How has our thinking changed?
The orthodoxy when I was at NATO was that Russia had invested significantly in revamping and modernizing its military since 2008 and that they would be one of the more impressive fighting forces in the world. We discovered that wasn't as true as we had thought. They were substandard. They were incapable of mounting that kind of complex and robust invasion of a country.
Part of the reason I thought it didn't make any sense for Vladimir Putin to choose this was the question of how he was going to hold Ukraine afterward. I don't understand the calculus, unless it's only and all about maintaining his power at home and being afraid of a prosperous democracy that's improving economically right next door in Ukraine in a way that he hasn't been delivering to his own citizens, and can't. It kind of makes sense then.
How have we shifted in thinking about Russia's capabilities? The other thing that's happened is that he started some limited conscription that didn't go well politically for him, so now they have a charm offensive. They're trying to have quotas and they're going to regions outside Moscow to get more and more soldiers to throw at the problem. They're clearing out prisons.
He doesn't care if his soldiers die. At some point, that'll come home to roost for him politically, but it hasn't yet. He can keep throwing young Russian men's bodies at this problem for quite a long time to come, which is too bad. It's too bad for the Russians.
Where it will end? There are different scenarios. I don't see many scenarios in which he is ousted from power. Whatever scenario it is, we'll have to collectively deal with Russia somehow, in a way that recognizes that they're right next door to Ukraine and will be forever, and that they're part of Europe. At some point, peace talks will have to happen, but I firmly believe it has to be President Zelenskyy's call when the time is right, and it can only happen when Ukraine has had such sufficient territorial gains that Putin is forced to the table.