption that since the annexation of Crimea, Russia GDP growth has been 1% lower pa due to sanctions, FX depreciation and the fact that policy has been run much tighter due to geopolitical than should hitherto have been the case.

Lost $60bn in additional defence spending because of the way - that is replacing lost kit as above and sending bags of potatoes to the families of Russian troops lost in Ukraine. This is money lost from productive use in tue Russian ecomomy.

Lost $1.5 trillion in total losses to the Russian economy since 2014, a full year’s GDP or more than $11,000 for every Russia national;

Lost neutral status of Finland and Sweden to NATO membership;

Lost the advantage whereby NATO had seemed to lack purpose before the invasion, it now has and has been unified and strengthened like no time since 1991;

Lost status and leverage in near abroad - Armenia is fleeing CSTO to cosy up to West, Azerbaijan saw Russian weakness as green light for latest offensive in NK. Turkey and China are reinforcing their advantage in Central Asia. Near abroad now just feels like plain old “abroad” to Russia;

Lost international prestige - he is now just seen as a loser;

Lost frequent flyer status as ICC indictment means he cannot travel much internationally for fear of being arrested. He cannot now even go to Armenia which just signed up to the ICC;

Lost huge Russian defence sales as Russian military underperformance on battlefield means potential buyers now understand Russian kit is crap;

Lost Ukraine - his idiotic, brutal invasion has United the nation against Russia. Even many of the prior pro Russian elements, parties and voters are now mostly fighting against Russian imperialism;

Lost Ukraine to EU membership - it is going to happen;

Lost military superiority to Ukraine - the days of Russia easily being able to walk into Ukraine are gone. Ukrainians have proven to be able fighters, willing to stand up to Russia and now armed with top notch Western kit which outmatches what Russia has;

Lost any Russian economic perspective for growth - the sanctioned Russian economy is not going anywhere. Russia has to offer discounts on exports to trade and premiums on imports to get anything it wants under sanctions. Who is going to ever invest in Russia under Putin?

Lost Russia’s great power status - everyone now sees Putin is running a Potemkin village. Going into this war Putin thought he was a peer partner with China, now he realises (and more importantly China does) that Russia is the third or fourth rate power and the weak underling to China;

Lost his chef - Prigozhin. But importantly with the Wagner coup, he has lost the sense of being untouchable at home;

And Matt Gaetz and the crazy element in the GOP want to stop arming Ukraine to reverse all the above?