he or his people are stupid. I believe he is the cold, calculating psychopath he was trained to be as a former KGB agent who has little to no regard for anyone aside from himself and possibly his closest inner circle of allies. His people are loyal because they know him and what he will do should they fail to be loyal. His circle is small which means he sorts through a limited amount of noise in his decision making. In other words, almost the exact opposite of what goes on in the United States for the vast majority of the time he has been in power. There are reasons he pulled similar maneuvers in 2008, 2014 and now 2022 and I think you are right that he is not yet ready/capable to take a bigger bite out of Europe. It will be interesting to see how the future plays out, however, right now China and Russia from a strategic positioning standpoint are thinking a few moves ahead of the United States.