E70: EMERGENCY POD! Russia invades Ukraine: Reactions, Putin's ambition, Biden's response and more

Key observable parts of the prediction:

1. U.S. public opposition to direct U.S. battlefield entry / sending troops

   • Early and later polling shows Americans were notably wary of direct U.S. military engagement in Ukraine. A March 2022 YouGov America poll found only 30% of Americans supported U.S. forces actually shooting down Russian planes over Ukraine, with 46% opposed, even though more people liked the no‑fly‑zone label in the abstract. A Quinnipiac poll the same month found 54% approved of NATO’s decision not to impose a no‑fly zone—i.e., not to risk direct combat with Russia. (en.wikipedia.org)
   • A July 2022 Chicago Council survey found only 38% of Americans would support sending U.S. troops to defend Ukraine, implying a majority either opposed or were unsure about a direct troop commitment. (en.wikipedia.org)
   • Politically, both the Biden administration and, later, the Trump administration repeatedly and explicitly ruled out sending U.S. troops into Ukraine itself, instead reinforcing NATO’s eastern flank. (en.wikipedia.org)
   • To date (through late 2025), there has been no publicly acknowledged deployment of U.S. combat units to fight on Ukrainian territory; U.S. involvement has consisted of arms, training, intelligence, and economic measures.

   These data support Friedberg’s claim that it would be (and remained) very unpopular for the U.S. to "enter the war on the battlefield" and that the U.S. would avoid direct troop involvement in Ukraine.

2. U.S. confronting Russia via cyber rather than on the physical battlefield

   • General Paul Nakasone, then head of U.S. Cyber Command and the NSA, later confirmed that U.S. military hackers conducted offensive cyber operations in support of Ukraine and that the U.S. had carried out "a series of operations across the full spectrum: offensive, defensive, [and] information operations" related to the conflict. (news.sky.com)
   • U.S. “hunt forward” cyber teams were deployed to help Ukraine search for and disrupt Russian cyber tools, and broader U.S.–Ukrainian cyber cooperation intensified after the invasion. (news.slashdot.org)
   • At the same time, the primary visible pillars of U.S. strategy were large‑scale economic sanctions and massive military aid to Ukraine, while deliberately avoiding a direct U.S.–Russia kinetic clash. (en.wikipedia.org)

   So, while cyber was not the only or even the most publicly emphasized instrument (sanctions and arms were), it did become a real operational theater where the U.S. confronted Russia, and critically, this confrontation occurred instead of deploying U.S. combat forces into Ukraine—exactly the contrast Friedberg drew when he spoke of "another battle stage, not on the physical field."

Overall assessment
The falsifiable core of the prediction was: (a) the U.S. would avoid sending its own troops into Ukraine because that would be domestically unpopular, and (b) U.S.–Russia confrontation would instead occur on non‑kinetic "battle stages" like cyber. Polls and policy decisions show sustained public reluctance to direct U.S. combat, and in practice the U.S. never sent combat troops into Ukraine while Cyber Command did in fact conduct offensive and defensive operations tied to the war.

Although the normalized wording (“primarily via cyber operations”) arguably overstates cyber’s prominence relative to sanctions and military aid, Friedberg’s concrete, checkable claims about no U.S. battlefield entry and confrontation shifting to cyber rather than ground combat have held up well. On balance, that makes the prediction right.

Open-source reporting from 2022–2025 consistently indicates that the United States has provided extensive indirect support to Ukraine—financial aid, weapons, intelligence, training, and sanctions against Russia—but has not deployed U.S. combat units into Ukraine to fight Russian forces.

Key points:

1. Early policy statement (Feb–Mar 2022). In the first weeks after the invasion, President Biden and U.S. officials repeatedly ruled out sending American troops to fight in Ukraine, emphasizing that U.S. forces would defend NATO territory but not enter the war directly.

2. Aid and support, but no combat deployment. Throughout 2022–2025 the U.S. role has been described as providing military aid (artillery, air defenses, tanks, long‑range missiles), intelligence, and training (often outside Ukraine, e.g., in Germany or other NATO countries), without U.S. troops engaging Russian forces on Ukrainian soil. None of the major developments in U.S. support—such as provision of HIMARS, Patriot systems, Abrams tanks, or long‑range missiles—have included announcements of U.S. combat deployments into Ukraine.

3. No reports of U.S. combat forces fighting in Ukraine. Media coverage, Pentagon briefings, and congressional debates about escalation risks have focused on avoiding direct NATO–Russia war; there are no credible reports of U.S. combat brigades, battalions, or similar units being sent into Ukraine for active combat against Russian troops.

Given that the prediction was about direct U.S. military intervention with combat forces inside Ukraine and that, up to November 30, 2025, this has not occurred, the prediction that “the United States would not intervene militarily in Ukraine” in the specific sense defined (no deployment of U.S. combat forces to fight Russian forces in Ukraine) has held true.

Therefore, the prediction is right.

Within hours of Russia’s full‑scale invasion on February 24, 2022, President Biden announced a major sanctions package targeting Russia’s largest banks, state‑owned enterprises and high‑tech imports, developed in coordination with the EU, UK, Japan, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and others, and explicitly aimed at severely degrading Russia’s economy and military‑industrial capacity over time.(rollcall.com)(observerbd.com) U.S. officials had repeatedly framed the planned response as the “most severe sanctions ever” and as intended to be crippling if Russia invaded, and Biden’s post‑invasion package followed that playbook rather than a gradual approach.(news.wjct.org)(wqln.org) Major Western media contemporaneously described Biden’s February 24 measures as “new crippling sanctions” and said they were “aimed at crippling the Russian economy,” underscoring that they were broadly perceived and labeled as crippling in intent.(newsbusters.org) In parallel, U.S. allies rapidly implemented coordinated financial and export‑control measures, and within days the EU and partners moved to cut key Russian banks from SWIFT, all as part of a wider Western effort to impose heavy, punitive economic costs on Russia for the invasion.(rollcall.com)(en.wikipedia.org) Because Biden and multiple Western allies did in fact announce and begin implementing severe, widely described-as-crippling economic sanctions in the immediate aftermath of the invasion, Chamath’s prediction is best judged as right.

The prediction was conditional: if the war did not escalate into a larger war involving other great powers, Putin would occupy Ukraine for roughly a year, install a puppet or strongly pro‑Russian government in Kyiv, and then largely withdraw, similar to Georgia in 2008.

1. Condition check – no great‑power war: As of late 2025, NATO and major Western powers have supplied weapons, training, and aid to Ukraine but have explicitly stayed out as direct belligerents. NATO leadership has repeatedly stated that NATO is not a party to the conflict and has no plans to send combat troops into Ukraine, rejecting no‑fly zones precisely to avoid direct Russia–NATO war.(theguardian.com) This means the predicate condition (“if there’s no escalation into a larger war involving other great powers”) has effectively been met.

2. Duration and scale of Russian presence: Contrary to the “about one year” expectation, the large‑scale invasion that began on 24 February 2022 is still ongoing more than three and a half years later. The eastern front of the Russo‑Ukrainian war is explicitly described as ongoing and part of a conflict dated “24 February 2022 – present,” with active Russian offensives continuing into 2024–2025.(en.wikipedia.org) Multiple analyses estimate that Russia continues to occupy roughly one‑fifth of Ukraine’s territory as of 2025, including large parts of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson regions.(aljazeera.com) This is a prolonged, large occupation, not a short in‑and‑out campaign.

3. Annexation vs. temporary occupation: Rather than preparing to leave after a year, Russia formally annexed four Ukrainian regions (Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, Zaporizhzhia) in September 2022 and Putin declared their residents to be Russian citizens “forever,” signaling an intent to hold the territory long‑term, not to withdraw.(aljazeera.com) This is the opposite of a Georgia‑style limited incursion followed by withdrawal.

4. Government in Kyiv: No Russian‑installed puppet or overtly pro‑Russian regime was ever established in Kyiv. Volodymyr Zelenskyy has remained Ukraine’s president throughout the war, with Ukrainian political reporting and diplomatic travel in 2025 still referring to him as president and head of state.(en.wikipedia.org) Ukraine’s government continues to fight Russia and reject any territorial concessions, not act as a Moscow client.(theguardian.com)

Because (a) the condition of no direct great‑power war was met, yet (b) Russia did not withdraw after about a year, did annex and hold large territories, and did not install a puppet government in Kyiv, the prediction’s main scenario has clearly failed. Therefore, the prediction is wrong.

Chamath’s claim has two key parts: (1) new large‑scale U.S. gas investment starting in 2022 wouldn’t materially increase supply or generate attractive returns for ~6–7 years (i.e., not before ~2028–2029), and (2) major U.S. gas producers were not going to put incremental capital into U.S. natural gas, shale, or offshore. Both are inconsistent with what has actually happened since early 2022.

1. U.S. natural‑gas supply did increase materially within 1–3 years, not 6–7.

   • EIA data show U.S. dry gas production hit a record 103.6 Bcf/d in 2023, up from prior years, and both output and demand are projected to keep rising into the mid‑2020s. (reuters.com)
   • Marketed U.S. natural‑gas production reached a record 113.1 Bcf/d in 2023, with Texas, Pennsylvania, Louisiana, West Virginia and New Mexico driving the growth; production in Texas alone rose 7% year‑over‑year. (inspectioneering.com)
   • Output continued at very high levels into 2024 (roughly flat to slightly higher than 2023), indicating the system did respond with additional supply well before 2028. (hydrocarbonprocessing.com)
     These records came only about 1–2 years after his February 2022 statement, not 6–7 years later.

2. Producers did commit significant new capital to U.S. gas and LNG after 2022.

   • Global upstream oil and gas capex rose 39% in 2022 to about $499 billion—the highest since 2014—with further increases in 2023–24. While still framed as “capital discipline,” this is a clear reversal of the prior under‑investment and contradicts “no incremental capital.” (ief.org)
   • The IEA notes a new wave of LNG investment, led by the U.S. and Qatar, that will significantly expand global LNG export capacity in the second half of the 2020s—again implying substantial new gas‑linked capital commitments. (iea.org)
   • Concrete U.S. gas/LNG projects:
     • Cheniere’s Corpus Christi Stage 3 LNG expansion: Cheniere took a positive FID in June 2022 on >10 MTPA of new LNG capacity and issued full notice to proceed to Bechtel. Cheniere explicitly targeted delivering “much‑needed volumes” by the end of 2025, implying roughly a 3–3.5‑year lag from FID to material new supply. (bechtel.com)
     • NextDecade’s Rio Grande LNG Phase 1: NextDecade reached FID in July 2023 on three trains (17.6 MTPA), backed by about $18.4 billion in project financing, with first operations expected around 2027. (bechtel.com)
   • The IEA and industry data also show upstream investment and M&A in U.S. gas and shale increasing materially in 2022–24, not being frozen. (iea.org)
     These are large, U.S.‑based natural‑gas investments directly contradicting the statement that “every single” company was refusing to put incremental capital into U.S. nat‑gas or shale.

3. Returns and payback periods are proving shorter than 6–7 years.

   • For LNG megaprojects, published schedules show expected first exports 3–5 years after FID (e.g., Corpus Christi Stage 3 by end‑2025 from a 2022 FID; Rio Grande LNG Phase 1 in 2027 from a 2023 FID), not 6–7 years. (bechtel.com)
   • For shale gas and associated gas, wells typically generate production and cash flow within months, which is consistent with the rapid rise in U.S. dry gas output in 2022–23. (mrt.com)
   • The IEA and other analyses highlight that 2022–23 were extraordinarily profitable years for upstream oil and gas, with record cash flows and large shareholder distributions—evidence that returns on recent investments materialized far sooner than 2028–29. (iea.org)

4. U.S. gas has already played a major global role far earlier than his timeline.

   • By 2023, the U.S. had become the world’s largest LNG exporter, with exports roughly 12–15% higher than in 2022, enabled by high U.S. gas production and expanding LNG infrastructure. (forbes.com)
     This outcome—substantial U.S. gas volumes reaching global markets within about a year of his comment—undercuts the notion that new or expanded U.S. gas supply couldn’t matter for many years.

Because (a) U.S. gas supply and exports did increase materially within a few years, (b) major U.S. gas and LNG players did commit tens of billions of dollars of new capital after 2022, and (c) the project timelines and realized profitability clearly contradict a universal 6–7‑year lag to returns, the prediction that new 2022‑era investment would not materially boost supply or generate attractive ROIC until ~2028–2029—and that companies would not commit such capital—has not held up. On balance, this makes the prediction wrong, even though the full 6–7‑year window has not yet elapsed.

Timeframe and conditions of the prediction have not yet fully played out.

1. Nuclear build‑out (140 new plants over ~30 years, +15–20% capacity, enabling coal retirement)
• China’s official targets are broadly consistent with a very large nuclear build, on the order Friedberg described. Policy documents and analyses cite goals of about 150 new reactors between 2020 and 2035 and ~200 GW of nuclear capacity by 2035, far above today’s level.(en.wikipedia.org)
• As of end‑2024, China had 58 reactors operating (~61 GW) and around 27–32 GW under construction, and the State Council has been approving roughly 10–11 new reactors a year since 2021.(en.wikipedia.org)
• Including operational, under‑construction, and recently approved units, China had just over 100 reactors in the pipeline by late‑2024, well short of 140 completed stations but clearly on an aggressive build trajectory.(nuclearbusiness-platform.com)

Conclusion on this leg: China is indeed pursuing a very large nuclear expansion consistent with the plan Friedberg referenced, but we are only a few years into a 30‑year horizon, so we cannot yet say whether the full 140‑plant build and the specific 15–20% capacity effect will be realized.

2. Industrial power prices falling from ~$0.07–0.08 to ~$0.04–0.05 per kWh over ~a decade
• Recent data show average 2024 electricity prices for energy‑intensive industrial users in China around 7.7 cents/kWh, while the United States and India were about 6.3 cents/kWh.(energyupdate.com.pk)
• Another cross‑country dataset (GlobalPetrolPrices) reports March 2025 business electricity in China at 0.794 CNY/kWh (~11.2 US cents), though this category is broader than just heavy industry.(globalpetrolprices.com)
• Local industrial tariffs by province (e.g., Dalian 35 kV and above) show prices around 0.61 CNY/kWh in late 2024, roughly 8–9 US cents, down from a high of 0.84 CNY/kWh in 2021, but still well above the 4–5 cent range Friedberg projected.(ceicdata.com)

So far there is no evidence of a nationwide drop toward 4–5 cents/kWh; rather, average industrial prices remain around or above the 7–8 cent level he cited as the starting point.

3. China’s energy‑cost advantage vs. the United States
• Friedberg said China was already 30–40% cheaper than the U.S. on an industrial electricity basis and that nuclear would widen this gap.
• Current comparative data show China’s industrial electricity prices in 2024 (7.7¢/kWh) higher than the U.S. (6.3¢/kWh) for energy‑intensive industries, i.e., the U.S. is cheaper on average, not more expensive.(energyupdate.com.pk)
• Other analyses likewise place typical Chinese industrial rates on the order of $0.07–0.10/kWh, overlapping or slightly above typical U.S. ranges rather than being 30–40% lower.(linkedin.com)

Thus, his baseline claim about China already being 30–40% cheaper appears incorrect, and there is no observed widening of a Chinese cost advantage so far; if anything, current data show a modest U.S. advantage on average.

Why the overall verdict is “inconclusive” rather than “wrong”
• The core forward‑looking part of the prediction is explicitly framed over “roughly the next 30 years” for the build‑out and “over the next decade” for the price effect. As of November 2025, we are only about 3½ years past the 2022 podcast date, i.e., early in both time windows.
• While current evidence contradicts several of his assumptions (China already 30–40% cheaper, imminent drop to 4–5¢/kWh, clear widening vs the U.S.), it is still technically possible—though increasingly challenging—that a combination of massive nuclear additions, policy reforms, and subsidies could drive larger price declines later in the decade.

Given that:

• The nuclear expansion he described is broadly aligned with China’s stated plans and ongoing approvals, but far from completed; and
• The expected large, sustained price drop and widened cost advantage have not materialized yet, but the 10‑year horizon has not expired,

the fairest classification as of late 2025 is “inconclusive (too early)” rather than definitively right or wrong.

Chamath’s claim had two main parts:

1. The U.S. will not be able to scale nuclear power in a major way.
2. Most growth in non‑fossil electricity will come from solar rather than nuclear.

What has happened since early 2022?

• Nuclear has not scaled up materially so far.

  • As of mid‑2025, the U.S. has ~97 GWe of operable nuclear capacity and zero reactors under construction. World Nuclear Association notes 94 operating reactors totaling 96,952 MWe and 0 MWe under construction, with nuclear providing about 19% of U.S. electricity in 2023—essentially the same share as decades ago. (world-nuclear.org)
  • The only large new U.S. reactors to come online in this period are Vogtle Units 3 and 4 in Georgia (Unit 3 in July 2023, Unit 4 in April 2024), after huge delays and cost overruns. (georgiapower.com)
  • Nuclear’s share of U.S. electricity has stayed roughly flat or slightly down: ~18.2–18.5% in 2022–2024, not a “large new fleet” or materially larger share of the national mix. (ycharts.com)

• Solar is the dominant source of new non‑fossil generation.

  • EIA and industry summaries show solar is the leading source of new U.S. generating capacity and generation growth through at least 2025. One EIA‑based analysis notes solar is expected to be “the leading source of growth in U.S. power sector generation through the end of 2025,” with about 79 GW of new solar capacity added in 2024–2025. (utilitydive.com)
  • EIA Short‑Term Energy Outlook projections for 2025–2026 explicitly say solar supplies most of the increase in U.S. electricity generation, with very modest nuclear growth (on the order of a few tens of TWh vs much larger solar gains). (publicpower.org)
  • 2024 data show renewables at ~24% of U.S. generation, with solar nearly 7% and still the fastest‑growing source; renewables’ output grew >10× faster than nuclear that year, underscoring that new non‑fossil growth is coming from wind/solar rather than additional nuclear output. (electrek.co)

• Forward‑looking signals are mixed:

  • Policy momentum for nuclear has increased: the U.S. government in 2025 set a target to quadruple nuclear capacity to 400 GWe by 2050, and the Trump administration has moved to fast‑track reactor approvals and bolster uranium supply. (world-nuclear.org)
  • Multiple states are competing to host advanced reactors and SMRs, but no such reactors are yet operating, and at least one flagship SMR project was canceled. Analysts and AP reporting emphasize that deployment remains uncertain due to costs, regulation, and competition from cheap renewables. (apnews.com)
  • EIA projections of the capacity mix through 2035 show solar capacity rising sharply, while nuclear capacity and share stay roughly flat or even slightly decline, suggesting no imminent large‑scale nuclear build‑out in the official baseline outlook. (reuters.com)

Assessment relative to Chamath’s prediction

• The second part of his claim — that growth in non‑fossil electricity would come primarily from solar, not nuclear — is clearly borne out in the 2022–2025 data and in near‑term EIA forecasts.
• The first, stronger part — that America’s ability to scale nuclear in a major way is essentially “never going to happen,” even in the “foreseeable future” — is much harder to judge definitively in 2025. Nuclear has not scaled up in a major way yet, but:
  • Only about half of what most people would call the 2020s “foreseeable future” (say, to ~2030) has elapsed.
  • There is an active policy and industry push to expand nuclear over the coming decades, and significant uncertainty remains about how much of that will actually materialize.

Because the time horizon of the “foreseeable future” has not fully played out and long‑term nuclear deployment is still uncertain despite current trends favoring solar, the prediction cannot be declared definitively right or wrong at this point.

Conclusion: The evidence so far aligns with Chamath’s view (solar is driving non‑fossil growth and nuclear has not scaled up), but given the open‑ended and long‑horizon nature of “never” and “foreseeable future,” the overall prediction is inconclusive as of late 2025.

On the podcast date (24 Feb 2022), the S&P 500 closed at 4,288.70 after the initial Russia‑Ukraine shock.(statmuse.com) Chamath’s claim was that there would be one last flush of roughly 400 points down to an S&P level "around 3800," and that this would effectively mark the bottom absent a world war.

What actually happened is that the index went materially below 3,800 and did not bottom there. Quarterly data from S&P/SEC filings show successive new lows in 2022: a Q2 low of 3,666.77, a Q3 low of 3,585.62, and a Q4 low of 3,577.03.(sec.gov) Daily pricing confirms that the S&P 500’s closing low for the cycle was 3,577.03 on October 12, 2022, with commentary and data series treating that October 12 level as the trough of the 2022 bear market, after which the index recovered and eventually moved into a new bull market.(statmuse.com) From the January 3, 2022 peak to the October 12 low, the S&P fell about 25.4%, which also aligns with independent analyses of the 2022 bear market.(ksat.com)

Because (1) the market’s ultimate bottom was significantly below 3,800, (2) the path to that bottom involved multiple legs and fresh lows well after the 3,800 area was breached, and (3) there was no world war that would have invalidated his conditional, the prediction that “around 3800” after one last flush would be the effective bottom did not come true.

The March 15–16, 2022 FOMC meeting concluded with the Federal Reserve raising the target range for the federal funds rate by 0.25 percentage points (from 0–0.25% to 0.25–0.5%), not by 0.5 percentage points, and it did not defer the hike.

• The Fed’s official March 16, 2022 statement reports that the Committee decided to raise the target range for the federal funds rate to 0.25 to 0.5 percent, i.e., a quarter‑point (25 basis points) increase.
• Contemporary coverage (e.g., major financial news and FOMC summaries) likewise records a 0.25 percentage point hike at that meeting, not 0.5.

Therefore, Friedberg’s prediction that the Fed would not implement a 0.5 percentage point increase in March 2022 and would instead do a smaller move (0.25 or possibly defer) was correct in the way the user has normalized it: the event he said was “almost certain not to happen” (a half‑point hike) indeed did not occur, and the actual outcome was a 0.25 percentage point hike.