It isn’t over until it’s over (everywhere)

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I find it fascinating that when it comes to Covid-19, we’ve swung from being afraid to step outside to wild abandon. Not a mask to be seen anywhere. All rules dropped. But it hasn’t gone away.

People are still catching Covid and long Covid is real, People are also still being admitted to hospital and still dying in not totally insignificant numbers. It’s probably fine, these people were sick already, but globally cases are also significant (see North Korea).

It’s conceivable that a nasty variant could still emerge (I was talking with a Prof. of virology at Cambridge a month or two ago and she said that while new variants are thought to be ever weaker, that’s a theory with no proof.

Scenario update.

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Regarding the scenarios I wrote about a few days ago. A few additional thoughts.

1). A scenario where Ukraine is split between East and West might be middle ground in terms of a diplomatic solution. (not popular with Ukrainians obviously!)

2) The outward migration could be huge: 5 to 10+ million people, in which case one wonders what Putin might inherit. (on the other hand an empty buffer zone might be what he wants).

3). It might be reasonably easy (it isn’t) to capture (flaten) the cities, but Ukraine is vast and largely empty. Occupying what is essentially empty space is hard. I can only see two outcomes here: The destruction of Ukraine or the destructioin of Putin.


4). As the historian Simon Schama points out, the war could suddenly end when Russia’s cash runs out, but it could also slowly come to a halt when Russian soldiers become disillusioned with the campaign. Disillusioned troops returning from WW1 played an important role in sparking the 1917 Russian Revolution. In War and Peace, Prince Andrei Bolkonsys remarks that success in war does not depend on equipment or position, rather it depends “on the feeling that is in me and him” (soldier and opponent). The battle for the future is always in the mind.


5). What do we mean, or define, by ‘end’? What does this ending look like?