The movie script was almost written. Vladimir Putin had overreached himself in Ukraine. The Russian dictator forged national unity there and revived the transatlantic alliance. He had foolishly confronted not just Ukraine but the world’s richest and most powerful countries, with predictably catastrophic results.
Sanctions would cripple his economy and war machine. His friends, scenting defeat, would flinch. Long-range precision strikes would destroy logistics. Settlers would flee Crimea. Setbacks on the battlefield, plus shortages of food, fuel, ammunition, and spare parts would lead to mutiny, surrender, and desertion among the ill-led, badly trained invading forces.
As Russia’s mangled army folded in the face of Ukraine’s mighty counter-offensive, military disintegration — 1917 all over again — would lead to political change in Moscow. Russians would revolt against mobilization. The elite would split and switch sides.
Under new leadership, Russia would wake up from its imperialist frenzy and become a friendly, normal, law-governed country. Unicorns would prance around Red Square and a permanent rainbow would reach from Kaliningrad to Vladivostok.
All that was wrong. And not just the last bit. The West wildly overestimated its own resources and willpower. It placed far too great a burden on Ukraine’s ability to win what became a war of attrition. It underestimated Russia’s ability to learn from mistakes, to build formidable defensive lines, to evade sanctions, to ramp up its war economy, to accept casualties, to crush dissent.
The result: Ukraine is running out of troops and ammunition. A catastrophic military defeat may not be imminent, but the danger is growing of more Russian territorial gains, more misery, and an arm-twisted deal in which Ukraine will have to make painful concessions.
That outcome would be catastrophic. It would vindicate Putin’s warmongering. It would destroy Western deterrence. It would humiliate Ukraine. And it would be temporary. Russia would be back for more, either again in Ukraine or in a challenge to an enfeebled NATO.
\The blame lies squarely with Western leaders. If they had backed up their stirring rhetoric and smiling photo-ops in the early months of the full-scale war with immediate decisions to start producing artillery shells and gun barrels, and if they had given Ukraine the long-range strike weapons it asked for, we would be celebrating victory.
Ukrainians have done everything they could, and much more that they seemingly could not. We have done far less than we could and pretended it was a lot more. This gulf between fantasy and reality may be lethal for Ukrainians now, and others soon.
The curse of wishful thinking lies much deeper though. It goes back to the 1990s, and the greedy, naïve approach to Russia: not a wounded, resentful, still-dangerous empire, but just another emerging market, with profits galore and some spicy nightlife thrown in.
NATO admitted new members slowly and reluctantly, and to this day does not have properly resourced plans to defend them. The shortfalls in readiness and capability look bad on paper, but at least in a crisis, they will be filled by the United States.
Oops. More wishful thinking. European allies for decades believed that scrimping on defense risked no greater cost than some cross words from Washington, DC. Even today, wealthy frontline states like Norway and Denmark do not take military spending seriously.
But American impatience is boiling over. Europeans may deplore Donald Trump’s transactional approach and harsh talk of “delinquent” NATO members. But it resonates with voters. That is why he says it.
Now the script looks different. Conceited talk combined with moral cowardice brings a crisis and then catastrophe. Forget the movie: Hollywood likes happy endings. A tale of hubris and nemesis is closer to a Greek tragedy. Or a Ukrainian one.
Edward Lucas is a Non-resident Senior Fellow and Senior Adviser at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA). He was formerly a senior editor at The Economist. Lucas has covered Central and Eastern European affairs since 1986, writing, broadcasting, and speaking on the politics, economics, and security of the region.
A graduate of the London School of Economics and long-serving foreign correspondent in Berlin, Vienna, Moscow, and the Baltic states, he is an internationally recognized expert on espionage, subversion, the use and abuse of history, energy security, and information warfare.
Europe’s Edge is CEPA’s online journal covering critical topics on the foreign policy docket across Europe and North America. All opinions are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the position or views of the institutions they represent or the Center for European Policy Analysis.
