Beyond the obvious consequences for Ukraine itself, the big geopolitical takeaway is the continuing weakness of integrated European foreign policy and defense. That the US is doing so much of the heavy lifting in the crisis, even going so far as to organize alternate natural gas arrangements for Europe, is an embarrassment, demonstrating yet again that America’s European allies cannot organize around even basic needs of joint defense.

European elites have spoken for years of the need to build a Common Foreign and Security Policy. Yet crisis after crisis in post-Cold War Europe – the Libyan War of 2011, Russia’s invasion of Georgia in 2014, Brexit – illustrates this failure. Worse, European cheap-riding – chronic underinvestment in military capabilities – has long been an issue in NATO. Similarly, the European Union has been unable to build a joint doctrine tying its member states to a common vision of the continent’s security. The hectoring and bullying of former US President Donald Trump ostensibly signaled that Europe had to ‘take its fate into its own hands.’ Yet nothing happened. Europe preferred to absorb Trump’s abuse than make domestic adjustments to enable it to respond robustly to local crises like Ukraine.

This – Europe’s perpetual weakness and almost willful refusal to adapt to handle regional, mid-sized crises – is the real lesson here, because Russia is too weak to pose the massive threat to European security which Anglo-American media are is hyping it as. Russia is not a continental imperialist; it is not Napoleon or Hitler. Russia will struggle even to occupy Ukraine at length should it choose to invade.