We are at about the two-month mark of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. That might
not seem like much, but it’s actually pretty deep into a war from a historical perspective.
Prominent wars—the ones that receive the most attention in history classes,
like World War I and World War II—are decidedly abnormal.
The vast majority of wars end within the first three hundred days.
And even within those wars, the most common durations are
one month, two months, and three months. And we are slowly crawling in that direction.
To understand why that might be happening, it will first help to
zoom out and understand what exactly has occurred over the first two months of the war.
With that in mind, here’s a broad overview of the campaign so far.
Russia initially had a three-front attack.
Prior to the war, it had troops stationed in its own territory,
In Crimea—which Russia had annexed eight years earlier,
and in its partner state Belarus.
The primary vector of attack appeared to be coming from the east: the Donbas front. This
wasn’t something new so much as an escalation of an ongoing conflict that started in 2014.
Russia wasn’t officially participating, but a large number of Russians were nevertheless
fighting Ukraine on behalf of separatists. The second vector came from the south:
the Crimean front. The motivation here was to secure a land bridge to
and water access for the annexed territory. And there’s also some oil down there.
The final vector is the Kyiv front. It came from the north and was not as obvious as the other two.
As we have discussed in a previous video,
it’s still not exactly clear what Russia’s motivation was here.
It may have been a strategic effort to completely remove the
Ukrainian government and occupy the country. It may have also been a tactical decision.
If Ukraine responded by focusing its defense on Kyiv, it would have made it easier for
Russia to win battles in the south and east, assuming that was Russia’s goal all along.
Either way, that strategy did not continue forever.
By the beginning of March, the assault on Kyiv had stalled out thanks to Ukrainian resistance.
As the month continued, Russia made some slow progress in the south and east, but that was it.
And by April, the northern offensive was officially a failure.
Russia had retreated from the north and began reorienting their forces to battle
in the other two theaters. Ordinarily, this turning point might be where a war would end.
It’s best to think of wars as a result of bargaining breakdown.
A reasonable interpretation of what we have seen so far is as follows.
Russia thought that it was relatively likely to win the war.
To represent that here, imagine that this white line reflects Russia’s expected gains from the
conflict, as estimated on the eve of fighting. Because war is costly, Russia would have
been willing to accept something less. We can use this red line to represent that.
The space between these lines is how Russia would internalize the loss of life and resources
in terms of square kilometers. It’s possible that Ukraine knew that
Russia’s estimates were wrong—that the true balance of power based on
Russia’s strategy was something over here. War is costly for Ukraine as well, and thus
there was also room to negotiate on their end. Unfortunately, the key thing is that the most
Ukraine might have been willing to negotiate over was insufficient from Russia’s perspective.
Bargaining was doomed to break down, and that’s how you get war.
Now that we have some hindsight, it is clear that Russia’s estimates were wrong on many dimensions.
It appears that Putin didn’t realize how unprepared Russia’s
military infrastructure was to handle the war
Or how much average Ukrainians would resist Russian invaders.
In that regard, the last two months have been revelatory about the balance of power—at
least to some degree. Russia realized that
the attack on Kyiv was a mistake and regrouped accordingly, turning its attention elsewhere.
Ordinarily, this would make brokering a settlement relatively straightforward. Indeed, this is why
so few wars last a long time. Once you realize what is going to happen in the war, you can just
implement it without having to pay further costs. Here, Russia is no longer under the impression
that this is the actual balance of power. And yet the fight continues.
If we think a little more about why Russia miscalculated to begin with,
we can get a better understanding of why that is the case.
Autocratic leaders like Vladimir Putin can have a difficult time obtaining accurate information
from their own intelligence agencies about the best path forward on foreign policy.
Imagine you were one of his advisors, and you knew that the military was
unprepared to handle the war. Do you tell Putin the bad news?
In a place where there is weak rule of law, you’d probably think twice.
Indeed, this was a significant problem Saddam Hussein had during the end of
his administration. It’s hard to get good information when everyone fears for their lives.
It hasn’t helped that over the last two years Putin has
been extremely frightened about contracting covid.
If you have seen some of the silly photos of Putin at a very long table, that’s why he’s so far away.
It’s also why he has taken a lot of meeting remotely.
All that isolation means that Putin is not making as well-informed of decisions
as he might be able to otherwise, which was a broader concern
when the pandemic began. And to some degree it has gotten worse
since the war started, as now Putin must be more worried about coup threats than he was before.
But the war itself has given Putin all the proof he needed that the original plan was awful.
That’s why Putin has reportedly purged some of his advisors.
This all means that Russia and Ukraine have solid information
about how a broad-scale war would play out.
However, that is no longer the war that is being fought.
It’s an entirely separate question of what the balance of power looks like here,
where the entire confrontation is focused on the south and the Donbass.
The good news is that, with Kyiv no longer in play,
the difference in beliefs has undoubtedly narrowed by now. That will make it easier
for the parties to negotiate a solution. But the change in tactics will slow that
process down, meaning that more lives will be lost in the meantime.
This is rough from Ukraine’s perspective. They are essentially having to pay the price
for how poorly run the Russian government is by sticking it out throughout the rest of the war.
Despite that sour note to end with, I hope you enjoyed this video.
And if you did, please like, share, and subscribe, and I will see you next time. Take care.