These are not the times to make an argument based on self-claimed establishment "expert" status

There is one simple test to see whether someone has even the most basic understanding of the process of winning and losing wars. If they say "Russia cannot be defeated by Ukraine", all they are revealing is that they don't know what they are talking about.

— Phillips P. OBrien (@PhillipsPOBrien) March 3, 2025

I am sorry for the testy response but this is the third vacuous assertion from a nominal "expert" first thing in the early hours of the morning.  All this is empty posturing.  

OBrien asserts that "Russia cannot be defeated by Ukraine" is a patently false argument and that anyone who does not know this is ignorant.

Clearly, on the other hand, we have three years of war and hundreds of thousands of deaths which should have been averted were it true that Russia can be defeated by Ukraine.  

"Russia cannot be defeated by Ukraine" is an argument that can be made with logic, reason and empirical evidence.  Three years of evidence suggests it is (so far) a true statement.  Russia (the instigator) has not so far been defeated by Ukraine. 

Will it remain true for another three years?  Who knows? It is conceivable.  

On the other hand, Russia has suffered gross losses in men and armaments in the three years.  There seems to have been a mass outmigration of men in their most productive ages.  The financial burden of prosecuting the war seems, by some measures, to be unsustainable.  

Can Ukraine defeat Russia?  That is obviously conceivable and a plausible argument can be made.  

But Ukraine has also suffered in terms of manpower losses, in civilian losses, in losses of territory, and in terms of the catastrophic impact on the economy.

Two battlers have gone three rounds and beaten each other to a bloody standstill.  I believe it is possible to make perfectly plausible arguments that either might still win the current war.  

I also suspect that with adequate funding and armaments from Western nations, it would become much more likely that Ukraine can defeat Russia.  

But it remains, based on logic, reason, and empirical evidence, perfectly feasible to make a plausible argument that "Russia cannot be defeated by Ukraine".  

OBrien is simply trying to shut down an argument that stands in the way of his own opinion or objectives.  The unstated, and unwarranted, supposition is that he is an "expert" who knows better than those with a different opinion than he has.  It is simple, baseless bullying.

And, given the poor credibility of "experts" after the past five years of "expert" failure across many fields (education, public health, economics, foreign policy, politics, etc.), basing your argument on your status as an "expert" reflects poorly on your ability to make a credible argument.

Lots of posturing opinions masquerading as evidence-based insight going around these days.  All amounting to cognitive pollution.