Why did experts fail to predict Russia’s invasion of Ukraine?

24 comments

1. …the only thing Maersheimer is an expert in is being confidently wrong.

2. It’s hard to take seriously anything Mearsheimer says because he’s so frequently wrong. You described his ineffectiveness perfectly.

3. Fools, fools as far as the eye can see!

   Keep up the good work Anders!

4. Meirshimer makes the huge mistake of thinking putin thinks like Western leaders do, clearly he doesn't.

5. Wait, are we really saying that social sciences are often wrong but shift the blame and don't learn and change? I'm shocked.

6. Mearsheimer not only predicts things wrong, he also contradicts himself all the time, and ignores basic facts of reality.

   Mearsheimer predicted that Russia would not invade Ukraine because such an invasion would be catastrophic for Russia, but after Russia did invaded Ukraine, Mearsheimer completely contradicted himself and went on to say that the invasion was a great success and that Putin was winning everything, an opinion he still holds, even though it is obviously ridiculous, because Russia had no intention of receiving massive sanctions or seeing a new round of NATO expansion in its neighborhood.

   Mearsheimer also bizarrely said that Putin did not want to conquer Ukraine, despite the fact that Russia tried to decapitate the Ukrainian government, and despite the fact that Putin formally annexed even more Ukrainian territories. It's not like Putin is secretive about irredentism, he is explicit that irredentism and imperialism are the reasons for the invasion of Ukraine.

   Perhaps strangest of all, Mearsheimer's theory is that countries are aggressive and that they have a tendency to go to war against their neighbors and capture territory if possible, which led Mearsheimer to make ridiculous predictions such as that Germany and France would go to war after the Cold War, and yet, on the topic of Russia, Mearsheimer insists that Russia is not an aggressive power trying to increase its power by absorbing its neighbor.

7. Peter Zehan predicted it

8. Well, that's a heckuva way to say "I told you so!" 😛

9. You are not even a hair of the head of John.You should show the whole conversation and not a snippet to spread your dirty propaganda.

10. Nobody did, it was ignored you mug

11. My guess is that you applied a risk management approach with a knowledge of the historical tensions between Russia, the U.S and NATO. The realism theory of IR does has an explanatory value but is not really helpful for probability analysis.

12. I think you're too easily discounting how close Russia actually was to being extremely successful at the beginning of the war. A "Right" call would have been "the outcome is too close to call and it could fall either way given some pretty basic circumstances" not "Russia will definitely fail".

    Then, too. Russia is still going…

    Nevertheless, I do agree that there is still value in your analysis.

13. 14:24 i feel like this is important to point because Putin understands this concept when engaging US since hes been appealing to conservatives this election and basically since the war start

14. Russia is winning and the pro ukraine crowd was wrong an this video is damage control/cope.

15. All this channel is lying.
    This war was set up exactly like WWI, so a bunch of private military industrial complexes could earn the $$$.
    Read "War is a racket" by general Smedley Butler.
    Also, Russia has long been a western colony, guess who supplies West's oil, gas, metals, and nuclear materials. Yup, GO RUSSIA! 🇳🇱

16. The dopey professor – Mearsheimer is a charlatan. Very impressive back drop.

17. Anders, thank you for bringing the CSIS report to our intention. I just printed it off and will review it.

18. Great analogy. Putin did not understand the resolve of the Ukraine people to be free of the russian people. It is the Ukrainians that built the military for russia during WW2 and Putin's history forgot that. Now the people of Ukraine are proving their skills and resolve to fight back and be free..

19. I also don’t believe that just because a country is big, important, or rich, and especially if ruled by a dictator, that it will make rational choices. I would like to hear your prediction for china and taiwan.

20. The title alone is a big disservice to so many experts that correctly called Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

21. I see the point of arguing that all others were wrong and anders and some were actually right.
    In what? well, in predicting that russia will invade AND the invasion, based on hard figures, would fail.
    I argue that the same reason a majority of "experts" did not see russia invading is the same that now, all of them AND those that supposedly got it right, did not see it from UKRAINE'S PERSPECTIVE, or even from ruzzia's neigbors perspective. They keep their 'russia experts" high and loud in the ear of some like Biden and Sholtz and Macron, and recomended this stupid "escalation management" that even Anders is a fan of, scared shitless of russia blackmail of nuclear fearmongering, but ready at anytime, like after ww2, to give stalin or putler half of europe, never thinking FROM THOSE COUNTRIES PERSPECTIVE.
    I just hate cold geopoliticians even when they declare themselves pro ukraine, but ready in a second to force Ukraine "see the necessary concessions" at the "mandatory negociation table" . Negociate with a war criminal my a55. anders will say that without blinking, just like Stotkin, just like other russians turned westerners turned russian experts, that cannot see russian empire desintegrate as it should

22. Putin isn't a fool, but he was one of those who made the biggest miscalculation. Others said, correctly, that Putin had more economic and political upside to maintaining the tension but NOT invading. They, like Putin, believed Russia would win easily and no-one would do anything much about it. And, while they all miscalculated the depth and breadth of Russian corruption and incompetence (Russia not only didn't win easily, they they lost massively, largely due to their own weaknesses), their real miscalculation was on the West standing up and supporting Ukraine. Everyone turned to the US and for some reason Biden responded, …not as well as he might have, but adequately enough to embolden the Baltics, Scandinavia, Poland and the UK to join in and momentum picked up and continued. Putin didn't expect that! He's been dragging on with the war in the expectation that Western resolve won't hold, …more recently in the hope Trump wins the US election and pulls out of NATO and stops supporting Ukraine – Trump may not win the war. Putin stirred up trouble in the ME to try to distract the US and Europe, but that appears to have distracted Iran is ally. He has tried to put pressure on China to do something in the pacific, but Xi isn't in any hurry to deal with Taiwan and won't allow Jong-Un to stir up the Far East. Even Putin knows he cannot trust or rely on India. Even the Saudi regime has tired of the expense of supporting Putin by keeping oil production low so prices go high (if they ramp up production to claw back income, the price drop will cripple Putin's cash flow). Putin invaded for ideological reasons, expecting a quick victory would quickly correct any inconvenience – his was a wobbly war machine to begin with, and now the wheels have all but fallen off. The Western countries need to hold their nerve and maintain their unity in NATO, continue to support Ukraine, and trust/hope the US public vote blue.

23. Yes, your Premises is wrong….literally hundreds of experts were saying this was going to happen….it was the American military and intelligence networks that failed to acknowledge that this was about to happen!

24. Pro Ukraine "analysts" in foul moods lately, and lashing out