Continues to heat up.
So let’s take the conversation beyond continuing for multiple years and look to what could be beyond that, which is a never-ending war.
What is a never-ending war?
Does this have the potential to be a never-ending war?
Let’s say Western support stays on long enough that Ukraine can continue to fight and that their population can support a never-ending war.
What would that look like?
Yeah, well, yeah, as you point out, we should be clear what we mean by, you know, forever, never-ending war.
Of course, that’s not literal.
All wars do come to an end someday.
And there’s some semantic arguments that could be had.
But I think we can say there are two key factors that determine the so-called never-ending or forever war.
The first one is the impossibility of achieving victory through military means.
That could be that there’s simply not an objective to capture or an opposing army, a regular standing opposing army to destroy, or it’s just not possible to do so.
But the second key aspect is that the belligerent that’s involved in the war isn’t in serious danger of losing either.
So it’s just this endless grind.
But does Ukraine-Russia fall under that category?
I don’t think it actually does.
I would class it as a protracted war rather than a never-ending war, simply because Russia does have the military means to win.
Whether or not they will, of course, we’ll find out.
But this strategy of attrition is designed to grind down Ukraine’s industry and manpower to the point where they’re forced to capitulate.
Well, there’s no guarantee, of course, they will.
But it is possible.
But then we also have to look at the outcomes that Ukraine desires, that Russia desires.
You talked earlier about Zelensky’s four-point peace plan, which we don’t have the specific details of right now.
But I think we can deduce that that is a contracted version of his earlier ten-point peace plan, which was proposed in the year.
The key aspects of that would be the future security guarantees.
Obviously, they don’t want this to happen again.
So what could that look like?
That’s probably membership of NATO, other aspects like that.
Return of territory that’s currently occupied by Russia, that’s going to be a huge sticking point in any negotiations, which I think is one of the reasons, one of the reasonings behind the Kursk incursion is to have that bargaining chip.
I don’t think Ukraine has any serious ambitions to hold that indefinitely.
It’s just they spotted a weak point and took advantage of it.
And that has been one of the aspects of why this war has gone on so long is Ukraine isn’t fighting a passive war.
They’ve shown a lot of ingenuity and imagination in prosecuting this war, whereas Russia’s kind of this very plodding, grinding, attritional strategy, which is making some slow gains in the east.
As Ukraine is showing a willingness to really strike at the heart of the Russian war machine and attack weak points, Russia is having to respond to those.
For Russia, it’s actually not as clear as we would think what they’re actually hoping to gain from this conflict.
There has been different analysis of the rationale behind the invasion in the first place.
We hear things like NATO expansion, denazifying Ukraine.
That stems back to a conversation we had a little while ago about the history and just invoking this kind of myth from World War II about Ukraine’s role in Operation Barbarossa and the invasion of the Soviet Union.
But I think that the opaque nature of Russia’s war aims is almost deliberate.
It gives Putin some flexibility in how he can claim a favorable outcome of the war.
So is it limited objectives?
Is it complete victory?
Is it setting up a buffer zone in eastern Ukraine?
Is it fully annexing eastern Ukraine and Crimea?
You know, it kind of remains to be seen.
So I’d say there’s probably a bit more flexibility on the Russian side about what they’ll accept.
Ukraine is a bit more certain than what they want from this conflict.
So right now, we’re still a long way apart for both sides, which is why the war is going on so long.
And again, you mentioned Ukraine strikes within Russian territory hitting the artillery depot.
I think that was just in the last couple of days.
So Ukraine, and they do have some medium-range munitions, and they’re negotiating to get long-range munitions, which is going to open up a whole host of strategic targets within Russia that they could strike at.
They could really do a lot of damage to the Russian war machine, really slow things down.
But equally, Russia is ramping up its military.
So, again, this war could end tomorrow.
I don’t think it will.
I don’t think it will end next year either.
But I would hesitate to offer a prediction as to when it’s going to come to an end.
But Russia is certainly hoping to eventually win.
Right.
Well, as both sides are.
You had mentioned the strike on the ammunition depot, which is such an interesting facet here.
By all means, an impressive and meaningful blow by Ukraine to Russia.
I saw some estimates that there was a seventy-month shell supply in that depot.
Now, that’s not verified.
We don’t know if that’s the case, but just based on the scale of the explosion, we know it’s a lot.
But in an odd way, when you take that much inventory offline for Russia, a country that has shown a willingness and almost a preference for an attritional war strategy, it almost means that the war could just last longer.
You know, maybe Russia slows down and then they revamp production further, further inland where Ukrainian drones or missiles can’t strike.
You know, I don’t want to say this plays to Russia’s advantage.
It doesn’t.
But by slowing down Russia, you almost increase the likelihood that this becomes a never-ending war.
