Ukraine: Compromise or Collapse

Whoever wins the US election, the start of a new administration should be an opportunity for a serious reevaluation of US policy toward the war in Ukraine. For it is abundantly clear that the present course is unsustainable, and if persisted in, is likely to lead sooner or later either to Ukrainian collapse or to direct NATO involvement in war with Russia. This is indeed now tacitly admitted by some US commentators like Robert Kagan, though he has not been willing to tell Americans that they must go to war in order to prevent Ukrainian defeat or a compromise peace.

The news from the Ukrainian front line is grim. Ukrainian forces are heavily outnumbered and outmatched in artillery and ammunition. There are growing signs of exhaustion, demoralization, desertion, and evasion of service by both the elites and ordinary people. Russian success is grounded in the fact that Russia simply has far greater resources than Ukraine in terms of both industry and manpower. It has been able to recruit hundreds of thousands of new troops by paying them very high wages, up to six times the average salaries in the regions from which they are drawn.

Ukrainians and Western hawks claim that more Western weapons will make a critical difference; and indeed, if some of these had been provided in 2022, when the Russian armed forces were outnumbered and in serious disarray, they might have led to much greater Ukrainian success. Now however, so great is the Russian advantage that Western supplies can make little difference.

Western industry cannot produce anything like the number of artillery shells Ukraine needs; the USA cannot provide sufficient air defense systems to Israel and Ukraine and keep enough for a possible war with China. And above all, NATO cannot manufacture more soldiers for Ukraine. The German government has already declared that it is freezing military aid, and will cut aid to Ukraine by almost half next year, and by more than 90 percent by 2027.