Why can’t we be honest about Ukraine’s counter-offensive?

Even before the counter-offensive, Ukraine had lost some 100,000 soldiers. But the reality could be worse given Western media has created the impression that Ukraine is ‘winning’.

A Ukrainian flag flies above the ruins of buildings destroyed during fighting between Ukrainian and Russian occupying forces. Picture: Getty Images.

In early June one of the world’s foremost military intelligence experts David Petraeus said the Ukrainian counteroffensive would be “very impressive”. But to date it has been a disaster – one that should question the wisdom of providing further military and rhetorical support for the war, which could ultimately weaken Ukraine’s bargaining position in peace negotiations.

In more than two months Ukraine has retaken little territory at an unknown cost, despite months of Western training and total NATO military and economic aid since January 2022 of €165bn ($279bn – more than five times Australia’s annual defence budget), according to the Kiel Institute. Between 20,000 and 50,000 Ukrainians have lost one or more limbs since the start of the war, The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this month.

Even before the counteroffensive began, Ukraine had lost some 100,000 soldiers, according to US General Mark Milley. The reality could be even worse given Western media has generally created the impression that Ukraine is “winning”, even though more than five million Ukrainians have emigrated, the nation’s infrastructure has been crippled and more than 20 per cent of its territory is occupied.

In the Vietnam War the US, which then had a population over 200 million (more than five times that of Ukraine), lost around 60,000 soldiers. It lost 2400 in Afghanistan over 20 years.

Last year Elon Musk was derided for suggesting Russia be allowed to keep Crimea and the UN hold referendums on the status of the four annexed provinces in eastern Ukraine.

“This is highly likely to be the outcome in the end – just a question of how many die before then,” he said, prompting accusations the world’s richest man was on Vladimir Putin’s payroll.

Almost a year on, having instead heeded the wisdom of foreign policy experts, that looks like a best-case scenario.

Russia’s military advantage appears insurmountable in troops and artillery without mobilising, and sanctions appear to have failed. Eight in 10 Russians say they haven’t personally been affected them, according to a recent survey by the Chicago Council of Global Affairs. Crimea – supposedly under threat from Ukrainian military – is currently overflowing with Russian tourists.

Volodymyr Zelensky

Vladimir Putin

Moreover, by promising to welcome Ukraine into NATO after the war ends (something Russia launched its invasion to prevent), Moscow has an incentive to keep the war going and even seize more of the country to make its ultimate NATO membership less of a problem. The promise of “Ukraine in NATO” created ample opportunities for virtue signalling but may have extended the war for years.

In May, Donald Trump was mocked by foreign policy experts during a CNN Town Hall interview for refusing to say whether he supported Ukraine “winning”. “I want everybody to stop dying. They’re dying. Russians and Ukrainians. I want them to stop dying,” he said. Experts were furious but his opinion may increasingly reflect that of the US public.

A CNN poll last week found 55 per cent of Americans opposed sending further aid – well up from 17 per cent in February 2022 when Russia launched its invasion. Yet the Biden administration asked congress last week for another $US24bn in aid for Ukraine – fully backed by top Republicans.

“We haven’t lost a single American … Most of the money that we spend related to Ukraine is actually spent in the US, replenishing weapons … So it’s actually employing people here and improving our own military for what may lie ahead,” Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell said, batting away criticism.

However much a boon for the US defence industry the war is, it’s not clear ordinary Ukrainians want it to continue. Opposition parties have been banned in Ukraine. Elections have been suspended. And all media and journalists have been under state control since January.

For months, social media has been awash with videos of young Ukrainian men being dragged into trucks to be sent to the frontline. Last week President Volodymyr Zelensky sacked 24 senior enlistment officers after it emerged wealthy Ukrainians were paying up to $US10,000 to avoid the draft, according to The New York Times.

Soldiers from the US army during a load exercise directed by the 210th Field Artillery Brigade in Ukraine.

Governments and their citizens’ interests diverge sharply during wartime, given the costs of fighting fall mainly on the latter.

In 2008 Putin privately told George W. Bush Ukraine would be dismembered if it sought NATO membership, according to John Mearsheimer’s 2018 book, The Great Delusion, which chronicles the disastrous unintended consequences of US foreign policy since 9/11. If I went to a dangerous part of Washington late at night and told a random gang I could do whatever I want and there’s not a damn thing they could legally do about it, I would probably be bashed or killed. That’s not fair or right, but it’s the world as it is, not as it should be.

The sad reality is Moscow’s interests and arguments, whether we agree with them or not, will need to be taken into account in Ukraine, at least as much as Washington’s.

If that means the Russian-speaking parts of Ukraine become part of Russia, or even if Ukraine has to promise not to join NATO, perhaps that’s preferable to another 100,000 young Ukrainians dying or losing their limbs, and Moscow and Beijing becoming even closer allies. It may not be forever: Russia won’t be able to hold on to the territories it has annexed if the people don’t want to be part of Russia. Time will tell.

Israel’s former prime minister, Naftali Bennett, said the US and UK scotched a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia in early 2022, hundreds of thousands of deaths ago.

If another opportunity arises, the terms won’t be as good, but they could well be better than what’s available at the end of this very unimpressive counteroffensive.