"Foreign Affairs": Ukraine will not win the war on Russia. The West must change its strategy and wait for Putin to die

pch24.pl 10 months ago

The West will not win the war in Ukraine. alternatively of relying on Vladimir Putin to surrender to Russia for advanced costs, the only solution is to wait until the Russian leader disappears from the Kremlin. This would entail limiting the fight and assistance to Ukraine to a level that would let the current Ukrainian positions to be maintained and the continued sanctions against Moscow," suggests Peter Schroeder in abroad Affairs magazine.

Analyst of the U.S. intelligence agency CIA, erstwhile Deputy National Intelligence Officer for Russia and Eurasia from 2018 to 2022 at the National Intelligence Council, elder discipline Officer Center for a fresh American Security, there is no uncertainty that Ukraine's current actions and supporting allies – raising the cost of war for Russia – have not brought and will not bring the desired effect in the form of a change in the reasoning of the Russian leader.

Therefore, in an article entitled "The West Can’t Change His Calculus – It Can Only Wait Him Out" published on the September 3 website of the influential magazine "Foreign Affairs", he advocates to importantly reduce the level of assistance provided to Kiev and ... wait until Putin dies.

It indicates that the US strategy so far does not make sense. “Two and a half years after Russia invaded Ukraine,” he writes, the United States strategy on ending the war remains the same: to impose adequate costs on Russia so that its president Vladimir Putin decides there is no another way but to halt the conflict. In order to change the cost-benefit account, Washington attempted to find a golden means between supporting Ukraine and punishing Russia on the 1 hand, and reducing the hazard of escalation on the other. Although specified an approach may seem rational, it is based on the incorrect assumption: that Putin's conviction can be changed," we read.

The author claims that the ‘proof’ suggests that the Russian leader will not give up. He considered the issue of "preventing Ukraine to become a bastion which the West could usage to endanger Russia" as a "strategic necessity" and "take individual work for achieving this goal".

Moreover, he most likely even believes that the fight for this is worth almost any price. Hence, "the effort to force him to surrender is simply a fruitless exercise that simply wastes life and resources."

So what should be done in this situation? According to Schroeder, we gotta wait until Putin dies. In order to reduce the fight, the number of casualties and the amount of resources spent to aid Ukrainians, aid should be calculated so that Ukrainians keep their existing positions and hold sanctions against Russia until Putin's death or leaving office. Only then – in his opinion – will there be a chance for lasting peace in Ukraine.

When the author examined the situation of war beyond our east border, he emphasized that erstwhile Putin ordered the invasion, it was a “Russian war of choice”. The Russians did not face any greater threat to their safety. The war in Ukraine is simply a clear choice for Putin. fewer among the Russian elite knew what was going on. Both William Burns, CIA manager and Eric Green, then elder manager of the National safety Council for Russia indicated that Russian officials seemed unaware of Putin's decision. However, erstwhile the invasion of Ukraine took place, the elite yet stood behind their leader.

“Because it is simply a war of choice, Putin has the power to halt it. Realizing that the game proved more hard than expected, he could have chosen to reduce losses" we read. But he didn't.

The Americans mistakenly assumed that Putin was an opportunist and that the pressure, broad economical sanctions, military aid to Ukraine, intelligence support and isolation of Moscow internationally would bring the desired results.

Meanwhile, Putin is not an opportunist, at least on Ukraine. The analyst suggests that “after Russia took Crimea in March and April 2014, the Ukrainian government was devastated. But alternatively of aggressively acting to take over the extra territory, Putin decided to launch a tiny rebellion in east Ukraine, which could service as a bargaining card to limit Kiev's abroad policy options. In September 2014, after the Russian troops defeated Ukrainian forces in the city of Ilovajsk, Moscow was likely to decision further along the coast of the Azov Sea, forming a land corridor from Crimea to Russia. However, Putin alternatively decided on a political solution, agreeing to the Minsk Protocol. Even after U.S. president Donald Trump took office erstwhile it became clear that Washington was not willing to aid Kiev, Putin continued to refrain from starting a wider military attack or making any another effort to grow Russian influences in Ukraine. specified wasted opportunities do not fit Putin's view as a master of opportunisticism," suggests a CIA analyst.

"Instead of an opportunistic aggressive war, the attack on Ukraine is better seen as an unfair preventive war launched to halt what Putin considered a future threat to Russia's security".

The Russian leader felt that Ukraine's drift towards the West should be prevented and its transition to anti-Russian, as it could be utilized by the West to undermine Russia's interior cohesion and adopt NATO forces that would endanger the Russian Federation itself.

The American intelligence community, specified as Avril Haines, manager of national intelligence, was well aware of this. Schroeder considers that Putin made a "strategic decision" on Ukraine, which he does not intend to retreat from, as indicated by the magnitude of the Russian forces involved, as opposed to another interventions, erstwhile he tried to change the global trade in cases, for example in Syria or Venezuela.

"The fact that war is so different from Putin's average hazard account suggests that he made a strategical decision regarding Ukraine, which he does not want to retreat from. His decision to send most of the Russian army to Ukraine in 2022 and then mobilize more forces erstwhile the first attack failed shows that he considers the war besides crucial to lose. And despite all the costs of its decision to invade Putin, it is likely that the cost of idleness would be higher, namely that Russia would not be able to prevent the emergence of Ukraine allied with the West, which could service as a trampoline to a colorful revolution against Russia itself’.

Given this, it is virtually unrealistic for Western force to force the Kremlin decision-maker to change his head and end the war on conditions acceptable to Kiev and Washington.

The analyst suggests that the war in Ukraine can end in 2 ways: either Russia will lose the anticipation of continuing the war campaign, or Putin will cease to be in power. And since the first solution is unrealistic – it would be essential to supply Ukraine with immense amounts of ammunition, which the United States is planning to increase only from next year, and even this is not adequate to meet the requirements on the battlefield, not to mention air defense, or send another batch of soldiers to the front – there is nothing left but to wait until Putin resigns or dies.

Washington, however, should aid Kiev to keep its current position and prevent further Russian military progress. He should proceed to impose economical and diplomatic costs on Moscow, but not anticipate them to have much impact.

Washington should besides save its own resources so as not to waste them on major offensives in Ukraine, as they do not have much impact on the overall course of the conflict. It's just a war to destruct without a breakthrough.

However, diplomats should search a ceasefire to spare life and property in Ukraine. Following Putin's death, America should present a ready-made European safety framework plan that will alleviate military tensions, reduce the hazard of conflict and offer a imagination to be accepted by the fresh Russian leaders in Moscow.

Analyst points out that the request for "a courageous leadership, firm diplomacy and readiness to compromise – in Moscow, Kiev, Brussels and Washington".

Source: foreignaffairs.com

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