With accelerating Russian gains in Donbass and the implied political shift accompanying Trump into office next month there is an equivalent increase in speculation about how much longer the war will last. That is a tough question so let’s quickly review what happened from the start of the SMO.
First off, it is fair to say that the post-Maidan regime has sharper teeth and far more public support than most people on either side of the ocean anticipated in Winter 2021.
Remember how the Kurdish nationalists in Washington assured the Bush administration that Iraqis would greet American troops as liberators? Or remember how Soviet expats assured the Biden administration that Putin would be overthrown if Russians lost their OnlyFans accounts? Well, in hindsight I think something similar happened in Russia.
Ukrainians in Russia usually don’t like the Ukrainian government, obviously. If they did like it they wouldn’t have left. You could talk to a hundred Ukrainians in Moscow and come to the conclusion “Wow, the Ukrainian government isn’t very popular.” But a Ukrainian in Moscow might have a different attitude than a Ukrainian in Kiev or Lvov. Oops.
Okay, so no immediate collapse. If a regime doesn’t immediately collapse under pressure, then that means it probably won’t collapse later either. Collapsing means defeat, and despite what trolls in echo chambers say, most humans don’t deliberately defeat themselves.
Any person with common sense knows that overthrowing his government will generally cause chaos and military defeat, so is most likely going to bite his tongue until the war is over. This principle is true for both Ukraine and Russia. Someone who hates Zelensky or Putin but isn’t an outright traitor just hides his grievances and waits for a more appropriate time to spread dissent.
Some of my readers who have made it this far are probably thinking “But if the Ukrainian nation and state are being destroyed wouldn’t a patriot want to force the government to surrender?” Yes, but also no.
Think of Germany in 1918 when they surrendered. Their situation was vaguely similar to Ukraine now. Germany still held significant amounts of territory in France and Belgium. Likewise, Ukraine still holds territory in the rebellious provinces and even some villages in Kursk region. The pro-Ukraine crowd loudly claims this territory serves as a “bargaining chip” against Russia.
Looking at WWI, this argument is obviously nonsense because in 1918 no one cared that Germany still technically held French territory. No one granted Germany more generous terms and certainly did not suggest that the Germans could keep that territory. War isn’t a game of “finders, keepers.” If you lose, then you have to give back whatever you took. That is why it is called losing.
Of course this was the logical thing to do. It was better for the Germans to surrender in France rather than get German territory destroyed and surrender anyway. But the humiliation of preemptive surrender apparently felt worse than just fighting to the bitter end.
So the second time around, Germans fought all the way to the bitter end until there was literally nothing and no one left to fight with.
In general, I consider the often-repeated trope of “will to fight” to be nonsense. Nation states continue fighting while they have the means to fight, and when they no longer have such means they stop fighting. I’m not saying will to fight doesn’t matter but its importance is overrated, and does not overrule means to fight. An army with guns will always eventually beat an army with sharpened sticks, even if the guys with sticks have more will to fight.
“Will to fight” enthusiasts wag their fingers at France in 1940. Well, what about it? France fought extremely bitter and high-casualty wars both before and after WWII, so calling them “cheese eating surrender monkeys” is stupid and intellectually lazy. The much more likely and logical explanation for ineffective French resistance was that France and Germany shared a common enemy, the Soviets. Letting Hitler bully his way into the chief executive position of the “rules based world order” was preferable to suffering millions of casualties fighting him and making both nations weaker for the upcoming showdown with the “Russian menace.”
Churchill refused to negotiate with Hitler not because the British had more “will to fight” than the French. This is nonsense. He refused to negotiate because he viewed Nazi Germany as a more serious threat than the Soviet Union. If Churchill felt the Soviets were the worse threat, then of course he would have struck a deal and there was no logical reason for him not to except what I just stated. Churchill believed a temporary alliance with the Soviet Union against Nazi Germany was preferable to the reverse option.
The reason why he felt this way I think is very simple. Subordinating the glorious British Empire to German leadership was politically worse than negotiating with Russian commies. And note that Churchill was a bit of an outlier in this conclusion. There is a reason fascist propaganda of the time depicted Brits as untrustworthy соmmiе-sympathizing, jеw-loving coniving. From an ideological standpoint, a pure-hearted 1940s fascist has every reason to be enraged at this vile English treachery!
Map of Europe in the eyes of a fascist. All of civilized Europe is united against the Bolshevik menace, except for the traitorous and greedy Englishman. Note the helpless Ukrainian and Baltic nationalists.
So throw away thoughts of “will to fight.” In 1940 there was the West, the Axis, and the Soviet Union. In 2024 there is NATO (merging the western allies and defeated axis powers into one entity), Russia, and China (replacing 1980s Japan as the big scary yellow menace of the East). The choice that the incoming US president has to make is if he wants to double down on attacking Russia, or pivot against China. The USA could at least hypothetically out muscle Russia or China, but absolutely and positively not both at once. If he wants to bully China, then he must broker a truce with Russia. End of story, case closed.
All that said, there are signs that Ukrainian means to fight ar possibly depleting.
Regarding prisoners. Traditionally this is the best indicator of an army near its breaking point. Ukrainian (and Russian) surrender rates are a tiny fraction of the losses, but I argue that this isn’t a good metric. If a soldier on the Donbass front doesn’t want to fight anymore and isn’t surrounded then surrendering is usually unnecessary. He can just retreat without orders. He can also completely desert.
Ukrainian desertion rates are getting so high even the western media acknowledges it. If the dersertion rate continues to accelerate at its current pace, then within 12 months Ukraine will simply not have an army. Technically they might, but any kind of offensive operations will be impossible.
The most common metric for winning or losing is territorial change. As I have repeatedly argued before, this is the most kinetic and fast-paced war in history. So fast, there is rarely any significant territorial change one way or the other. However, it still needs attention.
Commentators, particularly westerners, love to compare the Ukraine conflict with WWI. Most people who compare these two wars don’t understand either. The fighting in Ukraine certainly is not static but WWI wasn’t either. WWI advances were so grinding for the exact reason that military technology had evolved so rapidly. If the Germans captured a trenchline, the French could bring in another 10 thousand men, fire a thousand artillery shells, and recapture the trench. Then the Germans would bring in another 10 thousand men, fire a thousand artillery shells, and take the trench again. This wasn’t a war being stagnant or primitive but the literal complete opposite. This was a level of technology, communication and logistics never seen before in human history. The same applies to Ukraine. Nothing like this has ever happened before.
So now that Russian advances are accelerating, we can conclude that their advantages have grown enormous enough to push back Ukrainian defenders. If the UAF were just deliberately abandoning territory to conserve their forces and resettle in stronger positions, like the Russians have done several times before, that would be one thing. But that is not what’s happening. The UAF are trying to cling to every inch of dirt, but the troops are being killed or running away too fast and they lose ground anyway. That is not a good sign.
Another not good sign is posturing about the conscription age. Pro-Russian sources have been claiming for at least a year that the USA is pressuring Ukraine to lower the conscription age all the way to 18. Western media has always vehemently denied these rumors as Russian propaganda. But now the western media themselves are admitting it is true. Why and why now? I think it’s obvious. The US backers showed their hand and it is the Trump card of blackmail. NATO is officially demanding that Ukraine grab the last few men who haven’t been killed yet and ship them to the front. If Ukraine refuses, then that proves they are unserious about beating Russia and deserve to lose.
If Ukraine doesn’t budge, I predict that within the next six months there will be western news stories openly condemning Ukrainians for not having “will to fight” and they don’t deserve western help. Then the war is truly over. NATO can back out and it will be the fault of those weak Ukrainians not having enough resolve.
There are stories circulating on Russian media that the amount of intelligence leaks from the UAF have increased by a lot. I consider these stories unsubstantiated, but likely.
So in conclusion, Ukraine still has a lot of fight left, but their reserves of blood are not infinite. If NATO keeps giving them sufficient arms and financial stimulus to keep fighting, they likely will until so many Ukrainian men are dead they just can’t hold on anymore and there is a general collapse.
Ian Kummer
Support my work by making a contribution through Boosty
All text in Reading Junkie posts are free to share or republish without permission, and I highly encourage my fellow bloggers to do so. Please be courteous and link back to the original.
I now have a new YouTube channel that I will use to upload videos from my travels around Russia. Expect new content there soon. Please give me a follow here.
Also feel free to connect with me on Quora (I sometimes share unique articles there).
A sober, sad but true assessment.