Today is a dark day, but Ukraine has faced worse tests than this. In the end, Ukrainians will have the last laugh, Putin.

Too many on social media believed Putin's lies and pushed back hard on U.S. intelligence saying that he's going to invade soon.

Worth noting also that Ukrainian leaders, including President Zelenskyy himself, downplayed the risk of a Russian invasion, not wanting to cause a “panic.”

Understandable, but much more could have been done to prepare. Highways could have been blockaded; entrenchments could have been dug. There was an interesting interview with Gen. David Petraeus about these things.

https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2022/02/david-petraeus-ukraine-russia-invasion/622893/

Russia’s astonishingly rapid advance owes a lot to these failures.

That said, the blame obviously falls first and foremost on Putin. He successfully kept his true intentions masked behind a fog of lies, explaining away the troop deployments right up till the final hour when he continued to insist it was only about the Eastern provinces of Luhansk and Donetsk.

That’s the advantage dictators have over democracies. They can brazenly lie, in front of their own people and the world, and no one can hold them accountable.

Well, now the mask is off. There should be no remaining illusions, and no element of surprise among any in Europe if Putin were to invade another country.

Perhaps some didn't think Putin was this crazy, but I was surprised that Zelenskyy thought America was being hyperbolic.

Russia under Putin has menaced and even annexed parts of neighbors, including Ukraine — but trying to swallow a country whole, let alone one the size of Ukraine, is a radical departure, even for him.

So it was still possible to believe Putin was only using this manufactured crisis to annex the Eastern provinces, and consolidate his hold on Belarus. If Putin were being smart and strategic, that’s what he’d have done, IMO — and keep undermining Ukraine from within, eventually getting another pro-Russia guy elected through “legitimate” means.

But for whatever reason, megalomania went to his head. The fact he’s getting older, or the COVID isolation he’s put himself through? Even the Russians who thought they knew Putin are shocked.

There’s no precedent for this, but the phrase “Hitler with nukes” comes to mind.

Putin is a truly evil man. The Russian government is corrupt and a lot of the citizens as well as the Ukrainian citizens live in fear. If the oppose his rule, he will make them disappear.

These Russian troops also didn't have to die young for his egomania.

Totally agreed! Half the Russian troops don’t want to be fighting. It isn’t fair. Putin doesn’t give people their rights.