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Ukraine army helicopters flying over Kyiv. Photo Credit: Oleg V. Belyakov, Wikimedia Commons.
On February 24, Russia invaded Ukraine for the second time in eight years. While many assumed that the war would be short, a stiff Ukrainian defense halted and then successfully counter-attacked against the Russian advances on Kyiv, Sumy, and Kharkiv. After capturing Kherson, Russia’s main advance from occupied Crimea in the south toward Mykolaiv also stalled. At the time of writing, Ukrainian forces are beginning a counterattack in that region and are located approximately 12 miles outside Kherson city center.
Mariupol, on the Sea of Azov coastline, fell to the Russians on May 22 after Ukrainian forces made a heroic last stand in the Azovstal iron and steel works. This capture allowed Russia to create a land bridge from the Russian Federation to occupied Crimea. Mariupol’s capture also turned the Sea of Azov into a Russian lake.1 In the Donbas, which is arguably Russia’s main effort at this stage of the war, Russian troops have made limited advances at a very high cost in equipment and manpower. In late June, Russian forces capturedSievierodonetsk after weeks of heavy fighting, leaving Russia in control of Ukraine’s Luhansk Oblast.
Ukrainians are currently defending a front line that is approximately 1,250 miles long—this is equal to the straight-line distance from Washington, DC, to Houston, Texas. Russian public opinion still supports the war.2 While Russia’s advancements in the Donbas have been slow and costly, there is no indication that Moscow will stop its offensive anytime soon. President Vladimir Putin knows that his legacy rides on Russia’s victory or defeat in Ukraine.
After almost five months of fighting, two things are clear. First, Russia is not meeting its intended military objectives that it planned to achieve by this point in the campaign. Yet Moscow also has no plans to give up. Second, this war will be long and measured by years, not months. Policymakers in the West must start preparing to support Ukraine for the long term.
Ukraine is in a national struggle that will determine its geopolitical future: the county will either be a firm member of the Euro-Atlantic community or become a Russian colony. The outcome of this struggle will have long-term implications for the transatlantic community and the notion of national sovereignty in the twenty-first century.
Ukraine represents the European idea that each country has the sovereign ability to determine its path, choose its leaders, and decide with whom it has relations. No outside actor (in this case, Russia) should have a veto on a country’s membership or closer relationship with organizations like the European Union or North Atlantic Treaty Organization. In many ways, the war in the Donbas will decide the future viability of this idea and the transatlantic community.
It is in America’s interest that Ukraine remains independent and sovereign and that Kyiv can choose its destiny without outside interference. The implications of the war’s outcome for America are not limited to Europe:
Russia is a top geopolitical adversary for the US. For Americans who believe in strong and secure national borders, the primacy of national sovereignty, and the right to self- defense, support for Ukraine in the face of Russian aggression is natural. Considering America’s other geopolitical concerns like a rising China, a healthy economic relationship with Europe that benefits the American worker, and instability in the MENA region, US support for Ukraine is an imperative.
During the early days of the war, Russia pursued a strategy that tried to rapidly capture Ukraine’s major cities while decapitating and replacing Volodymyr Zelinskyy’s government.7 After the original strategy failed, the conflict transitioned into a war of attrition.
No American president or policymaker can define “winning” for Ukraine. As the ones paying a high price in life and limb, Ukrainians are the only ones who should be able to define what winning the war against Russia means. However, for as long as Ukrainians are willing to defend their homeland, US policymakers’ baseline planning assumption for “winning” should be the full restoration of Ukraine’s territorial integrity and the preservation of Ukrainian sovereignty inside its internationally recognized borders, which includes Crimea. Until the Ukrainian government states otherwise, this is the definition of “winning” that the US and its allies should use for developing a strategy to help Ukraine fight Russia.
Policymakers need to understand that the war in Ukraine will last years, and they need to start planning accordingly. To date, US and allied support to Ukraine has had a major impact on the fighting, but more needs to be done. The US should:
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine serves as a reminder that there is no greater motivation to take up arms than to defend one’s homeland. The Ukrainians have proven to be brave and capable fighters. Ukrainian ingenuity on the battlefield has been unparalleled in recent military history.
Ukrainians are not asking for, nor do they want, US troops to help them fight Russia. All they ask for is the equipment, weapons, munitions, and financial resources required to give them a fighting chance. Providing Ukraine what they need to fight Russia effectively will not be cheap. However, the costs that American taxpayers incur to help Ukraine is money well spent and will pale in comparison to the cost of deterring a victorious Russia and an emboldened China on the global stage.
If steps are taken now, Ukraine will be better prepared for a longer conflict that will lead to a Ukrainian victory and a more stable transatlantic community. Now is not a time for dithering. It is a time for decisiveness.
*About the author: Luke Coffey is a senior fellow at Hudson Institute. His work at Hudson analyzes national security and foreign policy, with a focus on Europe, Eurasia, NATO, and transatlantic relations. Mr. Coffey was previously director of the Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies at the Heritage Foundation from 2015 to 2022, in which role he oversaw and managed a team covering most of Heritage’s foreign policy and international affairs work. From 2012 to 2015, he was the Margaret Thatcher fellow at Heritage, focusing on relations between the United States and the United Kingdom and on the role of NATO and the European Union in transatlantic and Eurasian security.
Source: This article was published by the Hudson Institute (PDF)
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