The US will host this year’s NATO summit in Washington DC from July 9 to July 11. Thirty-two allies will meet at the Capitol — coming 75 years after 12 countries first signed the North Atlantic Treaty there. J. David Ake/Getty Images

Odesa
—
As Washington prepares to welcome world leaders for a landmark summit commemorating 75 years of NATO, some 5,000 miles away I was having a heart wrenching dinner conversation.

“My dreams have been shattered,” a Ukrainian friend, Inna Ivanova, told me at a restaurant tucked away in an obscure corner of Odesa.

A former resident of this southern Ukrainian port city, Inna was visiting family during a break from her job as an accountant in Germany.

Up until Russia’s full-scale invasion two years ago, Inna was studying drama with hopes of becoming an actress. But with the frequent air raid sirens and electricity outages, like millions of other Ukrainians, Inna opted for a calmer life elsewhere.

Her turmoil, however, continues.

This week, 32 NATO allies will be gathering in Washington, DC, amid what they rightly describe as “the most dangerous security environment since the Cold War.”

The overarching message from Ukrainians I’ve spoken to over the past few weeks, including Inna, is: “Help us stop this war — now.”

And indeed, catapulting Ukraine into a winning position should be the key goal of the Washington summit. Failing to push back Russian President Vladimir Putin, a man who only responds to brute force, will only prolong the war and make it more costly for Europe — especially if many thousands of Ukrainians, unable to heat their homes, seek asylum there this winter.

The question on everyone’s lips

Looming over the summit will be the question of Ukraine’s desperately sought NATO membership.

Former Vice-Prime Minister for the European and Euro-Atlantic Integration of Ukraine Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze told me that if NATO leaders pass up the opportunity to “signal the irreversibility of Ukraine’s membership … it will be a drastic mistake of the alliance.”

She added that it would be a much bigger mistake for the region and the world than the “mismanaged 2008 Bucharest NATO summit decision,” which opened the door for Ukraine and Georgia to join the alliance, but with no plan on how to get there. (Critics argued it essentially raised a red flag to Moscow regarding two former Soviet countries but without the benefit of NATO protection.)

Considering the moves already made by Brussels towards integrating Ukraine and providing it with more predictability, Kyiv could feel that it is pretty much part of the NATO family — save for the collective protection (known as Article 5) that full membership supposedly brings.

The Biden administration has talked about the idea of a “bridge” to NATO eventual membership for Ukraine, but the alliance has yet to offer Kyiv a concrete timeline. Nonetheless, NATO leaders could give themselves a pass to skirt the membership question by giving Kyiv drastically enhanced capability to repel Putin’s aggression, while still providing a solid roadmap for a seat at the alliance table.

The two faces of Ukraine

After more than two years of war, those of us who have stayed recognize newcomers or returnees such as Inna. With each passing air raid siren they anxiously scroll through Telegram channels to assess the threat (cruise missiles and ballistic missiles being the biggest).

But a brief stroll would present an Odesa that is opening up, looking less and less like a war zone. The port, the engine which powers the local economy as well as a crucial part of the global food supply chain, is back to pre-war levels of traffic. Visitors this summer will find the landmark Potemkin Stairs and many other prized attractions re-opened after the removal of military blockades.

But beneath the surface, the war is still undeniably taking its toll. Fewer men are visible on the streets; caught up in the war or hiding from the roving conscription squads trying to enlist them in it. The morale of soldiers, many of whom have served for more than two years with little time off, is in rough shape, those who visit them regularly, tell me. Military cemeteries in cities such as Lviv are bursting at the seams. And firms are struggling to keep operating amid a severe manpower shortage and power cuts.

A smouldering building in the southern Ukrainian port city of Odesa, following a Russian missile strike on June 24. Oleksandr Gimanov/AFP/Getty Images

Nationwide, including here in Odesa, attacks on critical infrastructure have been so brutal that much of Ukraine’s generating capacity has been destroyed — leading to outages of several hours a day. Ukrainian-Canadian Bohdan Chomiak, who lives in Kyiv, told me that “roughly speaking, more than half the day is without power.”

Some experts are predicting that by the time the first frost arrives later this year, parts of Ukraine could be down to less than four hours a day of power, creating the conditions for a humanitarian catastrophe.

To make matters worse, Russia has reportedly started to attack renewable energy installations such as solar and wind farms.

What’s next for Ukraine?

Let there be no mistake: The last thing Ukrainians want is for any of their countrymen to live a minute more than necessary under brutal Russian occupation. But I’ve seen a noticeable shift in the mood of ordinary people, with many telling me that they can’t take much more of a war that’s claimed the lives of tens of thousands of soldiers and at least 174 civilians in May alone.

Bitterness is building up too about the drip, drip, drip approach to providing aid to Ukraine. Had Kyiv been given everything it needed at the start of the war, the argument goes, Russia wouldn’t have been able to exploit the delays to seize more territory, build up defenses and repurpose old missiles to target Ukrainian cities.

Ukrainians are also realizing that their traditional alliances with Western capitals may not be so solid after voters turned towards far-right parties in the recent European elections. The agonizing five-month wait for US legislators to approve $61 billion in military and other aid for Kyiv should’ve been a signal for the Zelensky administration that they can also no longer bank on unrestricted American support.

Even more so with the prospect of a return of former US President Donald Trump who, in CNN’s presidential debate, made the outrageous claim that he would have the war “settled” before Inauguration Day — doubtfully in Ukraine’s favor.

Meanwhile in Washington

The forecasted record heat won’t be the only thing making NATO leaders in Washington break into a sweat.

Growing questions over President Joe Biden’s ability to govern, Trump’s strong showing in post-debate polls and the political uncertainty swirling around other alliance leaders in the fallout from the European elections, will make this summit feel more like a painful goodbye gathering than a celebration of NATO unity.

The clock to November’s US election is ticking — and loudly. NATO members now look certain to agree to Secretary General Jen Stoltenberg’s proposal to guarantee at least 40 billion euros in military support each year to Ukraine, “for as long as necessary” — an apparent effort to future-proof Ukraine funding from a Trump presidency.

Given the high stakes for Ukraine, people here will be watching developments in Washington closely. As one Ukrainian member of parliament, Kira Rudik, leader of the Golos Party, told me: “The best way of honoring Ukraine’s fight for freedom is to allow us to finally win this war.”

Source: CNN

See aftermath of biggest air attack on Ukraine since war began

Russia’s renewed campaign of missile and drone strikes against Ukrainian civilians has begun in earnest. The campaign was long expected — but even so, Ukraine’s Western backers appear to be repeating the same mistakes of last year in responding to it.

During last year’s winter assault on Ukraine’s heating and power infrastructure, intended to freeze the country into submission, Western support efforts focused on replacing that infrastructure — keeping the lights on in Ukraine, but also inevitably lining up more targets for Russia to attack.

This year, the emphasis is on supplies of air defense systems to better shield Ukraine’s skies.

But the problem with both of these approaches is that they are defensive and reactive, and do nothing to address the problem at source by stopping the strikes.

At the moment there are no downsides for Russia in continuing its attacks on Ukrainian residential areas and critical infrastructure. That’s because the West as a whole, and the US in particular, have decided that they can do nothing to influence Russian choices.

But just making Ukraine a more resilient punchbag is not a sustainable strategy. If they want fewer civilians to die, Kyiv’s Western backers have to realize they can take the initiative instead of watching helplessly.

In fact one of the most obscene and perverse elements of the war on Ukraine is the way in which Russia has been permitted by the global community to wage it. The world — and the West — has acquiesced in rules of the game dictated by Moscow, where Russia is afforded safe zones from which it can launch missile attacks against Ukrainian apartment buildings without concern for counter-strikes.

That acquiescence argues a failure of imagination and initiative, and a failure to step back and realize how absurd and bizarre it is that Russia can continue on this path of behaviour unchallenged by anybody but Ukraine.

It’s a mental paralysis rooted in an assumption that Russia is too big, too strong, too irrational or has too many nuclear weapons to be influenced. Russian state behavior seems to be treated as a natural phenomenon that must be observed helplessly, rather than the result of calculated decisions by leadership figures — whose calculations can be influenced by both incentives and deterrents.

Stopping the strikes doesn’t necessarily mean simply hitting back at the sources of the missile and drone attacks. That’s largely ruled out anyway given the US ban on using US-supplied weapons against Russia inside its own borders. But that doesn’t mean the West — with or without the US — has no leverage at all.

Some options for dissuading and deterring Russia from specific actions in Ukraine have been considered and rejected. These included a troop presence from NATO member states in Ukraine ahead of the invasion in order to prevent it — swiftly ruled out as implausible without US support.

But other Western decisions have been presented to Moscow as explicit choices. Back in December 2022, the UK told Russia it would supply Storm Shadow missiles to Ukraine if attacks on Ukrainian civilian infrastructure continued. Russia did continue, and now Storm Shadow has been a significant factor in the defeat of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet and holding Crimea at risk.

There is plenty more the West could do that Moscow would genuinely dislike. That could include promises of greater deliveries of high-profile weapons systems like combat aircraft or long-range missiles; or signaling more serious intent to seize Russian state assets frozen abroad as reparations for the damage done to Ukraine.

Linking the prospect of unpleasant outcomes to changes in Russian behavior would provide influence and leverage on Moscow — but this valuable opportunity seems almost never to be taken.

There is plenty more the West could do that Moscow would genuinely dislike.
Keir Giles

The Biden administration has consistently communicated its aspiration to support Ukraine. Sadly, it has also consistently and clearly communicated that it greatly fears a direct confrontation with Russia. This signaling has taken the place of any real efforts at deterring Moscow. President Joe Biden has claimed to “have Ukraine’s back” at the same time as emphasising the “flat assurance” from Ukraine that US-supplied weapons systems will not be used against Russia itself.

Throughout the war, although holding back on capabilities that would take the fight to Russia, the US has assisted Ukraine with weapons and materiel sufficient to allow it to hold back the invaders. Those supplies have been vital to Ukraine’s continued survival despite criticism of Washington’s hesitancy over specific weapons systems.

But now these flows too have been interdicted by elements of the US Congress determined to prioritise domestic political point-scoring over the future of the global system that underpins US prosperity. And Ukraine’s military leadership can’t make realistic plans while it remains unclear what military equipment will be available to implement them.

For all the disconnect between a timid White House, a recalcitrant Congress and a US military which by contrast remains fully focused on enabling Ukraine to evict the Russian invasion force, the evidence lies in the actions, not the words of the United States.

That evidence supports only one conclusion: the US political establishment has assessed that enabling Ukraine to defeat Russia is not in the broader strategic interest of the United States. That indicates an inability or unwillingness to recognize the dire consequences for the US and the West overall of Russian success.

There are disturbing parallels with the period leading up to the Second World War. Strong isolationist voices in the US argue that wars far away are of no concern at home. Others bicker over which challenge needs to be faced, as if there is a choice — with Russia and China now taking the place of 1930s Germany and Japan.

In the meantime, the US may have hoped that non-escalatory measures – like economic sanctions, and a cautious and incremental approach to arming Ukraine — would be sufficient to settle a strategic confrontation with Russia. If so, this has manifestly failed.

As so consistently throughout the conflict, the UK is at least saying the right thing and calling for Ukraine to be enabled to defeat Russia rather than merely survive. Europe too, shocked awake by the threat to US support, now says it aims to ramp up production of weapons to help Ukraine — welcome news, even if long overdue.

But that is not a substitute for a much deeper change of mindset on how to deal with Russia. And with the US out of the picture as the leader of a coalition of the unwilling, there is an opportunity for others to step up. Front-line states like Poland, acutely aware of the existential nature of the threat, can take a greater role in changing how the West as a whole understands the conflict — not just in open combat in Ukraine, but in the wider war Russia is waging on the global system that has kept Europe safe for decades.

Defending that system will be complex, messy and expensive, and involve hard choices for both Europe and North America.

But in Russia’s terror campaign in Ukraine’s skies today, the equation is brutally simple: the less willing the West is to show Russia its actions have consequences, the more Ukrainian men, women and children will die.

Source: CNN

Russia’s war on Ukraine will soon enter another winter. And as surely as the seasons roll around, the debates over US provision of military aid to Ukraine are following their own familiar and predictable cycle.

Supplies of HIMARS rocket artillery, Patriot air defence systems, Abrams tanks, cluster munitions and F-16 fighter jets to Kyiv have all followed the same pattern: initial refusal by Washington, followed by resistance to months of lobbying by Ukrainian officials supported by public opinion across the West, eventual hints of a change of view and finally confirmation that Ukraine will receive the weapons.

The latest equipment on the table is the long-range Army Tactical Missile Systems (also known as ATACMS) — currently at the ‘hints’ stage despite long being recognised as a critical enabler for Ukraine’s efforts to evict its Russian invaders.

As with each iteration of this cycle, emotions are running high among Ukraine’s supporters. Nobody can say with certainty that giving Ukraine all it asked for in 2023 would have enabled its armed forces to evict the Russian invaders by now. But what is certain is that delay and hesitancy has cost lives — not least by extending the time Russia had to build its layers of mined and fortified defensive lines.

But while campaigns for Ukraine to be granted whatever high-profile weapon system is top of its shopping list at the time have been an essential component of maintaining public support, they have also distracted from the flows of less glamorous and more mundane materiel that have been constant throughout the war – such as munitions, clothing, vehicles and medical supplies.

Focusing on a single capability at a time has risked elevating it to the status of a “wonder weapon” that will win the war independently, as opposed to an integrated part of a long-term and evolving building of capability.

The paradox is that the US has been by far the greatest provider of military support to Ukraine by volume, but also receives the most criticism for not giving Ukraine what it needs precisely because it has the most to give.

The public criticism centers around the US’s perceived excessive concern over triggering Russian ‘escalation.’ US officials point out that technical aspects like logistics, training, support, infrastructure and delivery all impose real delays on provision of new capabilities to Ukraine. And they’re right — but the biggest delay has consistently been the political hold before that process even starts.

Once the political brakes are off, coalition partners have shown willingness to move fast even on immensely ambitious projects like the provision of F-16 fighter jets. The UK, in particular, has consistently led the drive to give Ukraine what it asks for, as well as disregarding US concerns about what Ukraine can strike with what it is given.

Meanwhile, though, the language of ‘Russian red lines’ still seems to drive US policy. There’s an extraordinarily tenacious idea among some Western policymakers that the US has no leverage, initiative or agency and instead can only be a party to this confrontation on Russia’s terms. It’s led to persistent suggestions that the US is reluctant to enable convincing Ukrainian victory because of a tacit or explicit agreement not to defeat Russia.

And disagreements over Ukraine within the US system have been reflected not just in policy contradictions, but in a whispering campaign of anonymous briefings to US media, casting doubt both on Ukraine’s conduct of the war and its ability to win it.

The net result is the US leads a coalition of the unwilling among Ukraine’s supporters, where Germany has repeatedly pointed to America in an effort to justify its own reluctance to supply arms, or in the case of Leopard tanks, even holding back others from doing so.

But as the war grinds towards its third year, there’s a strong argument that restraint has been a self-defeating strategy. It’s not only that the emphasis on avoiding escalation reassures Russia that it can continue to pummel Ukraine’s economy and murder its civilians through drone and missile strikes with impunity.

Anything that draws out the conflict — such as decisions on support for Ukraine that were driven by caution on what to supply — play to many of Russia’s advantages and the West’s weaknesses.

And as the fighting drags on into 2024 and potentially beyond, Western backers will find it ever harder to provide what Ukraine needs. The US’s generous support for Ukraine is under threat from political trends there even before a potential change of presidency.

So with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the US this week to appeal for international support once again, it’s not only wavering members of the UN he is addressing. He knows there’s a risk that the window may eventually start to close on backing from Washington itself.

And even without considering the tolerance of voters for the economic cost, failure to restart European defence industries in earnest means searching ever harder and wider around the world for the munitions and weapons that are essential for Ukraine to survive.

For example in the UK, eager support is constrained by 30 years of defence cuts that have left the cupboard bare. Critical deficiencies in munitions stocks were identified well before 2022, supplying howitzers to Ukraine necessitated an emergency purchase of replacements from Sweden, and there are strong indications that the UK’s tiny donation of 14 Challenger 2 tanks represented a substantial proportion of the number of tanks the British Army had still in working order.

But making Ukraine stronger is a key ingredient for Europe’s long-term security as well as for the outcome of the present war. For Russia, this is a ‘forever war’ that taps into fundamental ideas of Russian identity and for which President Vladimir Putin is willing to inflict vast economic and human losses on his country.

Even evicting every last Russian soldier from occupied eastern Ukraine and Crimea won’t end the war while Russia still has artillery, missiles and drones to launch destructive attacks while rebuilding its land forces for the next offensive.

Most Western leaders have done an exceptionally poor job of explaining to their electorates that that means huge reinvestment in defence and the industries supporting it is vital and overdue. As the US becomes increasingly focused on China, the defence of Europe will increasingly rely on those front-line states that understand the threat and are willing to take it seriously.

After decades when it could pretend to itself that military threats were a thing of the past, the rest of Europe needs urgently to realise that the cost of defence is not an optional luxury.

Instead, it is the price that must be paid for sharing a continent with Russia.

Source: CNN

“They’re still going to see, for the next couple of weeks, if there is a chance of making some progress. But for them to really make progress that would change the balance of this conflict, I think, it’s extremely, highly unlikely,” a senior western diplomat told CNN.

“Our briefings are sobering. We’re reminded of the challenges they face,” said Rep. Mike Quigley, an Illinois Democrat who recently returned from meetings in Europe with US commanders training Ukrainian armored forces. “This is the most difficult time of the war.”

The primary challenge for Ukrainian forces is the continued difficulty of breaking through Russia’s multi-layered defensive lines in the eastern and southern parts of the country, which are marked by tens of thousands of mines and vast networks of trenches. Ukrainian forces have incurred staggering losses there, leading Ukrainian commanders to hold back some units to regroup and reduce casualties.

“Russians have a number of defensive lines and they [Ukrainian forces] haven’t really gone through the first line,” said a senior Western diplomat. “Even if they would keep on fighting for the next several weeks, if they haven’t been able to make more breakthroughs throughout these last seven, eight weeks, what is the likelihood that they will suddenly, with more depleted forces, make them? Because the conditions are so hard.”

A senior US official said the US recognizes the difficulties Ukrainian forces are facing, though retains hope for renewed progress.

“We all recognize this is going harder and slower than anyone would like – including the Ukrainians – but we still believe there’s time and space for them to be able make progress,” this official said.

White House National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications John Kirby addressed the speed of Ukraine’s counteroffensive Tuesday, telling CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on “The Situation Room” that “even the Ukrainians … including President Zelensky, have said that they’re not going as far as or as fast as he would like.”

“While they are making progress, and they are, it’s incremental and it’s slow and it’s not without its difficulties – but they keep trying, they’re still at it,” Kirby said. “There is active fighting along that front, they are definitely trying to push forward. How far they’ll get, where that will be, what kind of breakthrough they might be able to achieve, I don’t think anybody can say right now. We’ve got to make sure we’re staying behind them and supporting them.”

Multiple officials said the approach of fall, when weather and fighting conditions are expected to worsen, gives Ukrainian forces a limited window to push forward.

Western officials also say the slow progress has exposed the difficulty of transforming Ukrainian forces into combined mechanized fighting units, sometimes with as few as eight weeks of training on western-supplied tanks and other new weapons systems. The lack of progress on the ground is one reason Ukrainian forces have been striking more often inside Russian territory “to try and show Russian vulnerability,” said a senior US military official.

Ukraine’s armed forces chief, Gen. Valerii Zaluzhnyi, told US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley that Ukrainian forces are step by step creating conditions for advancing. Zaluzhnyi added that he had told Milley that Ukraine’s defenses were steadfast.

“Our soldiers are doing their best. The enemy is conducting active assault actions in a number of directions, but is not succeeding,” Zaluzhnyi told Milley, according to a read out issued by the Ukrainian government.

Talking about the situation in the south, where Ukrainian forces have struggled to gain ground, Zaluzhnyi said, “Heavy fighting continues, Ukrainian troops step by step continue to create conditions for advancing. The initiative is on our side.”

These latest assessments represent a marked change from the optimism at the start of the counteroffensive. These officials say those expectations were “unrealistic” and are now contributing to pressure on Ukraine from some in the West to begin peace negotiations, including considering the possibility of territorial concessions.

“Putin is waiting for this. He can sacrifice bodies and buy time,” Quigley said.

Some officials fear the widening gap between expectations and results will spark a “blame game” among Ukrainian officials and their western supporters, which may create divisions within the alliance which has remained largely intact nearly two years into the war.

“The problem, of course, here is the prospect of the blame game that the Ukrainians would then blame it on us,” said a senior western diplomat.

Last month at the Aspen Security Forum, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky pointed to the slow arrival of more advanced weapons systems from the West as reason for Ukrainian forces’ slow progress so far.

“We did plan to start [the counteroffensive] in spring, but we didn’t,” Zelensky said. “Because frankly, we have not enough munitions, and armaments, and not enough properly trained brigades. I mean properly trained in these weapons.”

Source: CNN