The only reaction to Trump’s victory and Harris’ defeat that I’ll offer here is that my job and the job of people like me got a lot easier, because now that the voting is done it will be a breeze to compare what was promised or threatened during the campaign – and that’s both sides – with actual reports from actual real life. It’s already started, actually.
On the ground, I would say the most significant developments on the front this week have been a Russian push in the Kursk region, probably without North Korean help; and a slowdown, or maybe better stated, a redirection of Russian attacks in Donbas.
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But on the general Ukraine news front, I’d say the main story is the Trump administration’s scrambling to keep their candidate’s promise to end the war immediately, as in “24 hours,” after getting elected. His words not mine.
This is not just a reporter playing “gotcha,” as the case I will make below attempt to show that US credibility on Ukraine is poor and it seems like it will not improve. My guess is that reality will drive the war in new directions.
We aren’t going to sign off on some agreement that allows Russia to attack us again. If that’s the only option, then we have no choice, we have to keep fighting.
Ukraine’s American experience
This section is swiped partially from an answer I wrote to a reader who asked about Ukrainian reaction to the Republican victory in the US. I think it’s reasonable to kick off the discussion on what’s happening in ceasefire/peace negotiations, and what comes next, by looking at things through Ukrainian eyes first; it’s their country and their blood.
What’s Behind Ukraine’s Surprise Comeback?
The Ukrainians want the death and destruction to stop more than anyone. But I would say the view that simply stopping shooting and trusting to foreigners that things will be OK would be worse than more war is pretty much total across society.
It might be possible to trick the Ukrainian public into a peace deal that says it will protect them from Russia that does not actually do that. But Ukrainian media is pretty energetic and Ukrainian officials have to defend what they do, which includes signing peace deals. Me, I don’t see any way at this point to get the Ukrainians to accept a peace deal that won’t absolutely guarantee their safety. Otherwise, they will fight.
I’m aware outside Ukraine this view that nothing is possible unless Ukrainian security is absolutely and totally guaranteed seems irrational and suicidal to some.
Almost any Ukrainian would answer: You are outside Ukraine, you aren’t being attacked and you don’t have to live with the possibility of a future attack from Russia. And this isn’t bad news like your stocks lost value or you lost your job. This is death, destruction, mayhem, families ripped apart and uprooted. We would love for the war to end. But we aren’t going to sign off on some agreement that allows Russia to attack us again. If that’s the only option, then we have no choice, we have to keep fighting. At least that way the Russians can only attack us with a damaged army, and every time they do it, we kill more of their soldiers who, obviously, can’t ever attack us again.
The US has sold Ukraine down the river repeatedly. It is an established pattern, it is a known quantity, it isn’t theoretical.
From the Ukrainian perspective, there is a big problem with American ideas about a ceasefire with Russia. The thing is, the US has sold Ukraine down the river repeatedly. It is an established pattern, it is a known quantity, it isn’t theoretical. It’s true that not just the Ukrainians have been thrown under the bus, but that doesn’t make things better.
My point is, it’s not about morality or Ukrainian stubbornness. It’s just that Ukrainians remember American actions most Americans are ignorant about, or would just prefer to forget, and they point to a pattern that, if ignored, is a direct threat to Ukrainian national security.
This is all straight-up recorded history so, for those of you who know this, certainly skip a bit.
In 1991, shortly after Ukraine declared its independence, no less than George H.W. Bush told the Ukrainians they needed to stay loyal to Russia. In his view, Russia had Ukraine’s best interests at heart. This later became known as the “Chicken Kiev” speech. It’s arguable the US stance towards Ukraine didn’t shift substantially in the next 30 years. Foodie image attached.
In 1994-6 Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons in exchange for American assurances Ukrainian independence and sovereignty were inviolate. That was the Clinton administration.
From 2003 to 2008, in one of the first combat deployments by a military from any former Soviet republic, in history, Ukraine deployed troops to Iraq to support the US-led war there.
Ukrainian soldiers were killed. It was not lost on the Ukrainians that in 2008, when Russia attacked Georgia, the Americans took no meaningful steps to intervene or contain Russian invasion of a neighboring state. That was the George W. Bush administration. Image.
Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014. Then they annexed Crimea. The Obama administration’s response was to lateral the problem to the Europeans, take no steps to assist the Ukrainians, and make clear Ukrainian sovereignty and European security are not US priorities.
In 2015, after declaring the use of chemical weapons a “red line,” the Obama administration watched and failed to act as the Syrian government used poison gas to attack Kurdish fighters who were American allies. Some had fought alongside the US military when the US invaded Iraq in 2003. The Ukrainians (and the Russians and Europeans) saw that.
The Trump administration, in power in 2016, after some delay, sent a few hundred Javelin missiles to Ukraine. Then the Trump government stopped all arms deliveries to Ukraine for more than a year to try and leverage a renewal of arms shipments into Ukraine for an investigation into a US political rival.
The Ukrainians don’t care Trump was impeached for this. For the Ukrainians, the key point was that Trump, like Obama, saw Ukrainian security and safety as so unimportant, it could be thrown away, much like a cheap poker chip. Also, it wasn’t like Trump started sending Ukraine tanks, fighter jets and artillery. Pretty much it was HUMMVs and medkits.
As I pointed out during the election campaign, anyone arguing Trump understands Putin and Russia must explain how the Trump administration, from 2016 to 2020, did not discourage further Russian aggression. HUMMVs and medkits and a few hundred Javelin missiles are useful, but we’re talking deterring authoritarian Russia, on the heels of its invasion of Georgia and then Ukraine.
If that were not signal enough, the Trump administration on Dec. 19, 2018, ordered all US troops out of Syria, effectively abandoning Kurds living in the region to main force attacks by the Turkish, Syrian and the Russian militaries.
Then the US pulled out of Afghanistan. When Russia invaded Ukraine a second time, in 2022, the US advice to the Ukrainians, now Biden administration, was to surrender most of their country to Russia and fight a partisan war. Since then, that administration saw fit to place avoiding the risk confrontation with Russia ahead over the Ukrainians’ ability to defend themselves. This has even extended to US weapons bought and paid for by other countries that wanted to give those weapons to Ukraine.
The message to the Kremlin, now fighting a war of destruction with the objective of annihilating the Ukrainian state was clear: Use nukes in Ukraine and the US will intervene seriously. Use anything less than nukes, and the US won’t oppose Russia seriously.
As the war ground on, US officials kept on declaring “Aggression will not stand” and that “America has Ukraine’s back,” and “As long as it takes.” Then, from December 2023 to April 2024, the US cut off all arms deliveries to Ukraine.
From the Kremlin point of view, it’s obvious: the US talks a lot, but when push comes to shove the US backs down. Over and over. Not just in Ukraine.
From the Ukrainian perspective, American appeasement of Russia is bipartisan, it is ingrained in DC institutions, it is the way the Americans have treated Ukraine for generations, and it is not something that will change any time soon.
The point is, in any future negotiation, by any state, even formal security promises signed by a US president and ratified by the Senate, aren’t necessarily to be trusted. Past US behavior allows no other interpretation.
For the Ukrainians, the key point was that Trump, like Obama, saw Ukrainian security and safety as so unimportant, it could be thrown away, much like a cheap poker chip.
I promise you, in any talk on a deal in which a US negotiator suggests Ukrainian concessions in exchange for US commitments, the Ukrainian response will be: “Well, what about the Vietnamese capitalists? The Iraqi democrats? The Bosnian refugees? The Kurdish allies? The Afghan women? How did relying on American promises of undying support to democracy and freedom and a rules-based international order work out for them?”
My point is, demonstrated US fecklessness and lack of credibility in an international security agreement will be the Ukrainian starting point in any talks involving the US and ceasefire negotiations with Russia. Vietnam iconic image attached just to hammer in the point.
As the Ukrainians see it, the Americans are not reliable, they have really never been reliable, and they absolutely do not see Ukrainian national sovereignty and prevention of Russian attacks on Ukraine as particularly in the US national interest.
When you start seeing the US mainstream complaining about the stubborn Ukrainians, that’s your answer why.
Technical problems with the US sales pitch
As we have seen in the news, one set of peace deal terms being floated by the Trump administration – to wit, by three unnamed officials of unclear rank to the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) – is that the way to get to a ceasefire is to freeze fighting lines and place European tripwire forces between the Russians. Meanwhile the US would fund a really combat-capable Ukrainian army. But no US troops on the ground and no US commitment to use force to guarantee Ukrainian security.
The Zelensky administration, unsurprisingly, has politely called the idea rumors in the press. For Kyiv it was mostly just another opportunity to point out that a ceasefire not absolutely protecting Ukraine from another Russian invasion is something Ukraine can’t agree to, it would be stupid. This official Kyiv view is nothing new, so the WSJ article made only a minor ripple in Ukrainian news cycles.
But for those of us in the English-language sphere outside Ukraine, I think it’s worth digging into how utterly absurd, ridiculous, idiotic, uneducated, naive, fantastic, childish, moronic and detached from reality (no thesaurus) the proposition of a big Ukrainian military financed by the US, and screened by the Europeans is.
First place, the potential adversary needing to be deterred is the second- or third-largest military in the world. Right now, the Russians are fielding and sustaining an army of, perhaps, 250,000 to 300,000 men, backed by tanks, air force, artillery, missiles, the works, in Ukraine.
It’s worth asking, what would it take to deter the Kremlin from unleashing that force, or a bigger one, again against Ukraine?
It would have to be a serious Ukrainian army. This is not Afghans with AKs trained and paid to kick in doors so the US special ops guys don’t have to that we’re talking about. This would have to be a modern, combined-arms army first and foremost built of brigade combat teams capable of sustained conventional war combat.
According to open sources, right now Ukraine has more or less 150,000 to 200,000 men in arms. Possibly less due to casualties. Maybe 100 or so combat brigades, effectively all with serious personnel and equipment shortages, are on the line any one time.
There is no need to guess what this force is capable of, as we can see right now; this force is able to inflict heavy casualties on the Russians and prevent a total collapse of defense.
But it’s unable to prevent small-scale Russian advances, or prevent continuing friendly losses that are hard to replace. These weaknesses are primarily due to a lack of training, particularly combat and staff officers. Equally lacking is firepower, both in weapons systems and ammunition. Obviously, in its present strength the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) are insufficient to deter the Russian army from attacking. Which is what you need to deter.
So what’s the price of a good brigade? According to the US government, to field one combat capable combined arms brigade for 365 days in 2017, US taxpayers were shelling out about $2.5 billion.
As we have seen, costs for munitions fired and combat vehicle losses are orders of magnitude greater in Ukraine than in Afghanistan.
Primitive math is why I say the claim: “Well, we the US will just guarantee Ukrainian security by paying so that Ukraine can defend itself” is so absolutely idiotic.
As we have seen, due to the size of the battle space and the combat power of the enemy, most likely around 100 full-strength, war-ready combat brigades is what Ukraine would need to make Russia’s next invasion of Ukraine so bloody that Russia probably would think twice before attacking. Minimum.
Do the math. The price tag for that would put US taxpayers on the hook for a quarter of a trillion dollars.
Every year. Just for the ground force; Ukrainian air forces, civil defense and navy forces would be extra. This is just the yearly cost for keeping the formation in the field combat ready. It doesn’t include one-time costs like raising the brigade and arming it.
Anyone who wants to argue the Ukrainians need less than that in terms of a ground force, will have a problem making a strong argument, because we can see right now what happens when the Ukrainian army has less than that. No need to guess.
So, even were the Ukrainians to believe American diplomats actually were serious with the line “We have your back, we will buy you a first-class military so you can be neutral and not join NATO,” the Ukrainians are not fools.
They know US taxpayers would never support paying for a force that size, not least because the president they just elected has promised them he will end the war in Ukraine on the cheap.
But more seriously, they also know the size of the combat force Ukraine would need to have on its own, in order to be neutral and join no alliances, and at the same time deter Russia, is orders of magnitude more than the United States is capable of paying for, even if the Americans were willing to do that – and they aren’t.
Absent the will to back Ukraine now, Europe will pay at least 10 times the price in unavoidable rearmament and support to millions of Ukrainian refugees that will flee to Europe.
Europeans are better at history than the Americans
American fecklessness has not been lost on Europe. In the Old World, the Russian threat is clear, and enough European states have an invasion by Russia of their country imprinted in the national DNA for unchecked Russian aggression to be well-understood as something that cannot be ignored.
The incredibly violent first half of the 20th century in Europe, and the mostly peaceful and highly prosperous past 80 years or so, plus Balkan wars and Middle Eastern wars triggering massed migration, likewise have forced European politics and politicians to take the implications of major war, as well as failing to do enough to prevent one, a lot more seriously than in America.
The Europeans also have not forgotten most NATO states sent troops to Afghanistan to fight and die alongside Americans, and like the Ukrainians, the Europeans have noted American commitments in Vietnam, Iraq, Syria and most recently in Afghanistan, and noted the outcomes.
The Europeans are fully aware that the Americans spend an inordinate amount of time complaining about how European security and stability is a distraction and that Europe isn’t doing its fair share, and Ukraine is proof.
Meanwhile, actual numbers, contrary to the US mainstream rhetoric, indicate that Europe has committed distinctly more money to supporting Ukraine than the US, marginally more weapons. Those trajectories are widening. I have written on this repeatedly, and it is well-documented.
Although this American double-standard is irritating in European capitals, the real importance is that the leadership of most major European states appears to have come to a conclusion similar to the Ukrainians: as allies, at best, the Americans are unreliable.
However, the flip side of trying to work with a superpower that has the geopolitical version of ADHD is that the dynamic works both ways.
I know you can find articles about the US being “the irreplaceable ally.” I don’t buy it. Hogwash. The net effect of long-term US policy towards European security, has been to marginalize the US as a national security player in Europe. The Europeans, being Europeans, are too polite to say that out loud. But it’s still happening.
To me sitting in Kyiv, it seems like about one third of Europe is already committed to stopping Russian aggression, and they are thoroughly frustrated with Washington playing fast and loose with NATO and European security.
As we saw this week in Paris, Berlin and London, senior officials reacted to Trump’s election and a possible American surrender and retreat from European security with public calls for Europe to man up and pay a lot more to build up their own militaries. They are talking openly about the Americans cutting and running.
For me, the significance is that saying something like that by a senior European elected official in 2022 was politically taboo. Clearly, now it isn’t.
Which means: a European public discussion of how to keep the continent peaceful, and contain Russia, with the Americans quitting and going home, is inevitable.
And that, I think, will demolish the loopy logic behind the other half of the present American wishful thinking on Ukraine, i.e., that the way to peace is a European tripwire force deployed between the Ukrainians and the Russians. (Image attached of a nice UN Ghanian patrol in Lebanon.)
Remember the 100 Ukrainian brigades? Europe right now would struggle to field five brigades in Ukraine, and it would still be a token force utterly unable to keep the two sides from killing each other.
We have all manner of examples, right now, of what happens when a war is papered over with a “peacekeeper” force with bad rules of engagement and too much combat area to be responsible.
Lebanon, and Israel, and Syria, and Gaza have taught us, an incapable peacekeeper force not dense enough on the ground is just a recipe for more casualties and more escalation. You want the Golan Heights but several hundred times bigger? Try shoving a few European combat brigades with zip combat experience into a space between the Russian army and the AFU, and all their drones and artillery, and watch what happens. (Image of UN troops running after their patrol got bombed.)
Once again, I am on the record that as far as I am concerned the British infantry is second to none, and I have personally witnessed Bundeswehr combat staffs from company through brigade at work. I know the French Zouaves got to the top of the Malakoff Heights first. Image plus the 93rd at the Battle of Alma, so I can work in a Crimea War reference.
My view, the Russian and Ukrainian armies are light-years ahead of NATO on how to kill the other guy on a battlefield and get away with it, that anyone thinking a NATO force separating the two sides in Ukraine could stop the shooting, as far as I am concerned, is either monumentally ignorant, or actually wants to see lots of military funerals in places like Poole, Kassel, and Marseilles.
Even if NATO soldiers willing to deploy to Ukraine to be a tripwire force were to be found, I have to wonder, how many would still agree to do that after they were told they would do so without air support? I don’t understand how European air support to a tripwire force in Ukraine would work, even theoretically. It’s absurd.
The fact some Trump administration guys were willing to push all of this on the WSJ may speak to the ignorance of the sources or the newspaper’s editors, I don’t know, but in the real world of European security the proposition is laughable, it’s not even a suggestion one might make drunk in a bar.
I’ll close with a link to a study from the Kiel Institute which, bottom line, concludes that absent the will to back Ukraine now, Europe will pay at least 10 times the price in unavoidable rearmament and support to millions of Ukrainian refugees that will flee to Europe.
It’s not at all clear the Europeans will step up as the Americans thrash and cut and run. But for the Europeans, the writing is on the wall.
Reprinted from https://stefankorshak.substack.com/ with the author’s permission. You can find the original article here.
The views expressed are the author’s and not necessarily of Kyiv Post.
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