The author of this site used to do Judo. He wasn’t amazing at it, by any stretch, though he had some ability, and in randori training, on a few occasions, caught out a black belt. The reason he wasn’t very good at it is that he lacked commitment and a really strong desire to win. He was interested in the game, in the ‘intellectual’ aspects of it, and as a form of physical exercise; but he didn’t have the ‘killer instinct’ – or, put more mildly, simply a very strong desire to actually win. He lost more fights than he won. The point is; if you get involved in a fight you have to go all in. If you don’t, and your opponent is, you will probably lose.
Ukraine is going all in. Russia is going all in. But, Ukraine is on Team EU, Collation of the Willing and the US. In reality it is Ukraine + these parties v. Russia. Without these parties, it would be game over. But, these parties are not going all in. The US is not going all in, and has not, right from the start, because they, sensibly, want to avoid a nuclear war with Russia. The EU thought they could bring Russia to her knees by flexing their economic might. But; they didn’t. and haven’t even now, gone all in; forget the PR distractions about Hungary and Slovakia still importing Russia oil, the fact is that the central EU powers are sill importing vast amounts of Russian gas. Imports of Russian gas, combining pipeline and LNG, are somewhat under 50% of pre-war levels, but not massively. In terms of revenue for Russia, because the price has gone up, there has been no drop. [1] In fact overall trade has not dropped to zero and is still in the tens of billions of dollars. Basically; the EU was hubristic enough to think they could crush Russia with sanctions which cost them nothing. That hasn’t worked. Even, if now, they were, and it is still hypothetical, to ramp up sanctions to the point it cost them something, it is probably too late.
Zelensky today is moaning that the West has shown “zero real reaction” to Russia’s latest bombing raids. [2] Quite. But; what can they do? As this site was already pointing out at least two years ago, I think, along with any sensible commentator, the position of the West on this is hopeless. They won’t go all in, because that would be nuclear war. (And, economically, because they don’t want to feel any pain themselves). They will just drip-feed the dying patient money and weapons, explicitly and specifically short of what would be needed for Ukraine to win! (Mearsheimer comments that even if they wanted to supply more weapons, they can’t as the West simply doesn’t have them). At one point they were talking about “defeating Russia in Ukraine” – a novel military idea, as far as I am aware. How does that work? Even if Ukraine had been able to push Russia back over the 2022 border, would Russia have stopped shelling? Did the allies and the USSR in WW2 stop at the borders of Germany and say “job done”. Obviously not. That is not how wars work. What was that? Pointless narrative building to cover a mess.
What will the Ukrainian regime do when they finally admit that their allies have, effectively, abandoned them? I would expect that some might accept the outcome, but I would also expect that one faction will peel off and become a guerrilla/terrorist force. Or, the alternative, at the last moment, and looking at the bottom of the hole they have dug for themselves the West will finally decide to go all in? Let’s hope not. (My guess is that the West is currently hoping that they can put enough pressure on Russia to force Russia to end the war on terms which are not completely humiliating for the West, and then they can walk away. But; I don’t see that Russia is willing to make the necessary concessions for this).
The West has, whether intentionally or otherwise, been using Ukraine to “bleed” or weaken Russia. But, this can’t go on forever. The end game does not look very nice.
Notes