We are at a pivotal moment in the war between Ukraine and Russia.
Almost four months after the invasion began, the two countries have reached a short-term deadlock.
Russia has taken over large swaths of territory earlier in the war,
but not much is exchanging hands at the moment.
Nevertheless, this is the calm before the storm.
The next phase of the war is Ukraine’s forthcoming counterattack:
Can Ukraine push Russian forces out of the south and back to Crimea?
Will the separatist regions lose their gains and perhaps their de facto independence?
The answers to these questions remain to be seen. However, as I will explain in this video,
neither of the plausible outcomes of this counterattack look good for Ukraine.
It is caught in a classic Catch-22, where any gains it makes from this point
only make the best possible outcomes for Ukraine harder to obtain.
To understand the problem, let’s take a quick look at how we got to the current military situation.
Given the available evidence, the purpose of the invasion
is looking more and more like a Russian land grab.
Whether that is to assist the separatist regions
in the Donbas and capture a large land bridge to Crimea
or go after Ukraine’s natural resources
or go deeper into the country remains unclear.
At the beginning of the war, it seemed that Russia was optimistic about the likely outcomes:
that Ukraine would quickly fold, that its citizens would treat Russian soldiers as
liberators, and that Putin would rapidly have control over everything he wanted to take.
In sum, Russia expected the new border between the two countries to push very far west.
Ukraine disagreed with this assessment. This is a classic recipe for a costly war,
and that is exactly what we saw beginning on February 24, 2022.
The first six weeks of the war were illuminating in that regard,
with Russia learning that such an optimistic outlook was unwarranted.
Western media treated this as disaster for Putin. And that is true to some extent.
Whether Russia’s attack on Kyiv was a feint to draw Ukrainian forces away
from the east or a genuine plan to capture the capital is irrelevant.
It was a poorly planned nightmare, and Russia paid a heavy cost in terms of lives and equipment.
However, domestically, the war was not a problem.
Putin already had extremely high poll numbers before the war,
and it is likely the case that those numbers are legitimate.
Once the conflict began, that approval rating soared above 80%.
Moreover, those numbers stayed steady into May,
well after the Kyiv failure
and Russia’s declaration that would reorient its forces to the east.
That’s because things in the south and the east were going well.
Russia completed its Crimean land bridge with the fall of Mariupol on May 20.
Meanwhile, the Luhansk and Donetsk People’s Republics
now have almost complete control over their respective regions.
One reason why the war might be continuing
is because of a disagreement between Russia and Ukraine over what will happen in the long term.
Russia thinks it can fortify its territorial gains and keep them for the long haul.
Ukraine, in the meantime, is banking that western aid
will continue to flow freely and that the sanctions regime will stay strong.
These last points are crucial.
Winning a war of attrition requires consistent resupply of lost materials.
One of the main efforts of the sanctions regime
is to cut off Russian access to component parts for its weapons.
We have not yet seen the effects of those sanctions
because Russia has been burning through its reserve supply.
However, in a war of attrition, the effects of those sanctions will become acute—assuming
the West sticks with them. Russia will start losing its equipment and unable to replace it.
In effect, we have gone from a sharp disagreement in the expected war outcomes to a lesser one.
From a purely informational perspective of war,
the conflict will end once that disagreement has been mostly resolved.
States start to care about the costs of war at that point and look for a way to avoid them.
One way that the disagreement in question will be resolved
is if Ukraine begins winning battles during the counterattack.
Russia realizes that a greater Crimea is unsustainable
and withdraws before it suffers further losses.
The other possibility is that Ukraine realizes
that the Russian defensive positions are too far entrenched and learns to live with the reality
of Russia having annexed another part of its territory.
This second outcome is obviously awful for Ukraine, but these things happen in
great power politics, and it is something to be on the look out for over the next year.
The first outcome looks more attractive for Ukraine, of course.
The country recaptures the land bridge and does not suffer any major territorial losses.
Perhaps the victories also eliminate the separatist movements.
Or perhaps Zelensky has to make some minor concessions regarding their autonomy
or pledge to keep water flowing to Crimea and not
dam the canal once again. But those are small prices to pay.
The problem here is that there is a second constraint that matters,
and it will make Ukraine’s life difficult.
Russia has paid a high cost on the battlefield and with its economy at home.
This is working for Putin because the Crimean land bridge is a significant
gain. It is something he can sell to his constituents and bolster his popularity.
Ukrainian victories
in the next series of battles
may signal to Russia that Ukraine has the right outlook on the likely military outcome.
However, conceding the issue is not politically tenable for Putin. It is an
invitation to coup plotters and welcome mat for popular uprisings.
Instead, Putin’s likely response is to “gamble for resurrection”—hope
that some unforeseen random factor shifts the war expectation in a way favorable to Russia.
In turn, Putin can maintain his popularity. Russian troops would beat back Ukrainian troops,
Russia gets to keep the land bridge, and Putin survives politically.
This leaves Ukraine in a Catch 22.
If it gives up on the conflict, then it automatically forfeits the land. [break]
But if Ukraine fights over the territory, even if it wins, it also kind of loses.
Russian setbacks put Putin between a rock and a hard place.
Every victory Ukraine earns just pushes Putin to fight harder to win.
As it stands, this appears to be the route that Ukraine wants to take: a long, drawn-out
war that expels Russia from southeast Ukraine is better than the alternative of giving up.
But it also means that Ukraine’s best-case scenario
given the circumstances—multiple convincing military victories
and then a quick Russian withdrawal—is not really a possibility. [break]
Well, not unless Putin leaves office before any of this happens. As such, if you are Ukrainian,
you should really hope that Putin has a terminal illness as the rumor mill suggests.
And actually, he was back to grabbing the table in a weird way on June 15.
Just something to think about.
Do you see a better outcome available for Ukraine?
If so, let me know in the comments. And if you enjoyed this video,
please like, share, and subscribe, and I will see you next time. Take care.