Saturday marks the two-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, euphemistically referred to by Vladimir Putin as a “special military operation”.
Initial fears of a quick Russian victory soon gave way to sweeping battlefield gains for Ukrainian forces and hopes they could drive the invading army back across the border. The much-hyped Ukrainian counter-offensive last year failed to make any meaningful progress before slowing to an effective stalemate. Now, as Western backing for Kyiv cools, Russian troops are once again on the front foot.
There has long been the belief that all that is required for “total victory” for Ukraine “is one more mobilization of Ukrainian youth, one more tranche of Western financial aid, one more delivery of American, French or British wonder weapons”, said Andrew Latham on The Hill. But the “strategic, operational and tactical realities of the war simply don’t support any version of this argument”.
In its place, talk of all-out victory is slowly morphing into what solution will allow Ukraine not to lose.
What did the commentators say?
With this now being a “war of attrition”, said James Waterhouse, the BBC‘s Ukraine correspondent based in Kyiv, the difference in the size of the two countries is “becoming more apparent”.
Russia’s population of 144 million is more than four times larger than Ukraine’s, so “despite losing thousands of soldiers in the process, Moscow has made its size count by replenishing them almost immediately”.
At the same time, Ukraine is facing a shortage of ammunition and military hardware. Speaking at the Munich Security Conference last week, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said equipment shortfalls had been a key factor in the recent decision to withdraw from the city of Avdiivka, said the BBC. It represented a strategic and symbolic loss for Ukraine and the first major gain by Russian forces in months.
By contrast, Russia has put its economy on a “war footing“, said Al Jazeera, allocating 6.5% of its total budget to replacing its significant losses on the battlefield.
With continued “Western dithering” and “Moscow’s recent advances on the battlefield, the war could be concluded in Russia’s favour” long before the vital weaponry requested by Kyiv sees action, said The Telegraph‘s defence and foreign affairs editor Con Coughlin.
But a focus on Western military support – or lack of it – masks a fundamental “delusional belief” said Latham, “that despite all of Ukraine’s devastating defeats and strategic setbacks, victory is just around the corner”.
The truth is “there isn’t”, he said. “And the sooner policymakers and influencers on both sides of the Atlantic grasp this, the sooner we can get to a negotiated cessation of hostilities that stems, at least for the moment, the obscene carnage that has come to define this war.”
What next?
Trying to find an “off-ramp does not mean letting Putin win”, Stefan Wolff, professor of international security at the University of Birmingham, said on The Conversation.
“For Russia, not winning means that it cannot turn a free Ukraine into a vassal state despite certain territorial conquests”, said Social Europe. It means too that the confiscated Russian assets remain frozen, “that the sanctions continue and that it remains isolated from its European neighbours”.
From Ukraine’s perspective, “not losing means that it stops the Russian advance and achieves a ceasefire ending the trench warfare”. An independent Ukraine, notwithstanding the losses in territory since 2013, “is firmly anchored in the economic, political and security structures of the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato)”.
Enabling Ukraine to defend the areas currently still under its control will require more Western aid, “but also serious consideration of negotiating a ceasefire“, said Wolff.
With its hopes for Nato membership likely to remain unfulfilled in the short to medium term at least, Kyiv should instead look to secure bilateral security deals with G7 nations.
“Reassessing current realities on the battlefield in this way will undoubtedly be seen as appeasement by some,” said Wolff. “But a more fitting analogy might be that of West Germany in 1949 and, even more so, of South Korea in 1953, both of which needed to establish internationally recognised borders in order to establish sovereignty in the face of hostile neighbouring powers.”
In short, Ukraine needs to establish its own equivalent of the 38th parallel that divides North and South Korea. This was meant to serve as a temporary solution but has turned into a de facto permanent border – crucially guaranteed by the West – that has allowed South Korea to prosper into one of the most advanced and dynamic countries on the planet. This is what “victory” for Ukraine could look like.