Wasn't this the whole premise of prodding the Ukrainians into poking the bear, to give Russia another Afghanistan?

For those of us actually old enough to remember, Russia fought two pretty brutal wars to hang onto Chechnya, but turned Ukraine loose without a look back.

Maybe if you actually read all the news and not just one side, it might actually start making sense.

The joke before the war was the West wanted a war with Russia to the last Ukrainian and that's exactly how it is working out.