How do you manage the costs of security? Hard enough at any time to put a figure on it. The implications are even more daunting when a country like Ukraine is fighting for its survival. This week at the summit in Vilnius, the question of Ukraine’s eventual membership in NATO comes to a head. The question is whether the possibility of Ukraine’s membership, first announced in 2008 in one of the last disruptive acts of the Bush administration, can be realized any time soon.
1. No evidence of fragile Putin "regime". Mr. Tooze, do you think Russians have not accumulated from 2000 onwards enough evidence to support Mr. Putin as their president? If anything, Russians want a ramp up effort to deal and finish Ukraine.
2. No evidence of Ukraine diplomatic success outside EU, US, and US protectorates like Australia, Japan, S. Korea. CELAC countries have even refused to include the mention of Ukraine in their joint statement with EU, claiming that Ukraine is a European problem.
3. What do you think is the price for security the Russians are willing to pay, given the scenario in the books prepared by the Americans immediately after the dissolution of USSR?
There is so much good information in this post, the most of which I agree with, such that it is a shame not to comment on it all in detail. I should like to raise a few points only which take the line of argument presented on a divergent course.
In my view, there will be no EU accession for Ukraine in the foreseeable future and very probable in current lifetimes because it is patently contrary to the interests of existing Member States to admit this country. It is large. It is poor. Its government and legal system are deeply corrupt even by the standards of other post-Soviet States admitted, indeed well past the point of dysfunctionality. EU subsidies to Ukraine of more than trivial amounts would be impossibly contentious in the present context of the community where even essential expenses are caviled over endlessly and authorized only in pfenning sized packets. The EU has no truly functioning confederation wide bond issuance mechanisms or own-revenue sources equal to this task, and would have to create them even to attempt to meet the costs. Ukraine, even if reduced by territorial loss, is a large state with a large population, whose accession would seriously destabilize existing Member State internal balances of power, almost entirely detrimentally so for existing primary stakeholders. Even to admit the Ukraine for any reason at all, the Community would have to significantly reform its governance structures which are strained to the failure point now by the number of Members involved and the liberum veto any State can exercise on any policy for any reason at all including no reason--and THAT reform is a massive political lift in its own right, anything but certain of accomplishment. Britain is constantly and loudly insistent the Ukraine be admitted to the Community which the present British government was itself so eager to absent itself from, one supposes in part from a too cynical calculus that Ukraine would be just the poison pill to the Community the the summary here suggests. But not for any productive reason, and regardless Britain has and would have no vote in the matter. In short, the EU will not admit Ukraine because it _cannot_.
On a second point, I cannot see that any NATO state would be willing to risk nuclear war over Ukraine, now, or in the foreseeable future. No amount of moral suasion adds up to a strategic calculus of positive utility there, and the publics of any and every state if polled would overwhelmingly decline to plunge into nuclear catastrophe for a people they scarcely know. Germany alone is certain to refuse any such "We'll die with you" offer, and it is no strategic interest of the United States and its governing elites to wrap themselves into an explosive straightjacket with Ukraine, with one condition excepted.
That condition is if Russia is defeated and rankly defeated _before_ Ukraine was given such a guarantee of nuclear defense, and thus cannot credibly threaten retaliation. And therein lies the essential problem with 'Ukraine in NATO' analyses. Russia is not defeated. In fact, by a reasonable reading of the military situation, Ukraine is very close to military collapse due to extreme personnel attrition and the exhaustion of essential ammunitions provided by third party countries, whereas Russia has a highly favorable loss ration in constant and continuing operations, continues to gradually augment its force complement over and above this, and appears entirely capable of sustaining armament production to not only replace asset expenditures but to gradually built them out further as well. Should Ukraine be defeated, or even come close to that, NATO, meaning the US would have to actively enter this war to retrieve the situation. And THAT is a step which no sane head of government in the Alliance can rationally see as in their interests, and so one there is no reason to think that they will take. Absent Russia being defeated, admitting Ukraine to NATO or the EU for any reason simply is impossibly risky, and will not be done, in my view. And that appears the view of the Biden Administration, and many governments in the European Union as well.
There remains the remote possibility that Ukraine will be able to continue to stave off outright defeat by using massive further funding provisions and guaranteed armament resupply from NATO states and such other countries as decide to expend their own capital to that effect. Given that these countries have already swept their arsenal cupboards all but bare even to prop up Ukraine thus far, that prospect appears to have a losing calculus IF Russia elects to continue the war. And there is every reason to suppose that Russia will continue _this_ war exactly as long as it can. While there are many reasons for that assertion, the most salient and obvious one is that NATO cannot admit Ukraine while the war continues but would be free to do so the instant the war ends _unless Ukraine is defeated in such a way that it cannot enter NATO subsequently_. I do not hold the view that the Russian government entered this war for existential reasons, but the situation is such that that government now perforce must _continue_ the war for existential reasons. If its far from clear what guarantee NATO member states and the USA could possibly give to Russia at this point that the Russian government could afford to believe. That being the case, it simply is not presently in Russia's interests to end the war, and very much the reverse, and, as said, it does not appear that Ukraine can sustain this war much longer.
This, in my view, is the fundamental reason that the United States, Germany, and other critical nations in the process are publicly deflating any hints of an accession path for Ukraine. This is also the underlying reason behind public fatigue whey military and monetary gifts to Ukraine have declined precipitously through the course of calendar 2023: Ukraine’s backers fear, with substantial probability, that not only will Ukraine lose but that it has in fact already been strategically defeated, with only the actual facts on the ground lagging the situation. And a very probable outcome of any actual Ukrainian military defeat at this point is the certain guaranteed by all parties concerned that Ukraine is NOT to be admitted to any anti-Russian alliance. The reason that this NATO summit is putting on a brave face of ‘a future together’ is more nearly to sustain the useful fiction of neverending contributions to begin to shape the space for a viable rather than an unconditional surrender. Hence, talk of 'Ukraine in NATO/the EU' seems to me a cart stationary on a broken wheel in the total absence of a horse either before it or behind to propel the issue into reality.
There's more to say on this, but that's entirely enough for now. I do find the thinking and content presented on Chartbook very valuable.
I regret that I have but one "heart" to give your thoroughly excellent comment. Ukraine is getting neither EU nor NATO accession anytime soon, if ever.
For Russians, yes. And since the question about the defense of Ukraine is not directed at Ukrainians, there is an asymmetry that is at the core of the entire issue.
So Turkey’s price for Sweden"s NATO membership is EU membership for itself. I don’t know which is funnier: Sweden’s old delusion about neutrality or Erdogan’s delusions about economic laws.
Mr. Tooze, you would have written much more honest and objective article if you treated perspective NATO membership of Ukraine more like a carrot on a stick, not a real possibility (which was never a case).
The comment about "bringing new talent and new resources" from Ukraine is just hilarious, it could be written only by someone who has cleraly no idea about the development of Ukraine since 2000s.
Does ``the recipe for crises to come'' change in 2024 if Biden is returned to the White House with majorities in the House and Senate and is Biden showing political prudence by keeping the status quo until that outcome is realized?
I mean that’s the entire unstated part of this, America’s support for Ukraine (and more broadly America’s general foreign policy) is highly contingent on the winner-takes-all nature of American elections, and on the massive turnovers in major bureaucratic positions that accompany a change in governments. The inherent difficulty for any planners involved in this situation is that it is entirely possible that every four years you will have a completely different set of policy priorities in the United States, which is part of why ironclad guarantees of security are so sought-after by other parties. It is a lot more difficult, politically, for the US to declare “we will not defend Turkey despite Article 5” than “we will stop shipping aid to Ukraine”. I do think the American policy consensus on Ukraine is still pretty strongly in favor of support, simply based off of the genuinely bipartisan support for Ukraine at the highest levels of politics. As is the case with much of American foreign policy, a lot of politicians consider themselves to be trustees acting in the best interests of their constituents/the country rather than representatives delivering the will of their constituents/the people when it comes to foreign policy.
I'll admit to growing impatient with NATO dithering. The war and suffering will continue until Ukraine's future is decided, so let's stop screwing around with half measures and get on with it. Are we are war, or not? Do we intend to win, or not? Make up your mind NATO.
NATO and EU membership for Ukraine are clearly desirable, but they aren't necessary right now. We could largely end the war immediately by doing something like this...
1) Ukraine disengages Russian forces.
2) NATO troops and weapons immediately flood in to the free part of Ukraine, thus permanently securing 80% of the country from any further Russian invasions.
3) The occupied parts of Ukraine are liberated through financial warfare instead of military conflict.
Once NATO forces are in Ukraine, we can tell the Russians that they won't be attacked in the occupied areas, but any of their units which try to enter free Ukraine will be destroyed to the last man by combined Ukrainian and NATO overwhelming force.
Putin's strategy is to wear down Western interest in this conflict in a never ending grinding war of attrition. He's right that, given enough time, that strategy will work. So we should take away his time, and settle the matter unilaterally without delay.
This war is starting to resemble the Vietnam War, where we were half in, and half out. We all know how that turned out.
Everyone is making a huge assumption that an integrated Ukraine will be positive for the EU experiment and for those folks, they have forgotten the lessons of history.
Ukraine was and had been one of the dominant republics in the Soviet Union and it is not by fluke that they are at odds with Russians today. Historical Russia started from Ukraine and what has happened is nothing but a bit of animus from the bears that wrestle under a carpet. What a Ukraine in EU will mean is almost a third of Russia and Russian citizens in the EU. And that, for the long-term will be to the advantage of a Russia that is at odds with the EU.
Solve the damn problem and stop setting up fights for tomorrow.
„How do you manage the costs of security?“ It is related to the power of nations and difficult to assess for both Ukraine, Russia, the rest of Europe, and the US.
Generally, power is your adversary‘s assumption of your strength calculated as the largest of
1. your remaining power, having used a part of it
2. the power that you threaten to use
3. the power that your adversary expect you to have
"Furthermore, what Ukraine needs is not just immediate help but a stable outlook for the immediate future."
What Ukraine needs is negotiations, and the United States to stop sabotaging peace efforts.
Some points:
1. No evidence of fragile Putin "regime". Mr. Tooze, do you think Russians have not accumulated from 2000 onwards enough evidence to support Mr. Putin as their president? If anything, Russians want a ramp up effort to deal and finish Ukraine.
2. No evidence of Ukraine diplomatic success outside EU, US, and US protectorates like Australia, Japan, S. Korea. CELAC countries have even refused to include the mention of Ukraine in their joint statement with EU, claiming that Ukraine is a European problem.
3. What do you think is the price for security the Russians are willing to pay, given the scenario in the books prepared by the Americans immediately after the dissolution of USSR?
https://www.thepostil.com/1993-the-barry-r-posen-plan-for-war-on-russia-via-zombie-state-ukraine/
There is so much good information in this post, the most of which I agree with, such that it is a shame not to comment on it all in detail. I should like to raise a few points only which take the line of argument presented on a divergent course.
In my view, there will be no EU accession for Ukraine in the foreseeable future and very probable in current lifetimes because it is patently contrary to the interests of existing Member States to admit this country. It is large. It is poor. Its government and legal system are deeply corrupt even by the standards of other post-Soviet States admitted, indeed well past the point of dysfunctionality. EU subsidies to Ukraine of more than trivial amounts would be impossibly contentious in the present context of the community where even essential expenses are caviled over endlessly and authorized only in pfenning sized packets. The EU has no truly functioning confederation wide bond issuance mechanisms or own-revenue sources equal to this task, and would have to create them even to attempt to meet the costs. Ukraine, even if reduced by territorial loss, is a large state with a large population, whose accession would seriously destabilize existing Member State internal balances of power, almost entirely detrimentally so for existing primary stakeholders. Even to admit the Ukraine for any reason at all, the Community would have to significantly reform its governance structures which are strained to the failure point now by the number of Members involved and the liberum veto any State can exercise on any policy for any reason at all including no reason--and THAT reform is a massive political lift in its own right, anything but certain of accomplishment. Britain is constantly and loudly insistent the Ukraine be admitted to the Community which the present British government was itself so eager to absent itself from, one supposes in part from a too cynical calculus that Ukraine would be just the poison pill to the Community the the summary here suggests. But not for any productive reason, and regardless Britain has and would have no vote in the matter. In short, the EU will not admit Ukraine because it _cannot_.
On a second point, I cannot see that any NATO state would be willing to risk nuclear war over Ukraine, now, or in the foreseeable future. No amount of moral suasion adds up to a strategic calculus of positive utility there, and the publics of any and every state if polled would overwhelmingly decline to plunge into nuclear catastrophe for a people they scarcely know. Germany alone is certain to refuse any such "We'll die with you" offer, and it is no strategic interest of the United States and its governing elites to wrap themselves into an explosive straightjacket with Ukraine, with one condition excepted.
That condition is if Russia is defeated and rankly defeated _before_ Ukraine was given such a guarantee of nuclear defense, and thus cannot credibly threaten retaliation. And therein lies the essential problem with 'Ukraine in NATO' analyses. Russia is not defeated. In fact, by a reasonable reading of the military situation, Ukraine is very close to military collapse due to extreme personnel attrition and the exhaustion of essential ammunitions provided by third party countries, whereas Russia has a highly favorable loss ration in constant and continuing operations, continues to gradually augment its force complement over and above this, and appears entirely capable of sustaining armament production to not only replace asset expenditures but to gradually built them out further as well. Should Ukraine be defeated, or even come close to that, NATO, meaning the US would have to actively enter this war to retrieve the situation. And THAT is a step which no sane head of government in the Alliance can rationally see as in their interests, and so one there is no reason to think that they will take. Absent Russia being defeated, admitting Ukraine to NATO or the EU for any reason simply is impossibly risky, and will not be done, in my view. And that appears the view of the Biden Administration, and many governments in the European Union as well.
There remains the remote possibility that Ukraine will be able to continue to stave off outright defeat by using massive further funding provisions and guaranteed armament resupply from NATO states and such other countries as decide to expend their own capital to that effect. Given that these countries have already swept their arsenal cupboards all but bare even to prop up Ukraine thus far, that prospect appears to have a losing calculus IF Russia elects to continue the war. And there is every reason to suppose that Russia will continue _this_ war exactly as long as it can. While there are many reasons for that assertion, the most salient and obvious one is that NATO cannot admit Ukraine while the war continues but would be free to do so the instant the war ends _unless Ukraine is defeated in such a way that it cannot enter NATO subsequently_. I do not hold the view that the Russian government entered this war for existential reasons, but the situation is such that that government now perforce must _continue_ the war for existential reasons. If its far from clear what guarantee NATO member states and the USA could possibly give to Russia at this point that the Russian government could afford to believe. That being the case, it simply is not presently in Russia's interests to end the war, and very much the reverse, and, as said, it does not appear that Ukraine can sustain this war much longer.
This, in my view, is the fundamental reason that the United States, Germany, and other critical nations in the process are publicly deflating any hints of an accession path for Ukraine. This is also the underlying reason behind public fatigue whey military and monetary gifts to Ukraine have declined precipitously through the course of calendar 2023: Ukraine’s backers fear, with substantial probability, that not only will Ukraine lose but that it has in fact already been strategically defeated, with only the actual facts on the ground lagging the situation. And a very probable outcome of any actual Ukrainian military defeat at this point is the certain guaranteed by all parties concerned that Ukraine is NOT to be admitted to any anti-Russian alliance. The reason that this NATO summit is putting on a brave face of ‘a future together’ is more nearly to sustain the useful fiction of neverending contributions to begin to shape the space for a viable rather than an unconditional surrender. Hence, talk of 'Ukraine in NATO/the EU' seems to me a cart stationary on a broken wheel in the total absence of a horse either before it or behind to propel the issue into reality.
There's more to say on this, but that's entirely enough for now. I do find the thinking and content presented on Chartbook very valuable.
Yes indeed.
Ukraine in NATO means war with Russia, no way around that.
I regret that I have but one "heart" to give your thoroughly excellent comment. Ukraine is getting neither EU nor NATO accession anytime soon, if ever.
Nobody in the American satrapies cares what the little people think.
Is the defense of Ukraine worth the price of WWIII?
Is the existence of Russia worth price of WWIII?
For Russians, yes. And since the question about the defense of Ukraine is not directed at Ukrainians, there is an asymmetry that is at the core of the entire issue.
So Turkey’s price for Sweden"s NATO membership is EU membership for itself. I don’t know which is funnier: Sweden’s old delusion about neutrality or Erdogan’s delusions about economic laws.
Mr. Tooze, you would have written much more honest and objective article if you treated perspective NATO membership of Ukraine more like a carrot on a stick, not a real possibility (which was never a case).
The comment about "bringing new talent and new resources" from Ukraine is just hilarious, it could be written only by someone who has cleraly no idea about the development of Ukraine since 2000s.
War to the last Ukranian, huh?
/& hmm ... tellingly, no canvassing of that other def possible outcome, a further territorial shrinkage of a ‘west Ukraine’.
Say, Russian absorption of all E of a line, incl Odessa to Kharkiv.
What then, re NATO & EU?
Does ``the recipe for crises to come'' change in 2024 if Biden is returned to the White House with majorities in the House and Senate and is Biden showing political prudence by keeping the status quo until that outcome is realized?
I mean that’s the entire unstated part of this, America’s support for Ukraine (and more broadly America’s general foreign policy) is highly contingent on the winner-takes-all nature of American elections, and on the massive turnovers in major bureaucratic positions that accompany a change in governments. The inherent difficulty for any planners involved in this situation is that it is entirely possible that every four years you will have a completely different set of policy priorities in the United States, which is part of why ironclad guarantees of security are so sought-after by other parties. It is a lot more difficult, politically, for the US to declare “we will not defend Turkey despite Article 5” than “we will stop shipping aid to Ukraine”. I do think the American policy consensus on Ukraine is still pretty strongly in favor of support, simply based off of the genuinely bipartisan support for Ukraine at the highest levels of politics. As is the case with much of American foreign policy, a lot of politicians consider themselves to be trustees acting in the best interests of their constituents/the country rather than representatives delivering the will of their constituents/the people when it comes to foreign policy.
Great write up. Thanks.
I'll admit to growing impatient with NATO dithering. The war and suffering will continue until Ukraine's future is decided, so let's stop screwing around with half measures and get on with it. Are we are war, or not? Do we intend to win, or not? Make up your mind NATO.
NATO and EU membership for Ukraine are clearly desirable, but they aren't necessary right now. We could largely end the war immediately by doing something like this...
1) Ukraine disengages Russian forces.
2) NATO troops and weapons immediately flood in to the free part of Ukraine, thus permanently securing 80% of the country from any further Russian invasions.
3) The occupied parts of Ukraine are liberated through financial warfare instead of military conflict.
Once NATO forces are in Ukraine, we can tell the Russians that they won't be attacked in the occupied areas, but any of their units which try to enter free Ukraine will be destroyed to the last man by combined Ukrainian and NATO overwhelming force.
Putin's strategy is to wear down Western interest in this conflict in a never ending grinding war of attrition. He's right that, given enough time, that strategy will work. So we should take away his time, and settle the matter unilaterally without delay.
This war is starting to resemble the Vietnam War, where we were half in, and half out. We all know how that turned out.
Go yourself.
Everyone is making a huge assumption that an integrated Ukraine will be positive for the EU experiment and for those folks, they have forgotten the lessons of history.
Ukraine was and had been one of the dominant republics in the Soviet Union and it is not by fluke that they are at odds with Russians today. Historical Russia started from Ukraine and what has happened is nothing but a bit of animus from the bears that wrestle under a carpet. What a Ukraine in EU will mean is almost a third of Russia and Russian citizens in the EU. And that, for the long-term will be to the advantage of a Russia that is at odds with the EU.
Solve the damn problem and stop setting up fights for tomorrow.
„How do you manage the costs of security?“ It is related to the power of nations and difficult to assess for both Ukraine, Russia, the rest of Europe, and the US.
Generally, power is your adversary‘s assumption of your strength calculated as the largest of
1. your remaining power, having used a part of it
2. the power that you threaten to use
3. the power that your adversary expect you to have