Russia Ukraine war, page-197754

IMO this war wont reach a negotiated settlement until :
(a) There is an outright battlefield victory by one side or the other (unlikely scenario)
(b) Until both sides realise that the extension of NATO to the south
(Georgia, Ukraine & Moldova ....and perhaps Belarus later) threatens
Russia's National Security which could develop into an existential threat for Russia.

There are no illusions now that the US led NATO regards Russia as its
enemy and that NATOs eastward move is designed to limit Russia's
sphere of influence to its west.(The re-establishment of the Iron Curtain)

We quite readily accept other countries' sphere of influence , particularly
that of the USA (eg US Monroe doctrine etc and even our sphere of influence
extending to East Timor, Indonesia, PNG, NZ, Solomons and the S/Pacific Islands.
yet we deny great powers such as Russia & China any such Sphere of Influence.

Geopolitics is all about the exercise of power, especially by the Great Powers
which in the real world gazumps smaller nations rights to exercise their national wishes
(take Iran, Venezuela etc for example ). The bottom line here is that if a Great Power
(in this case the USA) does not like an independent country's policies, it will be
subjected to extreme economic sanctions and ultimately war (remember Iraq)

Aus got a mild touch of US economic sanctions when the US blocked
the Whitlam Government's access to the overseas Bond market culminating
with the dismissal.

Iraq did not participate in 9/11 nor did it have WMDs as alleged by the USA
yet the USA invaded solely to effect Regime Change . Like Russia , Iraq
was a Petro-economy which was transitioning from the Petro-dollar to the
Euro

The secondary reason that the US gave for invading Iraq was to protect
Iraq's indigenous Kurds. (does this sound familiar)

IMO Russia invaded the Ukraine to execute regime change (with the ex Ukrainian President
holed-up in Russia) but underestimated
the regime's support both domestically and externally via the US led NATO.

And so we have this Proxy war with little short term prospect for a negotiated settlement
to date the biggest looser has been the Ukraine and its people.