Between fog of war, and the lies/propaganda coming out of both sides, I'm having trouble determining exactly what is actually going on.
As examples:
Is Russia losing steam and running into stiffer resistance? Or are they moving slowly and deliberately to allow civilians to flee?
Is it a 6 mile long convoy heading to Kiev? 18 miles long? 45 miles long? Is it so long because its is jam packed with armor and logistics for a long siege, or is it long because it's breaking down, falling apart, and being ambushed at every turn?
Is that a Russian armored vehicle that smoked the car, or an out of control Ukrainian one?
Putin is in way too deep to back out now without getting a big chunk of what he wants. Between the SWIFT exclusion and the weapons being provided to Ukraine he's probably got pretext for expanding the conflict, but it isn't at all clear that his conventional forces are up to it. Unless
the Ukraine thing is a feint with lower quality troops and his real forces are poised elsewhere. Regardless, I'm leaning toward the idea that absent leveraging nuclear threats or something outside the norm (heavy drone warfare, off-books terrorism, support from China, etc) he isn't likely to have much success with a larger conventional war.
Unless Putin is removed by his own generals (which seems unlikely at this stage), it feels like Putin is a nuke-armed rat being forced into a corner. I
really hope he doesn't decide that nukes are his only option. I do think he'd either waste a few in "tests" showing off or dump one carefully on Ukraine well before trying to roast the US.