In any international conflict that involves harsh political and diplomatic measures and violence of one kind or another, a key question arises for adversaries on both sides: what is the pain threshold on the other side?
More than six months following Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine, his opponents would do well to think regarding this question.
The pain threshold is a point which, when reached, forces the adversary to rethink their current strategy and seek relief. Some opponents may try to push this threshold as far as possible even following hearing their bones get crushed. This was the case of Adolf Hitler who was ready to see all of Germany turned into a heap of rubble but might not envisage surrender.
Others, like the late Ayatollah Khomeini in August 1988, would “drink the poisoned chalice” to stave off the collapse of their regime.
The Iraqi Saddam Hussein once offered us his own definition of the pain threshold. He recounted how, as a teenager, he and his buddies in Tikrit would jump on trucks transporting goods to Baghdad to get a free ride for kicks. The problem was that the truck guard was hitting them on the fingers with a wire whip that made them bleed.
According to Saddam, all the boys jumped following a few whippings, but he hung himself until his hands were dripping with blood. “I was proud to see that over time I was able to last a little longer.”
The apartheid regime in South Africa turned out to have a high pain threshold and decided to throw in the towel not because of sanctions and proximity pressures, but as a result of psychopolitical changes within the elites. white leaders.
In North Korea and the Islamic Republic of Iran, the threshold in question is set by the degree of threat to the regime and not by the suffering of the masses. In Pyongyang and Tehran, every pain is worth enduring as long as the regime’s survival is assured.
So what is Putin’s pain threshold?
Some Western leaders appear to have adopted a rather low threshold, believing that Putin would relent once the “crushing sanctions” begin to take effect.
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