Disagree. While they did achieved lot of points especially with EU, they really hoped for Russia to collapse or at least plunge into crisis which will force it to retreat, regime change and comply with US imperialism (that’s why Ukraine was never planned to militarily win, they just had to stand for a time and that’s why the initial loss of much territory was irrelevant to US).

It’s not the 4D chess, US really fucked it big time with consequences mounting, and it’s not really surprising considering their plan makers isn’t what they used to be during cold war.

I feel the ultimate goal was really China - using the martyred Ukraine as a call to arms to “save Taiwan”, as it were (the news painting Russia as villainous made a big deal of effort trying to tie China to everything Russia did in the war, and comparing the situation in Ukraine to the situation with Taiwan).

Yes, the ultimate target was China, but not like this. More directly, the most dangerous thing for US is either EU-Russia or Russia-China scenario. Neutralising Russia would do away with both, put US in much stronger position against China and ensure continuation of US hegemony for forseeable future. So while they succeeded in breaking up the EU-Russia closing and severly delayed EU-China, they pushed Russia closest to China they were since the Sino-Soviet split.