Kot običajno, zelo dober strateški povzetek zgodovinarja Adama Toozeja glede dogajanja v Ukrajini in glede strategije, ki je še preostala Ukrajini in njeni sponzorki ZDA. Po analizi dejstev in ugotovitvi, da zadnji finančni paket pomoči ničesar ne rešuje, je postavil ključno vprašanje: če je Ukrajina brez streliva in če ji streliva ne morejo dostaviti niti ZDA in Evropa, ker ga same nimajo in ga niti približno ne zmorejo dovolj proizvesti glede na rusko proizvodnjo, če je Ukrajina ostala brez za orožje sposobnih moških, če je Rusija iz meseca v mesec močnejša in če grozi, da bodo ruske sile vsak čas predrle frontno linijo na več mestih, in če se ZDA na vsak način želijo izogniti jedrski eskalaciji, kaj je potem sploh še ostalo od prvotne strategije ZDA in zahodnih držav v Ukrajini in kakšna je nova strategija? Mar ni čas, da začne Washington aktivno pritiskati na Zelenskega, da se začne pogovarjati o pogojih za premirje?

In a remarkable interview with Ezra Klein, in March 2024 Richard Haass – for 20 years the President of the Council of Foreign Relations – insisted that it was time for the US finally to formulate what he called an “independent” policy with regard to Ukraine – a policy defined by America’s own strategic vision and strategic interests rather than simply backing war aims as formulated by the Zelensky government in Kyiv.

A cynic might say that the US de facto already has such a policy. It consists in giving Ukraine enough resources to continue the defense against Russian attack, draining Putin’s resources. The USA does enough to avoid the opprobrium of abandoning the Ukrainian cause, but not enough to risk humiliating Russia and provoking nuclear escalation. Meanwhile, Washington waits for attrition to drive Kyiv to the conclusion that it must shift to a defensive stance and moderate its war aims.

Though this has an evident logic from the US point of view, Haass’s call for a new and more specific road map for the future of the war, is driven by three realization.

The first is that the economic sanctions imposed on Russia have not crippled it. Rather than spiraling the drain, the Russian economy has rebounded. Its armaments economy is expanding as not seen since the Cold War. Western pressure has driven Moscow closer to Beijing, which is hardly in West’s interests.

Secondly, though Washington may prefer not to pressure Kyiv directly to think about terms under which it will end the war, it is not clear how Kyiv itself will backtrack from the demand to reconquer all its national territory. For Zelensky and his government, even if they were so minded, it would be immensely difficult to retreat from the legitimate and obvious demand for Ukraine’s territory to be restored. Kyiv will maintain that to abandon its goals would be sacrilege given the blood and treasure spilled so far and the immense destruction inflicted on Ukraine. But faced with the failure of Ukraine’s offensive in 2023, not changing position opens up a gulf between reality and aspiration, a gulf that harbors its own risks.

As the Economist describes it there is an increasingly glaring gap between the official line of Ukraine’s government and the reality on the battlefield, a gap which is not lost on Ukraine’s soldiers and their commanders.

A year ago (April/May 2023), as Ukraine readied for its counter-offensive, just holding its own positions was considered the most pessimistic scenario. Now, (in May 2024) as Russia prepares for a fresh push, it is considered the best case. From soldiers to generals, everyone The Economist spoke to over the past week knows that Ukraine lacks the resources to get back to its 1991 borders, as its politicians have promised. “I suggest to anyone who talks of 1991 borders to come as far as Bakhmut,” Colonel Timchenko says, referring to a town Ukraine lost a year ago after months of savage fighting. At stake now is not Ukraine’s territorial integrity, but its survival.

The third factor, is that there is now a real risk that the Ukrainian frontline may suffer a sudden collapse. And there is the even more serious possibility that the Russian army may actually develop the capacity to exploit such a breakthrough at scale, as Ukraine did in 2022. As the military expert Michael Korfman explained in a recent War on the Rocks podcast, it is the combination of those two developments that must really be feared in the coming months.

It is this combination of factors – Russia’s surprising resilience, the extreme difficulty, not to say political and emotional impossibility, for Ukraine of accepting the hard facts of the situation, and the risk of sudden failure – that leads Haass to call for Washington to take the lead in formulating a more coherent vision of an off ramp.

What this would entail would be consolidating Ukraine’s existing defensive positions, offering a guarantee of future Western economic and military support and then moving to ceasefire negotiations, whilst conceding none of Ukraine entirely legitimate demands for restoration and reparations.

This would require a degree of bravery on the part of the Biden administration to risk giving up on the maximalist aims that flourished in 2022-23. But, if Washington could take some responsibility for deciding the future course of negotiations, it might relieve pressure on Kyiv. Though it might cause outrage in the blob, it would likely find favor with a majority of American and European voters too.

According to polling done by the Quincy Institute in February 2024:

Roughly 70% of Americans want the Biden administration to push Ukraine toward a negotiated peace with Russia as soon as possible, according to a new survey from the Harris Poll and the Quincy Institute, which publishes Responsible Statecraft.

In light of the facts on the ground and the West’s political and material limitations, what must be clear at this point is that Washington’s current strategy cannot deliver on what it promises. Failing to address that gap between aspiration and reality – by taking the risk on much larger aid or openly advocating diplomacy – cannot appear other than either weak or cynical. It will seem even more so with time. In the mean time Ukraine suffers huge losses and risks defeat. At home the indecision in the Biden camp hands the opportunity to a Trump administration to actually seize the initiative and define the terms of a “deal”.

Vir: Adam Tooze