Tale zapis v Bloombergu je dobra propaganda za nujno nadaljevanje vojaške pomoči Zahoda Ukrajini. Analizo o vojaški nevarnosti ruske zmage v Ukrajini so standardno naredili na Institute for the Study of War (ISW), “neprofitni organizaciji”, ki jo financirajo ameriške orožarske družbe, specializira pa se na “neodvisne analize” vojaških spopadov, v katerih so udeležene ZDA. Analize ISW glede vojne v Ukrajini so se do sedaj izkazale kot izjemno pristranske in so po pravilu povsem zgrešile kasnejši dejanski potek situacije na bojišču. Tako da je njihova uporabna vrednost zelo majhna, razen lepih zemljevidov glede kontrole nad ozemljem s strani različnih sil.

No, ta analiza kaže na nevarnost, da bi v primeru ruske zmage in popolnega zavzetja Ukrajine, Rusija lahko svoje vojaške baze postavila neposredno na meje Nata. Posledično bi to naj pomenilo, da bi morale vzhodnoevropske države Nata močno okrepiti obrambne sile na meji z Ukrajino, kar bi bilo zelo drago. Iz tega sledi propagandna implikacija, da je iz vidika stroškov bolj oportuno nadaljevati financiranje vojne v Ukrajini in upati na čudežno ukrajinsko zmago, kot pa nositi stroške ojačanja Natovih vojaških baz v vzhodnoevropskih državah.

Ta propaganda ne zdrži preprostega logičnega testa. Prvič, zakaj je Nato sploh silil v širitev v Ukrajino, kar je bil vzrok za začetek vojne v Ukrajini (kar potrjujejo sklepi z vrhov Nata in tudi izjave njegovega sekretarja Stoltenberga)? Prej je Ukrajina služila kot tamponska cona med Natom in Rusijo in je omogočala, da so članice Nata bile izven dometa večine ruskih raket. S sprejemom Ukrajine v Nato, bi Nato nenadoma imel dolgo skupno mejo z Rusijo in bi morale ZDA in ostale članice močno povečati izdatke za vojaške baze v Ukrajini. Torej, če so se države Nato hotele izogniti visokim vojaškim stroškom, zakaj so rinile neposredno na meje z Rusijo? (podobno se zdaj dogaja s Finsko po sprejemu v Nato, ker bo Rusija zdaj morala postaviti baze blizu finskih meja).

In drugič, če je interes Zahoda varnost in minimizacija vojaških izdatkov za dosego tega cilja, zakaj zahodne države ne sprožijo procesa mirovnih pogajanj z Rusijo? Tudi če bi Rusija v teh mirovnih pogajanjih dosegla nevtralnost Ukrajine in priključitev zasedenih ozemelj k Rusiji (1/6 ozemlja), bi to Rusijo ohranilo na zelo veliki razdalji do meja Nata in prihranilo ogromna sredstva članicam Nata za obrambo.

Da ne bo pomote: simpatiziram z Ukrajinci, niti malo nisem navdušen nad Rusijo in njenim režimom in v celi zgodbi glede vojne v Ukrajini me zanima samo mirna rešitev, ohranitev človeških življenj in možnosti Ukrajine, da lahko čim prej začne okrevanje v miru. Toda tovrstne analize, kot jo je pripravil ISW, so skregane z osnovami logike in samo spodbujajo prilivanje goriva na ogenj in Ukrajino oddaljujejo od miru in možnosti, da začne z okrevanjem. Ter seveda spodbujajo nadaljevanje negotovosti v regiji in s tem zaton Evrope.

An impasse over aid from the US and Europe has Ukraine’s allies contemplating something they’ve refused to imagine since the earliest days of Russia’s invasion: that Vladimir Putin may win. With more than $110 billion in assistance mired in political disputes in Washington and Brussels, how long Kyiv will be able to hold back Russian forces and defend Ukraine’s cities, power plants and ports against missile attacks is increasingly in question. And the longer term threat posed to NATO nations by a Kremlin victory is stark.

Speaking at a press conference in Kyiv on Tuesday, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy denied that Ukraine is starting to lose the war, pointing to advances his forces have made and the support he’s received. But in the US, with Republicans blocking $61 billion of support for next year, the Pentagon is warning that money for weapons for Ukraine will run out by Dec. 30. President Joe Biden, long a stalwart in his support for an embattled country which has seen tens of thousands of its people killed by Russian soldiers, mercenaries and convicts, last week pledged to back Ukraine for “as long as we can.” It used to be “as long as it takes.”

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The growing sense of alarm has slipped into leaders’ public statements. They’ve taken on an increasingly shrill tone as backers of the aid exhort their opponents not to hold the vital assistance hostage to domestic political priorities, something which rarely happened in previous debates.

“If Ukraine doesn’t have support from the EU and the US, then Putin will win,” Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar said last week at the European Union summit, where leaders failed to overcome growing opposition to next year’s €50 billion ($55 billion) aid package and only barely managed to approve the largely symbolic gesture of opening the way to membership for Ukraine sometime in the future.

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Russia is likely to push to take more territory and destroy more infrastructure if Ukraine doesn’t get the weapons it needs to defend itself, according to European officials. Unable to defend itself, Ukraine might be forced to accept a cease-fire deal on Russia’s terms, they said.

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Ukraine’s backers in both the EU and US contend aid is likely to be approved in some form early next year. But that’s unlikely to yield a major breakthrough on the battlefield, officials said. Beyond that, the outlook is increasingly murky, even as the stalemate on the ground makes it increasingly clear that the fight could go on for years to come.

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In the Baltic states, officials are already telling the public to be ready for the next war because Putin’s forces aren’t going to be destroyed in Ukraine. The discussion has moved from ‘if’ Russia might attack to a focus on concrete preparations for that once-unthinkable prospect. Despite Biden’s public assurances, questions about whether the US and other allies would actually put their troops at risk to defend tiny countries that were once part of the Soviet Union are growing.

“Russia is not scared of NATO,” Estonia’s military chief Martin Herem said in an interview with a local TV station last week, estimating that the Russian military could be ready to attack NATO within a year once the conflict in Ukraine — not a member of the alliance — was over. Other western officials said it would likely take Putin at least several years to make up for the tremendous losses his military has taken in Ukraine, let alone threaten NATO’s much more capable forces.

But the earlier confidence that the invasion would be a ‘strategic defeat’ for the Russian leader has faded, replaced in some quarters by a growing sense that Putin’s bet that he can outlast the US and its allies may prove right.

Finland, which joined NATO this year amid the growing threat from Russia, has stepped up its own defense buildup and is seeking to lock in security ties with the US. Putin Sunday warned that Russia plans to deploy more troops along its border, the longest between Russia and a NATO member. “There were no problems,” he said. “Now there will be.”

One western official described how a Russian victory would trigger an outpouring of refugees heading for the EU, piling pressure on services in those countries and exacerbating tensions between members. At the same time, the official said, the Ukrainian resistance would switch to guerrilla tactics meaning that the fighting would continue at a lower lever, perpetuating the instability on the EU’s eastern border.

Some European countries might seek to strengthen their ties with Moscow or Beijing to avoid having to rely too much on an unreliable US, other officials said.

With Russian forces potentially much closer to the borders of Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania, and Crimea giving the Kremlin a dominant position in the Black Sea, the US would need to make a significant investment in its European forces to pose a credible deterrent, the Institute for the Study of War said in a report released last week.

The US would have to deploy a “sizable portion” of its ground forces as well as a “large number” of stealth aircraft. Given the limitations of US manufacturing, that could force the White House to choose between keeping sufficient forces in Asia to defend Taiwan against a potential strike by China or deterring a Russian attack on NATO.

“The entire undertaking will cost a fortune,” analysts led by Frederick W. Kagan said in the report. “The cost will last as long as the Russian threat continues — potentially indefinitely.”

Vir: Bloomberg