Victory In Ukraine: Preparing For 2025
Victory In Ukraine: Preparing For 2025
Defeating Putin is a matter of time and resources. With his nuclear threats mere bluffs intended to stoke escalation fears in the USA, he's down to buying time and hoping the wind changes.
Well, it’s certainly been quite a week in geopolitics. The old Chinese saying/curse about living in interesting times has rarely felt so appropriate.
In addition to briefly covering how recent world political developments may impact Ukraine, this week’s post will address key battlefield developments and offer a high level look at the resources Ukraine needs to achieve victory by the end of 2025. That’s a mighty heavy lift to be sure, but Zelensky is publicly putting it on the table for a reason.
Weekly Overview1
Moscow launched another wave of counterattacks in Kursk that sent a lot of people in Ukraine and abroad into a tizzy for a couple days. Then Ukraine’s swift riposte revealed the situation to be a smidge less hopeless than some believed. Ukraine also smashed more important targets deep in russia - air bases, oil facilities, warehouses, all kinds of good systems destruction work.
There are also rumors - just that, at this point - of the first Viper ambush taking down a Sukhoi-34 on a glide bomb raid. Fingers crossed, but I’m skeptical, unless Ukraine got some new missiles or did some innovation with drones.
Like the rumors that a Patriot system shot down an F-16 this summer, hard public evidence is lacking. No others have been confirmed lost in any similar incidents, though Moscow has also not launched a massive missile strike in a few weeks, despite feinting in that direction. Still no telling whether the loss revealed a systemic problem.
Losing a Sukhoi 50km behind the front sounds like a plausible F-16 intercept, if the pilot had support from a friendly radar, risked flying about 25km from the front at low altitude, and arrived at just the right moment before running away. But a wandering Patriot ambush could easily have been responsible. In theory, someone could have even worked out how to attach a small anti-aircraft missile to a drone - or, as one internet commenter I chatted with recently on Tom Cooper’s blog suggested, a humble balloon.
If the orcs are flying predictable routes again, you might get lucky and have a jet fly under a balloon released at the right moment. A smart engineer might work out how to have an optical camera with image recognition tell a missile’s infrared seeker when to switch on. Never underestimate a clever tinkerer.
But back to Kursk - no doubt a very tough fight has been underway on the western flank of Ukraine’s incursion over the past week. And Ukrainian forces definitely took some bad hits, including losing a team of drone operators summarily executed by orcs from the 155th Naval Infantry Brigade after being taken as POWs. But Ukrainian forces quickly counterattacked against the spearhead, inflicting severe losses. Mopping up operations are reported to be underway, though who holds what ground will be unclear for a while (the yellow zone on Andrew Perpetua’s map).
Unfortunately, forward lines nowadays must be held by small groups because of the threat posed by glide bombs. We’re talking a fire team of about four people, a pair of these teams working in close proximity. A company of a hundred or so covers a kilometer or two (more, depending) of front. When attacked, Ukrainian troops in forward positions have to make a fast choice: stand firm or pull back before it’s too late. How many bad guys are incoming and how quickly they can be taken out is the deciding factor, with on-call support from drones and artillery playing a decisive role.
When the orcs launch one of their mass 50+ vehicle assaults, there can be too many targets in a sector to take everything out before survivors crash into Ukrainian positions. The defenders have no choice but to fall back to alternates and call in reinforcements before they’re overwhelmed. A reckless assault can sometimes punch several kilometers or even more before getting wiped out, but still doing damage in the process. Moscow’s operations typically feature assaults of varying intensity along a narrow front in hopes of overwhelming and exhausting the local defense, and if they sense weakness they throw a ton of troops in hopes that a few live to secure the gains.
My standard doctrine, were I leading a Ukrainian company (gods forbid!), would always presume a retreat of up to a couple kilometers in every engagement. It’s the job of higher-level operational commanders to make sure I’ve got enough firepower allocated to stop whatever focused attack the enemy might launch at the second or third lines then press a counterattack to clear the original one when the inbound wave is broken.
If I sense for an instant that my people risk being overwhelmed, I’m yanking them back. It’s usually better to organize a prompt counterattack with whatever forces can be gathered than stand and fight in a fixed position against overwhelming odds.
The natural danger is that the movement of my unit can expose the people right behind us or to either side. So close coordination is indispensable, which is another reason I strongly advocate having companies receive similar training and get slotted into larger battlegroups with a fairly flat command structure closely bound to the local geography. A few dozen company commanders can all get to know each other well enough to actively coordinate under the guidance of a competent battlegroup staff.
No matter what, though, things will go wrong. It’s just statistics, or Murphy’s law, if you prefer. Plans almost never play out as expected; when they do a leader should be wary of a trap. What matters most is how well everyone involved can adapt. But sometimes, the enemy gets a win.
Notably, this round of ruscist counterattacks on the western flank of Free Kursk has attempted to drive Ukrainian troops away from Korenevo. Moscow is still struggling to prevent the Glushkovo district from being cut off and break out of the cauldron around Snagost.
Ukraine’s defense of the region is centered on Sudzha, but early on Ukrainian forces rushed to the north, west, and east to take up positions on higher ground around it. Moscow’s push from Korenevo to Snagost and then east toward Sudzha is sending soldiers through a lowland area where they’re being eaten alive by drones, artillery, and ambushes from within the local towns.
Ukrainian troops had been pushing north past Korenevo toward Rylsk across a rail line, but it appears that they’ve now retreated behind a water barrier while fending off another pincer of the ruscist attack wave coming at Kremanyoe. There a group of orcs has apparently been surrounded for weeks, with Moscow repeatedly attempting their relief.
Ukraine might be forced back a bit more in this area, but will still retain plenty of defensible ground north of Sudzha. All in all, the latest moves of both sides suggests that Ukraine is definitely unlikely to cut off the entire Rylsk bulge, a feat that seemed possible at the start of the Kursk Campaign. But a smaller border buffer zone anchored on the Seim remains very doable and desirable through winter, even if the front line eventually runs through Sudzha itself. Ukraine has to defend its border somewhere - why not some ways inside russia?
Another real possibility is a major Ukrainian attack towards Snagost and Glushkovo after the latest orc assault exhausts itself. Interestingly, part of the 47th Mechanized Brigade showed up on the Kursk Front, which means that all three of Ukraine’s best-equipped brigades - 82nd Air Assault and 21st Mechanized already present - are represented. While the 47th might just be there to replace the 82nd or some other brigade there since the beginning, the plan could be for the trio to act in concert to retake Snagost and seize Glushkovo before the weather gets bad.
In occupied Ukraine, Pokrovsk remains the hottest front. The orc advance towards the crossroads town has slowed in the past couple weeks, though, with Ukrainian troops since last Monday giving up only a few positions despite steady orc assaults.
Moscow is still trying to sustain a costly advance, particularly fighting to displace Ukrainian forces on the southern flank. Numerous attacks are made on the northern flank too, but few have gone anywhere, the orcs having trouble pushing Ukrainian forces off higher ground. Selydove still stands, though I have to imagine both it and the Hirnyk-Kurakhivka area will eventually fall.
It’s become popular among Kursk skeptics to argue that this operation is the reason Ukraine has retreated so near to Pokrovsk already, but I see matters differently. Had Ukraine fought harder for the approaches to Pokrovsk the Vovcha line might have held, but this would have had only limited operational benefits, especially over winter, when streams freeze. The brigades striking in Kursk imposed a higher cost ratio on the enemy than would likely have been the case if committed to Pokrovsk and also demonstrated Putin’s strategic stupidity in going after Ukraine in the first place.
Moscow has been forced to hedge with its resources, taking tens of thousands of bodies - increasingly, experienced ones, too - away from occupied Ukraine. But lack of a coherent plan has led to them being committed piecemeal, reducing their effectiveness. The Kursk Campaign, everything considered, might have in fact saved Pokrovsk and a number of other Donbas towns.
Putin didn’t drop everything to defend Kursk because he has enough forces on the rolls that this wouldn’t be necessary even if Ukraine had pushed much farther. The pathetic delays in giving Ukraine proper air support have always meant that any offensive operations where Moscow is watching will run into trouble. All in all, that makes Kursk a more efficient operation than a stubborn defense of every single hamlet in Donbas, even if Ukraine unravels the incursion tomorrow.
I’m not trying to say that the situation on many fronts isn’t very hard, however. South of the Pokrovsk front, Moscow is attempting to follow the capture of Vuhledar by pushing towards Velyka Novosilka and Kurakhove. The objective here seems straightforward: secure the southern flank of the push to Pokrovsk from the threat of counterattack. Another goal is to prevent Ukraine from launching a future counteroffensive towards Volnovakha.
The fall of Vuhledar has drawn enough comment - what’s notable is the slow pace of the orc progress after its fall. The 72nd’s withdrawal, while operationally belated, was orderly, and the brigade isn’t entirely exhausted.
To the southwest, in the southern theater, Moscow has apparently been building up forces ahead of small-scale offensives meant to tie down Ukrainian forces. The ruscist attack near the Dnipro at Kamianske was knocked out, but there has been some renewed pressure in the remnants of the Robotyne bulge south of Orihiv. But here, as in the Dnipro delta, Moscow doesn’t seem to have enough combat power to do more than harass Ukrainian defenders, as reserved went to Kursk.
Swinging back to the north of Pokrovsk, Moscow is still trying to advance in Toretsk, though further progress in the town center has so far been thwarted. Moscow has apparently realized that a frontal assault won’t work yet, so is trying to push through the remaining parts of the town south of Dzerhinsky Street, particularly the Zabalka neighborhood.
Toretsk is definitely in trouble, but a plus of urban fighting is that Ukraine can allocate brigades specifically trained for it. Many of the battalions in Toretsk appear to be staffed by former police officers; they have quietly been doing good work in places like Bakhmut and Chasiv Yar. A regiment from Lyut brigade and several battalions have reportedly been fighting hard amid the high rises that anchor the town’s defense.
North of Toretsk, the orcs keep trying to establish bridgeheads across the canal just west of Chasiv Yar, and Ukraine keeps making them pay for it. It’s a sector where troops have been fighting for so long that Ukraine’s defense could be wearing thin. But considering how many analysts were certain that Chasiv Yar would fall many months ago, the continued effectiveness of Ukraine’s defense efforts here are interesting. The same can be said for the handful of brigades defending Siversk, which have come under renewed pressure lately but haven’t cracked.
Finally, Moscow’s troops are still trying to creep west between Lyman and Kupiansk, almost reaching the Oskil outside of Kruhliakivka. The fighting here resembles the First World War even more than most parts of the front line, and ruscist operations appear to be geared solely towards pushing Ukrainian troops over water barriers so Moscow can allocate troops elsewhere.
It’s always difficult when writing up an analysis of the Ukraine War’s dynamics to avoid either being too optimistic or pessimistic. Depending on the time horizon you look at and the people you tend to empathize with, everything can look awful or wonderful.
My sense of the conflict continues to be that Ukraine is moving along the right trajectory, though there are constant setbacks. The same was true of the Second World War. What matters right now is that Ukraine receives substantial material support before Moscow can enlist more aid from North Korea, Iran, or China.
Critical Elements of Ukraine’s Victory 2
Last weekend NATO leaders were supposed to meet at Ramstein to decide on how to back Zelensky’s Victory Plan, but it was postponed. Unfortunately, it’s hurricane season in the American Southeast, and kind of a bad look even in a non-election year for a president to go schmoozing at a summit when people are dying because of the standard inept governance back home.
On the plus side, more might actually be happening in Biden’s absence. There’s been an escalating string of announcements about future European support, and it’s looking very substantial already. Stefan Korshak has an excellent rundown of the details so far.
Ukraine isn’t going to surrender even if US aid dwindles next year; Europe clearly understands the stakes. However, Ukraine remains vulnerable to the conflict getting frozen due to lack of resources and waning global interest. This will give Putin’s system time to adapt again, ensuring that when he comes back for another round what ails his military machine will be partly remedied. If the world should have learned one thing from the Covid-19 pandemic, it’s the danger of allowing a virus to mutate.
That’s what imperialism really is: a plague that drives its hosts mad until they destroy themselves. Putin’s empire isn’t the only one out there, but it’s demonstrably the worst in terms of its present impact.
The orcs aren’t liable to develop a decentralized, small unit led paradigm for running operations and become masters of Network Age warfare. Putin’s system is too rigid for that. What the orcs might be able to do down the line is saturate a target area with so much firepower delivered remotely that it becomes impossible to defend. The result will be a desert, but it will still be conquest.
A lot of observers of the Ukraine War and not a few Ukrainian senior officers fail to appreciate that losing territory is not always a bad thing. At the most meta level, a total war really is like two fighters struggling to gain a decisive edge. How well each manages the limited reserves of energy available tends to be the decisive factor, not what part of the ring they stand in. A weaker fighter who patiently waits for the opponent to become tired and make a critical mistake can turn the tide in a sudden burst of action. A stab in the jugular is fatal even if an enemy’s muscles are huge.
Of course, everything depends on execution: anyone can come up with the most majestic theory of victory and plan to achieve it, but some poor bastards have to slog through hell to get the job done. Minimizing the risk frontline personnel have to take on is the key to maximizing their impact.
If ruscist forces can figure out a way to sustain large-scale total bombardments for weeks and months on end, their escalating shortages of Soviet equipment won’t matter as much. The recent orc shootdown of their own rare experimental “stealth” drone over Ukrainian territory, some twenty kilometers behind the front, reveals that the orcs are already planning for the moment when they can’t use crewed aircraft near Ukraine.
Glide bombs are unfortunately much more powerful than rockets or shells. Although Ukrainian brigades have been employing area defense tactics with skill, there are often no positions left to reclaim in a counterattack. Under these circumstances, it is irresponsible in most cases for Ukrainian troops to be asked to hold firm in fortresses like Vuhledar. The same problem has afflicted Ukrainian efforts elsewhere.
Ukraine is still in a position where the best strategic choice is to trade land for time on most fronts. But if its partners will finally commit to fully supporting a proper counteroffensive effort, by next spring Moscow’s insistence on throwing away ten thousand more soldiers than it can train every month will have pushed the orcs into another personnel crisis. Equipment is already becoming more scarce and the situation won’t improve any time soon, with the middle of 2025 looking to be a turning point in the availability of artillery and tanks.
Assuming that Ukraine finally receives the full backing from its partners that it has always deserved, it will be possible to put Moscow’s on the back foot to such an extent Putin won’t be able to recover.
When an entire country mobilizes its economic potential and applies the surplus to sustain military operations, hidden costs start to add up. Crisis is inevitable, and putting it off only makes it sharper when it hits. Ukraine will be able to take advantage now that it has proven the non-existence of Putin’s red lines - if adequately supported.
Ukraine’s primary objective in the war, beyond survival, is to preserve the lives of as many people as possible. It might be the only country in recent history to make the deliberate choice to shield younger Ukrainians from the conflict and instead send older citizens to the front lines.
This is part of why it’s so imperative that Ukrainian leaders and allies abroad accept that Ukraine should continue to pull back slowly on many fronts. This isn’t a sign of weakness or impending collapse: trading space for time is an ancient, time-honored tactic. The goal is always the same: create a moment of energetic asymmetry that triggers a collapse in the enemy’s combat power at the decisive point, leading to cascading failures.
Ukraine has done much to reboot its forces already, and that of course has to continue. Better and more intensive training is essential, and it’s good to see Britain leading a push to train Ukrainians in western Ukraine, despite that meaning NATO boots on the ground.
But there is simply no substitute for the hard military capabilities required to defend against the glide bomb threat. That means not only enhanced air defenses and the ability to strike orc airfields, but properly equipped ground forces to take advantage of any window of opportunity to seize new positions. Because there’s little prospect of Ukraine gaining air superiority, it will be necessary to have closely coordinated brief offensives as close together in time as possible.
Boosting Ukraine’s air power is right up there with providing more armored vehicles and shells. It not only gets you better air defense over the home front, but opportunities to deliver some potent ground attacks as well. That’s why France revealing that it will send about two dozen Mirage 2000 jets with trained Ukrainian pilots to operate them in early 2025 is great news.
These are older aircraft, and Ukraine has to be extremely careful flying aircraft close to the front lines. But especially if supported by F-16s carrying jamming pods and anti-radar missiles, strike packages can punch holes in Moscow’s air defense and electronic warfare network and fire cruise missiles at high value targets. Mirage and F-16 jets can also patrol behind friendly lines to offer on-call fire support using rocket-assisted glide bombs. Existing conversions to deploy precision weapons from Soviet aircraft require that target coordinates be programmed before the jet takes off, but NATO pilots can select targets in flight, leading to quicker response times. This makes soldiers in a jam very happy.
The provision of Mirage 2000s creates another intriguing possibility. Rafale fighters, slated to replace France’s Mirage 2000 fleet, can fire the very long-range Meteor missile. Whether modifications made to jets Ukraine stands to receive over the past year could include the ability to use these is a complete unknown, but it’s certainly more doable than making NATO tech interface with Soviet.
It is entirely possible that, much as France kept the scale of its training program for Ukrainian pilots (and possibly armaments) fairly quiet, Sweden along with one or more Gripen operators have quietly worked out a way to equip Ukraine with a small fleet. With a native ability to fire Meteor missiles, Gripens can almost go toe to tie with the best ruscist jets, making glide bomb attacks perpetually risky.
By summer Ukraine could be operating a couple dozen F-16s, as many Mirage 2000s, and a handful of Gripens. This would allow Ukraine to reach temporary parity over the front line and maintain a perpetual vigil against glide bomb strikes - if coupled to 24/7 AWACS support. Sweden has offered up two aircraft, delivery date unknown, but Ukraine badly needs at least two more just to maintain a single continuous patrol.
A serious limitation facing even NATO-origin Ukrainian jets is their radar range: while probably roughly equivalent in terms of combat effectiveness when you combine the impacts of electronic warfare and inefficient orc electronics, you should never choose an even fight.
AWACS solves this problem, allowing Ukrainian jets to keep their radars powered off, making it easier to hide in ground clutter and launch weapons without revealing their location. If Ukraine is given a tactical network like Link-16, an AWACS jet can actually feed targeting information directly to a missile on a fighter or drone.
One of the major limitations of Ukraine’s Patriot systems is the fact that anything flying low can hide behind the horizon until it gets within forty kilometers or so. With AWACS, the effective range of an air defense system against low-flying targets goes way up - actually against any target, because multiple radars can combine their signals through a network to give an even firmer track.
It should be possible to combine a smaller, short-range air to air missile on a drone with AWACS support and Link-16 to create a stopgap counter to glide bombers. A drone flying low and slow carrying a Sidewinder missile - range around ten kilometers - could get under a ruscist jet moving in to launch a glide bomb. If it can use the AWACS signal to lock the missile’s infrared seeker onto a target, boom.
One way or another, the glide bomb threat must be countered. Thanks to the orcs having plenty of advance warning before the US might even consider lifting the restriction on long-range strikes deep into russia using NATO weapons, most air bases are or will quickly be moved out of ATACMS range. Storm Shadow/SCALP cruise missiles can fly farther, and so can Taurus, but cruise missiles are generally easier to intercept. It’s frankly naive for Olaf Scholz of Germany to treat his as if they’re a true strategic weapon for that reason.
With drones getting better at pummeling air bases and Ukraine building its own ballistic and cruise missiles, the best targets for NATO weapons are probably ammunition and fuel depots, headquarters, and rail bridges well behind the front lines. In the grossest sense, there’s an efficiency factor applied to combat power that determines its actual effect, and the more you batter essential nodes in the supply chain the lower this factor becomes. The effect is hard to see at first, but it begins to tell, with impacts accumulating.
Once Ukraine is able to reliably fend off glide bomb attacks and interdict ruscist logistics at the strategic level, better ground-based air defenses and interceptor drones can blind the enemy on select fronts. This will enable pulses of action where Ukrainian forces can once again use mass and speed to outfight the enemy in the field. An essential component of this work is more modern armored vehicles, and they’ve all got to have the standard anti-drone defenses - reactive armor blocks, mesh to cover gaps where a drone will try to hit, and electronic countermeasures.
Nothing can change the fact that Ukrainian forces also need a lot more tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, and armored personnel carriers. NATO has got to take the risk of drawing down active stocks, while hopefully securing alternative supplies from countries in the Middle East that they’ve been exporting arms to for decades. If nothing else, Iran won’t be going after the UAE or Saudi Arabia if it’s busy with Israel.
Though there has been some talk funding issues with the Czech program to buy 155mm shells from abroad, overall Ukraine now reports firing one shell for each of Moscow’s three, which once accounting for accuracy implies rough parity. European production is supposedly going to double again in the next year, as will American, and Ukraine is building its own too as well as gunpowder plants. So there shouldn’t be a shell famine again.
Zelensky’s Victory Plan hasn’t been fully revealed to the public, but there has been no indication so far that anything in it is particularly surprising. War eats resources as fast as it does people. Ukraine needs more of both, and improved training for the latter. Leadership too, in too many cases.
But if Ukraine gets what it needs between now and next summer, victory in 2025 is possible. A foundational assumption, of course, is that Moscow’s combat power keeps being lost at present rates well into next year. Increasing cooperation between North Korea and russia is therefore deeply concerning, as is the potential of China transferring older equipment through intermediaries.
This has always been the risk in trying to posit a world split into autocratic and democratic blocs. Aside from the hypocrisy of the democratic side openly backing numerous vicious regimes, if China does decide to increase its support for Moscow the Ukraine War could drag on for a long, long time.
Divide and conquer, people. The last thing you want is your enemies unified, alert, and ready.
Geopolitics: The Ultimate Hot Mess3
The fact that Europe is truly waking up is very good news for Ukraine, especially if Trump turns out to be as friendly to Putin as Democrats insist. Over the past week, leading Democrats have tacitly confirmed that they expect Harris to lose. The best they can realistically hope for is narrow control of the House.
The fact that Harris stated in an interview this week that she wouldn’t have done anything substantially different than Biden had she been president the past four years is exceptionally telling. Barack Obama giving a fiery speech accusing Black men who don’t embrace Harris of being sexist offers another important clue. So is Harris accepting the endorsement of Dick Cheney, of all people.
People, you want to neuter a pro-democracy message? Buddy up with one of the architects of the Iraq War.
Democratic party elders have access to better polls than the public, and they know full well that Harris is in deep trouble by most metrics. They are positioning themselves for the aftermath of defeat like traders with access to inside information shorting a soon-to-be toxic stock. Each is working to preemptively lay the blame on opposing interests within the party.
Obama’s sexism rhetoric isn’t truly directed at men. Shame and scolding never turned out anybody who wasn’t showing up to back you already. Obama isn’t stupid, and he’s not wasting precious attention at a critical moment in a campaign without purpose. He’s protecting the brand that he’s invested so much in.
This rhetoric is a naked attempt to convince donors and volunteers to direct their rage after November away from a Democratic Party establishment that keeps failing miserably. Sexism is real, but when it comes to politics it’s a thin excuse deployed to handwave away incompetent hacks like Hillary Clinton when they lose to someone like Trump. Donor dollars must keep on flowing whatever the cost.
So, what was Harris doing by claiming that she’d have done nothing substantially different than Biden did? Keeping her dimming future political prospects alive by insisting that she was a good soldier to the bitter end, never betraying her boss. That will render her failure his as well as the party’s, not any defect in her personal brand. Sexism is a tougher excuse for her to claim, because actual sexists can always say that she’s just playing the gender card.
Yes, the rules are ridiculous, but so are the ones that decide whether Ukrainian soldiers live or die every day, whatever their identity. They fight on anyway. You achieve victory on the battlefield you wind up stuck in. Huh, that’s not a bad tag line for the Bringing Ragnarok saga.
The future of American politics seems pretty clear at this point: if Trump wins, the Democrats will talk a big game about Resistance! but ultimately go along with most of what Trump does, hoping that in 2028 they’ll get to take on a weak opponent in Vance. The loose talk about democracy being on the ballot will continue, the date of final reckoning simply pushed out a few more years.
Look, does anyone really believe that leading Democrats would stand up and fight if the Trump police state fantasies many indulge in ever became real? Yet once you pull that trigger once, rhetoric-wise, there’s no going back. You either act as if the danger to the Constitution is meaningful, or give up any hope of mobilizing people down the line when a determined fascist does appear.
On the other hand, if a surprise shift in turnout favoring the Democrats - which is absolutely possible, just not expected in the current political climate - gives Harris a surprise win, Trump’s voters are primed and ready to reject the result. It’ll be 2020 all over again. Then we get to see how committed to winning through pseudo-legal shenanigans or even violence they truly are.
As far as Ukraine goes, the main impact of Trump’s return will be that the onus is permanently on Ukraine to prove it deserves every shred of further support. Zelensky will probably have to make a show of negotiations with Putin, trusting Moscow to humiliate Trump and provoke increased aid supplies after talks fail.
However, the people surrounding Trump this time around appear to have a vision of foreign affairs focused on advancing Israel’s agenda in the Middle East. Most of the neoconservatives who vocally backed Ukraine in 2022 are already turning towards their white whale, China.
Fortunately, European leaders appear to be coming to the hard but necessary conclusion that the USA is no longer a reliable partner. NATO is going to have to transition to being a pan-European defense force more closely bound to the EU than the USA. America will remain a member to wield influence, but constantly try to pull Europe towards conflict with China while demanding fealty to Israel’s self-defeating actions in the Middle East.
Speaking of, if you pay close attention to the shift in American rhetoric about Israel’s operations, something rather alarming has happened. No longer is anyone talking seriously about a ceasefire or even restraint. Instead, American media outlets and pundits with close ties to the defense-security complex are talking up open conflict with Iran and fixing Lebanon’s long-lasting political crisis in the wake of an Israel invasion to root out Hezbollah.
Israel is presently repeating its pattern from 2006, killing thousands of civilians in an overt bid to punish the population for not rising up against Hezbollah. Israel’s rhetoric of late is almost American in its blatant attempt to blame Lebanese victims for deliberate choices Israel is making that defy all the supposed international laws - including shooting at United Nations peacekeepers.
Meanwhile, Hezbollah has reconstituted enough of its leadership to slowly escalate rocket, drone, and missile attacks deep into Israel. On the ground, ferocious fighting is taking place along the border, where the IDF is having to proceed with extreme care, suffering fairly serious casualties just to clear some border villages.
Hamas continues to wage a classic guerilla fight in Gaza, launching hit and run attacks on Israeli troops fighting in the ruins and sending sporadic rocket strikes into Israel. Nearly a hundred hostages are still held by Hamas, Israel’s leaders apparently satisfied to sacrifice them instead of admitting their strategy in Gaza has largely backfired. The IDF remains unable to free the hostages despite its vaunted US-backed military might, which may partly explain the total disregard for civilians. Shades of the US missing Bin Laden in Afghanistan then rushing to Iraq, anyone?
Into this mess the US is sending one of its few THAAD batteries, an advanced air defense system that can knock down ballistic missiles. Ukraine would dearly love one. No doubt this is giving Israel an excuse to further delay its impending revenge attack on Iran, something it needs to figure out how to do without getting hundreds of Israelis killed and suffering billions in economic losses.
Iran’s bombardment at the beginning of October demonstrated the limits of Israel’s missile defense shield. An additional 48 THAAD interceptors ready to fire only means that instead of 180 missiles Iran will have to send 250 or so to achieve the same effect - a fraction will explode mid-flight, so best to send a few extras.
With at least several thousand missiles capable of reaching Israel and even more drones, Iran can overwhelm Israel’s defenses and inflict serious damage. As Tehran has promised that its next strike will be much bigger if Israel responds to the last one, Israel has to weigh the costs and proceed carefully.
Between the need to move forces - possibly submarines carrying cruise missiles - into position, get whatever additional US defenses it can, and making preparations to conduct intensive aviation operations during an extended barrage, small wonder that Israel still hasn’t moved as of Monday afternoon, Pacific time. Covert operations would be preferable, but Iran might feel compelled to lash out anyway, given the trajectory of Israeli rhetoric leading down a path that looks dangerously like a bid for regime change in Tehran. I’ve got no love for the mullahs, but does anyone really believe this will work?
Israel’s best strategic option remains a full ceasefire on all fronts and exchange of hostages for prisoners. But that’s not what serves Netanyahu’s interests, and Israel’s democratic institutions can’t solve the core Principle-Agent problem of it all. My standing expectation is a series of exchanges and substantial damage to oil infrastructure while Israel gets bogged down occupying both Gaza and southern Lebanon.
As far as the Pacific goes, it’s no shock that China chose now to execute another brief demonstration of its ability to isolate Taiwan. Sure, Taiwan’s president made some remarks about autonomy, but China can usually ignore that.
What Beijing can’t ignore is the US remaining so preoccupied with defending Israel from the natural consequences of Israeli policy that the Western Pacific is devoid of carrier battle groups. No, Marine carriers don’t count even if they carry a few F-35s now. And neither does Italy’s Cavour - I’m all for training, folks, but can you head up to the Norwegian Sea instead? There are some ruscist subs I’d like NATO to keep a close eye on, maybe even accidentally drop a live torpedo on…
Anyway, China is by no means ready for a war, but it doesn’t have to be if it knows the USA won’t wage one itself. American strength in this regard is not demonstrated by sailing a few ships through the Taiwan Strait now and again, but keeping a high quality standing force able to reach the coast of Taiwan that demonstrates the capability and will to do so during these Chinese exercises. Otherwise, one of these days they’ll morph into something more.
The single thread of continuity connecting geopolitics everywhere right now is the awareness that American leaders are all talk. When push comes to shove, the impression is that for all their public rhetoric, American leaders are too afraid of an uncertain future to do anything that might actually prevent the collapse of the world they knew.
But in a way, that’s good news: the global balance of power is resetting back towards something physical and measurable. And Europe isn’t sitting on the sidelines waiting for America to act any more. European companies have recognized the immense future competitive advantage of investing heavily in Ukraine, a country which will emerge from this war highly experienced and in possession of vital knowledge about how to fight in the Network Age.
It won’t be American companies that benefit from a combination of ruggedness and affordability brought by relatively inexpensive Ukrainian labor. European defense institutions might be hollowed out by lack of investment, but they’re far from dead because Europe retains more of a manufacturing base than the USA. Europe has been painfully slow in retooling for expanded military production, but investments are finally starting to pay off.
When you couple the potential of Europe and East Asia, you’ve got the makings of a powerful globe-spanning democratic alliance. Decisions won’t be made quickly and politicians will remain moronic everywhere, but freed from the navel-gazing mode of cultural imperialism that infects the American oligarchy, this grouping will be flexible enough to serve. It might actually cope with global challenges in a systematic way, treating the world community as the ecosystem it is.
Here’s hoping, anyway. At the very least, enough of Europe seems aware of how dangerous Putin’s ruscist project and stands with Ukraine to repel the Muscovite assault. Putin’s dream of isolating the USA from Europe might become reality, but it won’t do him any good. For decades now, it’s been America that’s held the rest of the democratic world back. Change will be good for everyone in the long run. It’s how adaptation happens.
Concluding Thoughts
The Ukraine War is the true hinge point that will determine the shape of global power politics for a generation. After World War Two, the world entered a unique moment where truly universal values like freedom and basic rights might have defined international relations. This chance was callously squandered; now hopes for a better world system depend on powering Ukraine to victory.
If this does not happen, if the necessary steps are not taken by the middle of 2025, the next decade or two looks to be very, very violent. On the other side the world will face a long period of reconstruction at the same time a much warmer climate is attacking the very foundations of the global economy. That future leads to stagnation and another, even worse round of wars.
Alternatively, Ukraine’s triumph over a much larger power that’s fighting to be a dominant player in a vicious global oligarchy leads to a very different future. In it, powerful countries are wary of getting sucked into major wars and deeply reluctant to occupy a region inhabited by people who will fight to remain free. This is a world where networks of countries, cities, and alliances forge common cause to ensure collective security and prosperity in their region. It is not conflict-free, but the era of total wars is a relic of the past, no population willing to let itself be dragged into futile fights over empire.
There are no utopian solutions in the real world. But universal values like the integrity of borders and respecting laws of humane warfare can take root deep enough to make a real difference.
To witness what the future looks like if Ukraine is not victorious, look no further than the cold-blooded murder of nine Ukrainian soldiers captured by orcs of the 155th Naval Infantry Brigade. Captured on camera in a tree line south of Zelyonyi Shlyakh, this pointless atrocity is just one more added to that dismal unit’s many crimes. Giving the Waffen-SS a run for its money is not a legacy to aspire to, and there must be consequences.
So: dear Kyrlyo Budanov, Head of Ukraine’s Intelligence Directorate. Please cease all commando operations. They appear to risk too many good people anyway.
Instead, focus efforts on publicly identifying all survivors of 155NIB. Publish their names, hack and release their data, and pay assassins to hunt all officers down and inflict justice. For that damned unit, there should be only one way out: death or surrender. These are the only forms of redemption available for these orcs.
The misery of global power conflict is bad enough without creating conditions that transform even the simplest of human relationships into a monstrosity. Killing or torturing prisoners is always wrong, flat out. It’s a sign of degradation that demands a vicious response. Sometimes, the only way to restore a semblance of order in this life is to demonstrate what happens when basic rules held sacred by the vast majority are ignored.
If it can’t hurt anyone, leave it be. Those who refuse to adopt this simple ethic are the true enemies of everyone. That this behavior is not isolated offers the clearest evidence anyone should need of why Putin must be destroyed. At a certain point, fear of nuclear escalation becomes nothing more than a callous excuse to send less fortunate people to die.
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