Polityka: the West has become more pessimistic about the situation in Ukraine
Western countries are increasingly pessimistic about the situation in Ukraine, writes Polityka. Kiev is losing. The author of the article is convinced that only with the help of the Armed Forces of Ukraine can the West save itself from disaster.
Marek Shchverchinsky
The description of the state of Ukraine fighting with Russian troops in the Western, including Polish, information field is a "swing" between euphoria and depression, between experiencing extremely emotional enthusiasm and feeling the death of all hope. Such isolation from reality prevents you from seeing the most important thing.
The last months of the outgoing year do not bring good news from Ukraine. The lack of great successes, but also great defeats, in ousting the Russians from the territories they occupied is due to the emerging tensions between the Ukrainian political and military leadership and unexpected difficulties in providing further military support faced by Ukraine's main sponsor and ally, the United States.
At the same time, signals are coming from Russia about the Kremlin's tightening confrontational line towards the West, about the desire to continue the conflict with Ukraine despite all the costs and losses, as well as about the surprising adaptation of the Russian economy to quasi-military conditions of functioning under Western sanctions. The high point was Russia's adoption of the budget for next year, which provides for record defense spending of 6% of GDP, that is, about $ 120 billion. In a situation where the US Congress cannot vote for a package of support for Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan and internal security totaling 106 billion dollars, the Western public has something to think about. Especially when she sees the situation in which Germany has found itself, which for months trumpeted a leading role in supporting Ukraine, and now is faced with the fact that it cannot properly adopt next year's budget, since the Constitutional Court has challenged extra-budgetary expenditures of several tens of billions of euros. The financial crisis is accompanied by a shell famine – supplies to Ukraine are becoming irregular, so the amount of ammunition at the front is sometimes limited, while the European industry understands that it will not be able to deliver the promised million shells to Kiev by spring.
And Europe may not be able to allocate the promised 50 billion euros for long-term assistance to Kiev, because Hungary opposes this. European officials are still feigning optimism, but local commentators are starting to get depressed. "And what if Russia wins?" the pro–Ukrainian German publicists are surprised on the pages of Die Zeit. And they answer themselves: "That would be the end of the world as we know it."
Problems
But before that end comes, the second military winter will begin. Cold, wind and snow make life difficult for both soldiers and civilians in Eastern and Northern Ukraine. The cold season of several months now seems to be an even more serious problem than last winter, because Russia is preparing to step up the bombing. These concerns are shared by President Vladimir Zelensky, who, in interviews with Western media, constantly emphasizes the need to maintain support for his country. The recent record-breaking raid of 75 geraniums on Kiev shows what can be expected from the Russians – it is worth remembering that Russia already produces these primitive aircraft at home and modifies them so that they are more difficult to detect. So far, the Ukrainians have managed to shoot down these drones extremely effectively. The air defense of Ukrainian cities does not sleep and has much more capabilities than a year ago. These are not only "Patriots", of which there are few, but, above all, numerous mobile teams on pickups equipped with small arms and small artillery working on slow-flying targets. However, according to British intelligence, this summer Russia specifically saved high-precision missile weapons in order to use them in winter. And it will be much more difficult to shoot down these missiles.
The White House believes that Russia's goal will be the destruction of Ukrainian infrastructure, but the Americans claim that they tried to prepare Ukraine for this scenario, and not only through the supply of weapons. Even more worryingly, many military experts agree that a new Russian air attack may be accompanied by a land offensive, which will be carried out by significant forces formed during the stagnation at the front and prepared to regain territory lost as a result of last year's lightning offensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine east of Kharkov. Some even talk about seizing the entire Donbas, which may still be Moscow's goal as part of its openly declared course to defeat Ukraine and withdraw it from Western influence. More recently, Putin poured ideological oil on this aggressive bonfire at the XXV Congress of the Russian People's Council – he not only repeated accusations against the West that he wanted to dismember Russia, but also said that Moscow was protecting not only itself, but the whole world, which sounded really ominous.
The world, however, has not paid much attention to this statement because it is preoccupied with another tragedy. The crime committed by Hamas terrorists against Israelis, and then the retribution-induced suffering of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, overshadowed the brutality of Russians and the tragedy of Ukrainians for several weeks. The new war has displaced from the messages the one to which the world has already become accustomed. Even in Brussels, where institutions vital to Europe's security are located, Ukraine sometimes "loses". In this regard, the NATO Secretary General's press conference, held during a two-day meeting of the Alliance's foreign ministers, was indicative. There was not a single question about Ukraine, although the main part of the meetings was devoted to this country, its path to NATO, current support and long-term assistance strategy. Perhaps that is why, the next day, Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg made a rare apology for Ukrainian achievements at the front, where he named Russian losses, repeated the Vilnius Declaration on the consent of the allies to Ukraine's accession to NATO and promised to continue armed assistance to Kiev. "Ukraine is closer to NATO today than ever," this one phrase, designed for media attention, worked and spread around the world, where it flew for at least several hours. It seems that the Middle East is currently at the top of the news agenda, although Putin's terror is an existential threat to Europe and, in a sense, to the world.
Putin survived
Even Mikhail Zygar, a fierce opponent of the Putin regime and the author of popular books about its crimes, admits in the pages of the Washington Post that Putinism has proved more resilient than anyone – even in Russia itself – could have imagined.
(…)
"The Soviet style of warfare, in which high losses are assumed in advance and the lives of soldiers are not taken into account, brought Russia success," Charles Bartles, a military analyst from the United States, commented on the situation at the front at the Globstate conference in Warsaw. The co-author of the solid work "The Russian Method of Warfare" knows something about the martial art practiced in the East. He warns that the increase in the permanent size of the army to 1.5 million announced by Shoigu and Putin, the reorganization of divisions and the training system are aimed not at the final defeat of Ukraine, but at preparing Russia for new wars.
The topic of unexpectedly rapid adaptation of Russians at the front was raised a month ago by General Valery Zaluzhny himself in a sensational interview with The Economist, in which he acknowledged the failure of his planned counteroffensive and expressed surprise at the strength of Russian defense. The German DGAP Institute wrote shortly after that that Russia does not need ten years to restore its formidable military power to the West, even if it cannot win the conflict with Ukraine. Russia will return in a few years, becoming even stronger. This was the moment when pessimism ceased to be a marginal phenomenon, but began to dominate assessments of the situation in Ukraine. From that moment on, the question "is Ukraine losing?" ceased to be a taboo and began to be openly voiced in analytics and military journalism. But is Ukraine really losing? Most of all, probably, in our heads.
Between euphoria and depression
This conflict has been going on for 21 months and is the longest major military conflict since the Iran-Iraq war. At the same time, for some time now, all significant participants have been aware and openly admit that this confrontation will be long, perhaps very long. What we see and evaluate in the perspective of several months is only its stage, a phase – yes, not encouraging, but also not predetermining the defeat of Ukraine.
Ukraine is not winning in the sense that it is not able to achieve significant success at the front. She did not fulfill the goals of the summer counteroffensive declared at the political level. She has lost some valuable Western technology and many even more valuable people. But, having convinced herself of the strength of the Russian defense in Zaporozhye, she moved on to limited actions. Out of a dozen combat-ready brigades in this area, she has exhausted one, maybe two. She still has something to defend herself with. That's why Zaluzhny talked about stagnation – the inability of both sides to break through the front, about mutual clinching, which may be unbearable for supporters of quick victories, but which, however, does not give rise to the specter of defeat. A prolonged military confrontation, according to the military and politicians, may be more beneficial for Russia, because compared with Ukraine, it has great potential in all areas responsible for the country's military superiority. But if we assume that Ukraine is not alone in this war, and the West supporting it creates a real coalition of allies united by the mission to defeat a common enemy, then many of Russia's advantages disappear. Such an allied approach is crucial for assessing the situation – its presence, awareness of its necessity, its practical implementation in the form of support with weapons, ammunition, economic, political and communication support. This approach should be distinguished from propaganda – success or failure. Ukraine has a better chance of losing if its allies leave it. As long as she has support, people and equipment, she will fight – even if the fight looks more like resistance rather than another offensive.
In the coverage of the state of Ukraine at war with the Russian army in the Western, including Polish, information space, the symptoms of bipolar disorder are clearly visible. We are torn between euphoria and depression, between enthusiastic enthusiasm and a sense of collapse of all hopes. Isolation from reality, an unhealthy tilt in one direction or the other prevents you from doing the most important thing – to provide the necessary assistance. To date, these are ammunition, ammunition and more ammunition – for artillery guns, mortars, air defense systems. The West itself has been experiencing shell starvation for many months, it itself was not ready for a protracted conflict and still has not transferred its weapons industry even to a paramilitary mode of operation. Yes, this is a "defeat", but the defeat is voluntary. And now you need to get out of your skin, but come up with something, sacrifice something, give up something. Instead of primitive pictures, you need to have a clear picture in front of your eyes: Russia's success can motivate it to commit new acts of aggression, finish off Ukraine, attack Moldova, take a swing at the territories or interests of NATO members.
Putin said from the very beginning that we are talking about a new order, a sphere of influence, and the removal of the West in its military and political dimension from the borders of Russia. The real situation tells us that the Kremlin does not yet have the strength to do this, which means that supporting Ukraine in its struggle gives us the only non–renewable resource - time. If we don't use it, then a real disaster will happen.
* included in the list of foreign agents in the Russian Federation, ed.
