Yes, but as you said the web is a broken platform for applications. Painting a picture where we lived in a perfect world until React introduced some problems is a wrong analysis. React solved some (not all) problems of the web as a platform for GUIs, and introduced a new set of problems. People make their choice and choose which set of problems they prefer to work with.
The web works well for displaying static pages with links between them (if you are ok with some ugly things while the page loads), but once you introduce Forms or any sort of interactivity with the user all hell breaks loose and you will have to choose what you patch over, and what sacrifices you make.
The web works well for displaying static pages with links between them (if you are ok with some ugly things while the page loads), but once you introduce Forms or any sort of interactivity with the user all hell breaks loose and you will have to choose what you patch over, and what sacrifices you make.