A government tyranny with top-down leadership and a state-controlled propaganda machine can create an illusion of a powerful military force despite the fact that in other ways, the country is a third-world country with a corrupt leadership that rules through propaganda, fear, and intimidation.

Corrupt top-down leadership is reflected in all of Russia's state institutions, including the military, which is just as corrupt and dysfunctional.  The result is a military with inferior leadership; poor, undisciplined troop performance and morale; and military equipment that is outdated and poor in quality.  Tactical and logistics performance is abysmal.

The good news is that tyrannical China also has corrupt top-down leadership and a state-controlled propaganda machine that can create an illusion of a powerful military and economic force despite the fact that in other ways, it is a third-world country with an autocratic leadership that rules with propaganda, fear, and intimidation.  China also probably has a military with inferior leadership; poor, undisciplined troop performance and morale; and military equipment that is hastily manufactured and poor in quality.  The tactical and logistics performance of the Chinese military is also probably abysmal.

Another lesson is that battles of the future will be won with technologically highly sophisticated drones and missiles that take out tanks, artillery, radar, battleships, airplanes, and other heavy equipment worth millions and even billions of dollars.  In the near future, aircraft carriers and ships will be taken out by hypersonic rockets, and rockets with attached torpedoes will take out submarines.

A lesson learned by the European countries is this: don't become dependent on your energy supply from a tyrant country like Russia.  Extortion is a distinct possibility and can result in economic devastation once the supply is diminished or ended entirely.

Finland and Sweden are learning the hard way that without a nuclear umbrella to disincentivize aggression from a nuclear power, you are theoretically defenseless against nuclear extortion despite a top-notch military and economy.  It is entirely possible that Japan will go nuclear to avoid extortion by Chinese and North Korean nukes.  Will the U.S. protect Japan from Chinese aggression?  For now, yes, but who knows in the distant future whether the U.S. will risk nuclear war with China if the Chinese invade Japan?

The military-industrial complex is alive and well worldwide.  There are plenty of nations with Russian arms, which will be looking elsewhere to Europe, Israel, and the United States for weapons to replace inferior Russian arms.

If Taiwan gets militarily stronger with modern weaponry, does not depend on its energy sources from China, and maintains a strong national patriotism among most of its armed inhabitants, then Taiwan will not be invaded or extorted by China.

For the U.S., the greatest lesson to be learned is not to become a corrupt tyranny like Russia or China with state censorship, a toothless constitution, and most of its citizens living on welfare or close to the poverty line like a third-world nation.  We are already toying with the concept of a ministry of truth to censor misinformation, so the internal threat to our nation is more than just imaginary but can in fact become very real and disastrous.

Finally, the most important lesson to be learned is that there is still room for optimism and courageous action while the nation has not yet succumbed to tyrannical rule by an oligarchy and the Constitution is still intact.

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