Good article on Narva, Estonia’s resiliency. Yet we have all lived through Russia achieving surprise against Ukraine in 2022, right? And we recall Russian denials of even being involved in Crimea and the Donbas during 2014 and 2015, no? Putin will AstroTurf separatists in need of “rescue” if he can’t find any.

I do not assume Russia can’t achieve surprise. And I don’t assume Putin understands the resiliency. Nor do I assume that Putin won’t consider a Kargil-style operation as the least-bad option if he wants to restore his ambitions to add the honorific “the Great” to his name in Russian history books.

I’ll add a link to my Army magazine article on preparing to defeat such a Russian operation in a reply to this note.