No Lasting Global Security Unless Russia Is Defeated

No lasting peace in Europe, or in the world at large, is possible unless Russia is defeated in the ongoing war in Ukraine, say Ukrainians. The world should listen to them.

When Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Moscow expected to take Kyiv in three days. The world expected the nation of Ukraine to collapse in a few weeks; everyone anticipated Ukrainians would be swiftly defeated by the mighty Russian army.

Two years and seven months later, Ukraine remains vibrant and strong, with a functioning state and its institutions intact. Only last month its military conducted a successful incursion into Russian territory in the Kursk region, exposing Putin’s incompetence and weakness, and it continues to attack targets such as oil refineries and ammunition warehouses deep inside Russia.

The predicament, however, is that the collective West is not taking Russia’s global security threat seriously enough and is not moving fast enough to provide the necessary political and military backing for Ukraine to win this fight.

“Regrettably, there are still illusions in the world that you can talk to Moscow or draw some red lines due to which Moscow will, with time, become milder or inclined to reconciliation,” Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said at the 20th Yalta European Strategy (YES) conference in Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, on Sept. 13.

The YES conference, originated twenty years ago by Ukrainian businessman and philanthropist Victor Pinchuk to explore “Ukraine’s European future” with world leaders, was initially held at Livadia Palace, a former summer residence of the Russian czar near the Black Sea resort town of Yalta on the Crimean Peninsula, where in 1945 Winston Churchill, Joseph Stalin and Franklin Roosevelt came together for the original Yalta Conference that decided the fate of post-war Europe. The YES conference migrated to Kyiv following Russia’s occupation of Crimea in 2014.

This year’s gathering, organized in partnership with the Victor Pinchuk Foundation, brought together some 700 diplomats, business leaders, Ukrainian military representatives, and other important decision makers and supporters of Ukraine from more than 30 countries.

They seemed united in a common purpose: to bridge the gap between the West’s approach to the war and the needs of Ukraine and its civilian population, which is under persistent, deadly missile attacks by Russia, and its military, fighting nonstop on the frontlines.

“The West understands what it means if Ukraine loses, but there is a disconnect between what is understood and what is done,’’ said Pinchuk addressing the audience, gathered for the third year in a basement that could serve as a bomb shelter in case of a Russian missile attack.

“If Russia succeeds in Ukraine, [then] China, North Korea, and Iran are more likely to do something against Taiwan, South Korea, and Israel. All the world will be drawn into the war,” said Pinchuk.

Some western supporters of Ukraine, such as Michael Pompeo, the United States’ 70th Secretary of State and CIA director, says Ukraine is central to American and European security, and that Russia should be defeated in this war. During discussion with CNN’s Fareed Zakharia at the YES forum, Pompeo noted that “victory for Europe and Ukraine, and Russia’s defeat matters economically as well.”

While there have been some positive developments such as the Kursk incursion into Russian territory, Ukraine (largely) holding the front lines, continuous aid from the U.S. and other allies, and military training for Ukrainian troops, Ukrainians see things on a more granular level.

“The situation is difficult and sad,” said Taras Chmut, a Ukrainian sergeant and military analyst who heads Come Back Alive, a non-profit supporting Ukraine’s servicemembers. “We continue to lose in the Donetsk area, we partially lost our position in Kherson area — the control over the Dnipro [river]. We lost some positions in Kursk and hold the front in Kharkiv. We don’t have enough people, or long-range weapons, or armored vehicles.”

Despite the government’s mobilization efforts, Ukraine doesn’t have enough troops that are prepared to fight, he said. According to him and several people who personally visited the frontlines in recent days, the number of troops is less than half of what’s needed for successful fighting.

“I see that there is a lack of understanding of the war outside Ukraine,” said Stanislav Aseyev, a Ukrainian writer and servicemember. “Everything that is obvious to Ukrainians is absolutely not obvious in the West.”

As some western politicians echo Putin’s rhetoric about aceasefire along current front lines, that would essentially freezethe war, Ukrainians know this wouldn’t be a lasting solution. Russia won’t comply with any agreement, unless defeated. A ceasefire would only give Putin time to regroup and renew his attacks: not only on Ukraine, but elsewhere as well to disrupt the world order.

Most importantly, a potential ceasefire won’t be a just peace for Ukrainians, who not only lost thousands of troops on the battlefield, but have also endured numerous atrocities and genocide, with the mass graves of hundreds of Ukrainian civilians, killed and tortured by Russian forces, left behind in the formerly occupied territories.

Edited by Karina L. Tahiliani