Indeed, and if you look back at the start of the war in Ukraine it’s pretty clear that’s what US thought of Russia. Now they’re realizing they’re fighting a peer competitor and it’s not going well.
more charitably to US planning you could also conclude that America wanted to make the war costly for Russia but doesn’t actually care about Ukrainian ownership of the Crimea or what happens to Ukraine
For sure, but even with that in mind I would argue that things have gone catastrophically wrong for US.
I’m not so sure of that. The war definitely proved that America shouldn’t fight a direct war against Russia but everyone already knew that because of nuclear weapons.
The war was definitely more costly to the Russians than the gain is worth to them and America can recoup their losses by asset stripping what is left of Ukraine