The costs of stalemate in Ukraine
Apparently the administration is letting Ukraine hit military targets in Russia, though still with some restrictions. This is way overdue.
It seems clear that Russia under Putin is an expansionist power. Only a decisive defeat will prevent brutal ethnic cleansing in Ukraine. Defeat may also lead Putin to refrain from further aggression against his neighbors, and even get him to accept a vision of Russia as an ordinary European country that stands to prosper by living in peace with its neighbors. Thinking more broadly, if the administration is so worried that our very cautious support for Ukraine will trigger escalation by Putin, why should Xi think that we and our allies would stand up against an attack or blockade aimed at Taiwan? And letting Ukraine twist in the wind after Biden has given such public backing to Zelensky makes Biden seem ineffectual. That’s not a good look at a time when the world seems (and is) a chaotic and potentially dangerous place. Finally, victory by Trump would quite likely be a disaster for Ukraine and for Europe, but the scale of the disaster can presumably be limited by helping Ukraine do as well as possible before January 2025. All of this suggests we should long have had much more of a sense of urgency about helping Ukraine.
Of course, there could be issues not apparent to outsiders and non-experts, as indicated by a recent story in WAPO that the administration is worried about damage to the radars Russia uses to track incoming nukes, which could be destabilizing. But my guess – I’m just reading the tea leaves here, and have no special expertise – is that this temporizing and trimming is in large part characterological. Biden is a consensus seeker. This is a very commendable trait in general, and an important reason to support Biden. But it can lead to an overly protracted decision-making process (over two years for ATACMS!) with an emphasis on coalition management and a split-the-difference approach to policymaking. Again, this is just a guess; we’ll see what the historians say.
In my most optimistic moments I hope that a clear defeat in Ukraine could bring Russia back into the European fold – and out of China’s orbit – perhaps with some kind of partial EU membership. Pulling Russia back into Europe should be our overarching goal for the war. Obviously this will be very difficult to achieve, if it is achievable at all. But if this is where we want to end up we should articulate it and do what we can to maximize our chances of success. And it seems to me that Putin needs to be faced with the prospect of a decisive loss to accept a future for Russia as a normal European country that he evidently does not find appealing. Putin has no reason to turn westward unless he is clearly defeated and needs to give up his grandiose empire building. Of course, even then he may choose to ally with China.
I’ve never been a hawk before, but Putin (and Xi) have changed that. The gains from clearly defeating Putin’s Russia are potentially quite large, and the costs of a loss or even a stalemate are frightening.
Addendum: Lawrence Freedman has some characteristically thoughtful comments here, and reaches conclusions that are somewhat more nuanced and temperate than mine.
@Eric,
Nice post!
“Thinking more broadly, if the administration is so worried that our very cautious support for Ukraine will trigger escalation by Putin, why should Xi think that we and our allies would stand up against an attack or blockade aimed at Taiwan?”
Timothy Snyder has been making that same point for awhile. You’re in good company.
As for Russian radar, I have a feeling that Russia has way more tracking radar for incoming thermonuclear warheads than just the radar being used to guide their war in Ukraine.
NATO and the US won’t do what is needed and Ukraine itself is exhausted. Why should the suffering continue? Cut a deal now as good as is still possible and call it mature statesmanship.
@Eric,
LOL! All that will do is give Putin political breathing space and time to get Zelenskyy assassinated. No deal is final with Putin. He’s cut from the same cloth as Stalin.
Ukraine is well on the way to a tremendous defeat. NATO and the US carefully calibrate their effort with an overriding military goal of not putting Russia under too much pressure, even just in eastern Ukraine. NATO and the US understood last year about this time that some force needed to plaster Russian positions 10 miles wide and 20 miles deep to move the great counteroffensive forward. They understood no way Ukraine could manage that, so it was up to them to do it. But too risky! Things have gone worse since then.
@Eric,
Your prophecy is noted.
Awww isn’t that sweet, big bad Russians are going to kick some ass
Impressive show of force in Cuba yesterday, a sixty year-old sub, a tender, a tanker and a tug ~ I am soooo impressed
I’m surprised you boys haven’t already won!
Ten Bears:
As long as the US funds them on a timely basis, the Ukraine can last a long time. The US will probably rebuild them also. If the Ruskis were to take over Ukraine, it should have happened when Ukraine was waiting of the brave Republicans to act. Russia had a change during that period.
Just give up? Lay down and die? Surrender … ?
Change your nym to Neville … or Lucky Man
Too many in the west have long subscribed to the last 4words of Isaiah 2:4.
US/NATO is running a “phoney war” on Ukraine. Google it and see France and Britain warlike activities from Sep 1939…..
Ukraine needed an Air Force larger and better run than US applied in Desert Storm to attempt to attack kin 2023.
That level of commitment may not be possible with over 30 more years age on F-15 and F-16. As well as getting the vast amount of support close enough to use the AirPower.
Salami slice escalation is repeat of phoney war, and makes Neville a genius.
Someone wrote a song about those four ~ ’bout a hundred years ago
These day’s only those who’ve been there sing it
Bullets and bombs may be phony to you …
In Fall 2022 Russian forces were reduced to plundering chips from washing machines and marching off to war with shovel not personal arms… what happened?
What suggests Russians can get across the Dneiper much less reach Paris and Putin do a Hitler dance?
I see ATACMS, I once know some retired U.S. army officers. They knew MLRS/ATACMS.
The ATACMS rocket is two per MLRS type pod, range up to 160 miles, just shy 800 bomblets or a fair sized unitary bomb. It is not a wunderwaffen!
Discounting Putin trodding the Champs in Paris what is the national interest that Obama did not see?
It strikes me as highly unlikely that Ukraine could prevail in a war of attrition against Russia. Regardless of how many conventional weapons they receive from the west. The corrosive power of the petro-state is on full display.
Russia’s advantage is obviously manpower. The only way for Ukraine to deal with that is advanced weaponry and superior tactics. The weaponry is up to NATO. The tactics are probably not available without the weaponry. During the Ukrainian effort at a counter offensive the Pentagon was criticizing its failure to use combined arms techniques. What they failed to acknowledge, however, was Ukraine’s inability to follow NATO combined arms techniques due to lack of modern aircraft and modern armor. Increasing supplies in those areas have been too little, too late.