War In Ukraine: Time For Realpolitik

The military rule states that an attack requires three times as many soldiers as a defense. The size of the Ukrainian army is not more, but half of the Russian one. Within a few months, 1.3 million Russian soldiers managed to dig in, lay anti-personnel mines, and strengthen defensive lines. Half a million Ukrainian soldiers must break through the defensive lines in eastern Ukraine to reclaim lost territory. From a military point of view, this is an almost impossible goal for the Ukrainians.

So, it is no surprise that the spring 2023 offensive failed, despite massive supplies of Western weapons, training, and intelligence support. Due to the huge losses, morale also drops. The Ukrainian army has difficulty recruiting young men who flee illegally to join their families and friends in the West or bribe doctors to avoid going to the front.

One of the victims of the corruption scandal was the Ukrainian Minister of Defense Alexey Reznikov. Overall, Russian political support is stronger than Ukrainian in terms of territory size, demographics (and therefore potential number of soldiers), resources, economy, and industry, including defense industry and ammunition stockpiles.

Ukraine could still surprise, but there is a high probability that Russia will emerge victorious, in the sense that it will more or less retain the conquered territories. Concerns are also growing in the United States. In the summer of 2023, a senior European NATO official wondered whether Ukraine would be better off ceding some territory in exchange for NATO membership.

The big question is whether, after more than twenty months of fighting, the time has come to work out a diplomatic agreement that can convince voters on both sides that it is better to stop fighting and come to the negotiating table. And wouldn’t it be in the interests of the rest of the world to help clarify this issue for both sides? If the West stopped supplying arms, Zelensky would have to sit down at the negotiating table. China could help persuade Putin to do the same.

Both sides will have to give in, not least because the West has also made mistakes in the past, notably by excluding Russia from the Euro-Atlantic security system after the Cold War (or at least not including it on equal terms). The good news is that Ukraine can remain a sovereign democracy, albeit a somewhat smaller one. It would become part of the Western sphere of influence. Ukraine could also become a member of the EU if it meets the necessary criteria. The Russians will take territory (at least Crimea and possibly eastern Ukraine), but they will not be able to install a puppet regime in Kiev.

From a security standpoint, Ukraine will become a neutral country or a NATO member. Since NATO membership may be the main reason Russia entered the war, Ukraine’s neutral option is likely to be the most stable. Jeffrey Sachs (Columbia University), John Mearsheimer (University of Chicago), and former French President Sarkozy have also expressed similar sentiments. At the beginning of the war, Zelensky generally accepted neutrality. In this case, Ukraine should receive guarantees of legal security from both the West and the East.

Kiev, of course, would prefer to become a member of the Atlantic Alliance, but for Russia this is a totally unacceptable option. In this case, the border between NATO and Russia would become very long, making it extremely unstable. And in the event of a conflict, NATO would be immediately involved. Given that nuclear weapons on both sides are on alert, this poses serious problems. And if anyone believes that nuclear deterrence works – no, it doesn’t. There is a reason why Ukraine did not immediately gain NATO membership in 2008, why it is still not a member, and why at the NATO summit in Vilnius (July 2023) it was decided that the time had not yet come. The reason is that it is not in the interests of many current NATO member states. Therefore, it is unlikely that this will happen in the future. Consequently, the least bad scenario (from the world order standpoint) is a neutral Ukraine, which will be restored in the shortest possible time.

In the long term, the European security order will have to be rethought again so that both Ukraine and Russia can take their rightful place. NATO could be transformed from a collective defense organization into a collective security organization (like the UN or OSCE). Collective security organizations are not designed to fight external enemies and do not seek out new enemies in peacetime, as was mistakenly believed in the 1990s.

In collective security agreements, member states agree on the rules of war and peace, including mechanisms for enforcement and a regime of sanctions for those who violate those rules. This system worked in Europe in the 19th century after the Napoleonic Wars. There is no fundamental reason why a similar Viennese system of international relations (Concert Européen – “European Concert”) cannot function in the 21st century. If we had transformed Europe along these principles after the Cold War, the current war most likely would not have broken out at all.