SUBSCRIBER+EXCLUSIVE — The Ukraine war has reached a “pivotal moment,” a “critical stage,” an “inflection point“ – all phrases used to describe the current situation in a conflict that will be decided not only in the trenches of eastern Ukraine, but in Washington as well.
The war is also a turning point for NATO and the West.
“If we do not stop Putin in Ukraine now, we are going to face a wider war,” said Kurt Volker, the former U.S. Ambassador to NATO, speaking at The Cipher Brief's Kyiv Economic & Security Forum in Kyiv, Ukraine last week. “And the warning signs are already there.”
Former CIA Director General David Petraeus (Ret.), who led a Cipher Brief delegation to Ukraine ahead of the forum said, while “there’s no question about the continued determination of the Ukrainians,” an end to U.S. military aid could have devastating and widespread consequences. “This is a threat to all of our NATO partners, and it’s really a threat to the Western world.”
THE CONTEXT
- Russia continues assaults along the eastern front lines in Ukraine and is believed to be preparing a new offensive in the northeast.
- Ukrainian forces are building trenches and fortifications to stop Russian troops in what some have called a "spring defensive."
- Ukraine has had significant success targeting Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, and this week Ukraine’s military intelligence also claimed to have set a Russian missile ship on fire in the Baltic Sea.
- Ukraine has launched long-range drone strikes into Russia, targeting Russian military infrastructure and oil refineries.
- Europe is boosting military assistance to Ukraine as a U.S. aid package languishes in Congress.
THE DISCUSSION
At Friday's Cipher Brief Kyiv Forum, Amb. Volker joined Ukrainian Major General Vadym Skibitskyy, First Deputy Head of the Defense Intelligence of Ukraine, and Fred Kagan, Director of Critical Threats Projects at the American Enterprise Institute, for a conversation about the stakes of the war for Ukraine and the West. Nataliya Bugayova, a fellow at the Institute for the Study of War, moderated the conversation.
This excerpt of this session from the Security Forum has been edited for length and clarity.
Bugayova: Two years into this war, the fundamentals remain the same: Russia still intends to erase Ukraine as an independent state, and this outcome is still not in the U.S. interest. What seems to be changing is our perception of our interests. Ambassador Volker, what are the stakes, both in the case of failure and the case of success?
Amb. Volker: The first thing I would say, just to remind, April 4th was the 75th anniversary of NATO. And that's not just an opportunity to cut up some chocolate cake. It's a chance to remember that a previous generation set up a system that was designed to preserve peace, freedom, prosperity and security. And it worked for 75 years. And it has led to the secure, prosperous world that we have all grown up in.
Vladimir Putin is determined to overturn this world. This is what this is about. He wants to go back to the age of empire. This is what we fought to stop in World War II, why we created NATO and other institutions, to make sure that that kind of world order didn't come back. Well, it is coming back.
And therefore the stakes are, if we do not stop Putin in Ukraine now, we are going to face a wider war. And the warning signs are already there.
The first thing you have is Putin's own words. We can't ignore when he talks about Russian lands and says there's no place for independent governments on Russian lands, and that Ukraine is not really a national identity. And that Russia has a right to govern the “Russian world,” as he describes it, which includes lots of other countries and lots of other people.
We have increasing hybrid mischievous activity in the Baltic states and in Poland. I was just in Vilnius last week. They have people going around, taking down Lithuanian flags from public places, throwing paint on national symbols and statues in Lithuania. They are conducting cyberattacks on a regular basis.
(Putin) has announced plans for a Russian military buildup far in excess of what is needed for any war in Ukraine. It's really with a focus on the West. You've seen increasing collaboration between Russia andIran, not just on the drones that Russia uses to kill Ukrainians, but also on Iran's support of wars in the Middle East, including Hamas against Israel, including the Houthis against international shipping, all designed to tie up Western resolve and resources away from their conflict in Europe.
We see Russian cooperation with North Korea, knowing that's a global nuisance but also a way for Russia to get ammunition from North Korea, to get missile technology.
We see the meddling and the operations that Russia's putting into elections this year. Not only the U.S. elections, but all over Europe. 80 percent of the cyberattacks in the US, I'm told, are directed by Russia.
You'll note that I didn't mention China, but China stands to benefit from this and they know it. I wouldn't say that China is in the same category as Iran or North Korea in its links with Russia, but they're very happy to see this chaos go along because it advantages them in their desire to advance in Asia, particularly with respect to Taiwan.
So these are the warning signs of a wider war in front of us, which just keeps becoming more and more apparent and more likely, the longer Russia gets away with its aggression in Ukraine and we demonstrate a lack of will and a lack of resolve in the West to stop it.
Watch Dispatches from Kyiv for video interviews with delegation members, including former senior CIA Officer and Cipher Brief Expert Glenn Corn, exclusively on The Cipher Brief's Digital Channel
Bugayova: Fred, you've written that the U.S. has much higher stakes in this war than was realized, and specifically that conquest of Ukraine will bring the Russian army right up to NATO's border from the Black Sea to the Arctic.
Kagan: We have to consider worst-case scenarios, even though I hope and believe that they will not come to pass.
There are a lot of people, including a lot of people who are resisting providing additional U.S. aid, who are imagining a world in which the U.S. doesn't provide aid and the front line stays where it is, because they think the war is permanently stalemated and that it'll be okay. And that really this is just about whether Ukraine gets to retake more of its land. That's not a real thing. That's not an actual option in the real world.
The choices are: The United States can continue to support Ukraine, Ukraine can stabilize the lines and then Ukraine will have an opportunity over time to begin delivering more of its people and land; or the United States can put off aid and the lines will begin to move to the West much more rapidly than they are right now.
We have to contemplate the possibility that Ukraine could ultimately lose if we abandon it. And then we have to ask ourselves, what does that look like? And what it looks like is a large, battle-tested Russian army reconstituting already, preparing for war against us that it intends to initiate.
This is not just about Ukraine. We believe Ukraine is not Vegas; what goes on in Ukraine doesn't stay in Ukraine, because Putin doesn't intend for it to. So that is the worst-case scenario that we need to consider, because if people are concerned about the expense of helping Ukraine fight Russia now, they will really not enjoy the cost of having to build up the massive forces that will be required to be able to defend NATO from the Black Sea to the Arctic, against a revived, expanded, modernized, built-out, and aggressive and triumphant Russian military.
Putin is conducting an information operation that says the U.S. support for Ukraine is increasing the risk of war between the U.S. and Russia. Not so. The abandonment of Ukraine at this moment is the single biggest thing that the United States could do to increase the risk of war between Russia and NATO, involving the United States on terms that would be very disadvantageous to us.
Bugayova: General, how would you describe the operational environment, where we're clearly in a pivotal moment?
Gen. Skibitskyy: It's a very, very important issue we are discussing today, because really it's a strategic operation of the Russian Federation against our country. Russia started the war against our country in 2014. It's true that Putin is collecting all Russian territory, Russian lands and then the (old) Russian empire.
Very briefly about the current situation: Today, Russia continues assault actions in all lines of contact at the frontlines. The most dangerous are in the Kupyansk, Lyman, Pokrovsk, and Kramatorsk direction.
Concerning the Russian Federation’s goals and tasks for this year: First, the strategic goal of Russia is the full occupation of Ukraine and to absolutely destroy the statehood of Ukraine. That is why this year, according to the plans, the main activity of Russia will be in Donetsk. Why? Because their main task is to go to the administrative board of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts, and say that Russia achieved the goals of the so-called “special military operation.”
Next (for Russia), is to hold the temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine, including Luhansk, Donetsk, part of Kharkiv Oblast, and Kherson and Zaporizhzhia. Today it's possible for Russia to say that each territory is Russian territory, according to the constitution of Russia.
And then of course, to hold the so-called land bridge from Russian territory to the Crimean Peninsula, because the Crimean Peninsula today is a military base for the Russian Federation. It's a transportation road from Russia through the Kerch Bridge to the southern part of Ukraine, and of course all support of groups and forces of Russia in our territory. These are three main tasks for the Russian Federation for this year.
Another activity of Russia today is its mobilization in the territory of Russia. Also, a new stage of the so-called reorganization of armed forces. You know about the Moscow and Leningrad military districts. Russia’s return to this structure and the restoration of such military districts is not only against Ukraine; it's a preparation for possible conflict with NATO. The Leningradsky military district is preparing for a possible conflict in the northern part of Europe, in the northern part of Russia, especially with the new members of NATO, Sweden and Finland.
The next task of the Russian Federation today: to increase the production of weapons, munitions and other equipment for the war. Unfortunately, international sanctions that we have today in many cases do not work, because Russia uses other countries. China for example — more than 80 percent of some elements, some electronics components, go to Russia through China. North Korea and Iran provide additional ammunition and equipment for Russia. This month, Russia again received ammunition from North Korea.
And of course, the next task for Russia is a huge information campaign against Ukraine and against the democratic world in many countries. You see the activity of the Russian Federation in Europe. We know about the preparation of Russia for the election campaign in U.S., in Europe - for example, in the European Parliament.
We understand the common threats and common enemy for us, because the policy of the Russian Federation today, it's war not only in our territory. It's the possible preparation for further conflict, with NATO and this so-called eastern land of NATO.
Watch Dispatches from Kyiv for video interviews with delegation members, including former senior CIA Officer and Cipher Brief Expert Paul Kolbe exclusively on The Cipher Brief's Digital Channel
Bugayova: From your perspective, what is the range of outcomes, and what are some of the key variables in the short and medium term on the battlefield?
Gen. Skibitskyy: In the battlefield, first of all, it will depend on support from our friends and partners. Next, it will depend on the tempo of the (Russian military buildup). Because today, Russia has strategic reserves for the next stage of large-scale strategic offensive operations. It will depend not only on personnel, but on the equipment and weapons and munitions that the Russian Federation can provide to these new formations.
And we are preparing for the next activity or next stage of offensive operations of the Russian Federation in our territory.
Bugayova: Fred, the range of scenarios are extreme and the cone is extremely wide. Could you discuss how the Russian threat to the U.S. may evolve?
Kagan: Last fall, the range of likely courses of action here was rather narrow – protracted positional warfare and more optimistic scenarios in terms of Ukrainian counteroffensives liberating Ukrainian lands and people. But the delay in essential U.S. military assistance has brought much more dangerous courses of action into play.
If the U.S. rapidly begins to provide military assistance, these most dangerous courses of action will once again disappear largely from the picture. And since I do think that the U.S. will provide military assistance soon, these most dangerous courses of action are extremely unlikely.
But we need to understand that Russia of course has a lot of agency here, Ukraine has a lot of agency, but the United States has a lot of agency as well in determining which of these courses of action could become more likely, or making them largely vanish.
And the most dangerous are the collapse of the Ukrainian armed forces – not through lack of will, not through lack of courage, but simply through lack of munitions and essential capabilities. And that would be driven by the loss of air defense capability, which is in many respects right now much more urgent and much more dangerous even than the artillery shortage.
If you start with the very worst course of action being the collapse of the Ukrainian armed forces, I think what you'd have at that point is the world's largest insurgency, for which the Russians think they're prepared. The Russians thought they were prepared for insurgency in Afghanistan – that didn't work out so well for them either. I'm not persuaded this will work out for them as well, but they think that they're prepared for it.
And then we would have to consider a Russian army on the border from the Black Sea to the Arctic, preparing for further aggression against NATO. It's incredibly important for Americans and also Ukrainians to understand that the NATO border is not a magic curtain that is inviolate, and that there's no circumstance under which the Russians would ever violate a NATO border.
The NATO border is as strong as the Russian conviction that NATO will act firmly to defend, to execute Article V (the article in the NATO charter that compels member states to aid any member that is attacked). And what Americans and others need to understand is that if the U.S. shows its unwillingness to continue to support Ukraine in its fight against Russia, that will undermine Russian confidence that we will abide by Article V commitments elsewhere. It will weaken that NATO frontier and make that war more likely. That's the most dangerous course of action that I can see, and that's the one that should really be alarming us.
From there, the options become more favorable. The resumption of U.S. assistance will allow Ukraine to stabilize the lines to prepare to receive the Russian offensive that will come this summer. The Ukrainians have shown over and over again that when they have the material they need, they can stop Russian offensives cold, and the Russians have not demonstrated any new innovations or improvements that would suggest that they would be able to overcome a well-equipped and properly-manned Ukrainian military. So then you're looking at a course of action where the front lines stabilize and receive the Russian offensive and stop it. That is an incredibly advantageous situation for the United States and for NATO, and well worth the investment in itself.
When we start looking for more favorable outcomes, we need to look beyond the straightforward force ratios and financial ratios and manpower ratios of Russia and Ukraine. Recognize that size is not dispositive in the outcome of wars; there are many examples throughout history of smaller countries defeating larger ones because they fought better.
And this is something the Ukrainians have shown that they can do because they innovated more. And because they are more technologically advanced.
Bugayova: Ambassador Volker, how do we ensure that we end up on the trajectory of the most advantageous scenario? What is the strategy for success?
Amb. Volker: I keep getting the feeling from all kinds of comments, particularly from the U.S. and Germany but also elsewhere, that western leaders do not fully grasp that this is a war.
This is a war that Vladimir Putin is fighting, and he intends to win. He has many fewer resources at his disposal than we, the West, have at ours. But if we don't realize that this is a war, he could very well prevail. So the first thing we need - call it “Complacent Politicians Anonymous” - has to be recognition that we have a problem. And then there needs to be a very clear strategy for what to do.
We've talked about NATO and Article V. Article V is not a restriction. Article V is a commitment that allies have made to each other that, if attacked, we will come to each other's defense. It does not prevent us from doing anything else. And if you think about pre-1949, there was no NATO. The U.S. came to the aid of the United Kingdom because we thought it was the right thing to do and in our own interest. We joined and fought in World War I and World War II not because we were allies and had a commitment under a treaty; we did it because we had to. It was the right thing to do. And we should be looking at Ukraine with those eyes and saying, "Yes, Ukraine is not an Article V treaty member of NATO, but that doesn't prevent us from doing what we need to do to make sure Ukraine prevails, Putin is defeated, and that serves our interests in the world."
There's a military component to this – obvious. There is an economic component. The first part is what a lot of us are now beginning to do, but we must do it much faster with much more resolve, increasing our defense industrial capacity to produce more ammunition and armaments and to get those ammunition and armaments to where they are needed as quickly as possible. With an economy 22-plus times the size of Russia's economy, the U.S. and Europe ought to be able to outspend Putin.
So military, economic, and the third is political - institutional and legal frameworks. We need to be thinking already about what the end of this war looks like, and how we make sure it doesn't come back. We need a legal process for holding Russia accountable for war crimes. We need to be talking and moving on NATO and EU membership for Ukraine to show the institutional structure for a peaceful, secure Europe in the future.
And the fourth area I would highlight is information. We are not doing a good job of conveying resolve and commitment. I think everyone would say war is always a test of will. So we have to communicate our will to make sure that Russia does not win this war and that Ukraine prevails.
Final point: We have to stop taking options off the table. This is one of the things that drives me crazy. Every time I hear Western leaders say, "We won't do this, we can't do that" – because that only conveys the lack of resolve or lack of commitment to an outcome. I very much appreciate (French) President Macron's statement that we should not rule out Western troops coming to help in Ukraine. Doesn't mean it's a plan to do so now, but we shouldn't rule it out, because we should be striving for the situation where Vladimir Putin is waking up every morning wondering what we are going to do, as opposed to us assuring him every night before he goes to bed what we won't do.
Bugayova: General, you are a leader in an organization that has probably among the best understanding of Russia in the world. What is one thing that you think the West still needs to learn about the Russian threat?
Gen. Skibitskyy: First of all, today we understand that Russia cannot be prepared for a long-term war in our territory.
What is critical for us today? We must prepare our defense system. It's the reality. Next is our experience that this is a struggle that is not only on the battlefield (in Ukraine); in the territory of Russia, it's a real threat for the Russian defense industry, logistics system, arsenal depots, and all elements that are involved in the war. This is why deep strikes (into Russia) are some of the elements of the war today from our side. For example, a recent strike on an air base in Russia, it was because Sukhoi (jets) come from that air base and use gliding bombs on our territory.
Every day Russian strikes use at least 1,000 gliding bombs on the frontlines. Long-range bombers from (different bases) periodically strike our enterprises, our civilian targets and the critical infrastructure for our country. That is why they are really strategic targets for us.
And then of course, preparation, restoration and reconciliation of our troops, because without additional well-trained, well-prepared brigade units, we cannot stop the assaults and offensive activity of the Russian Federation on the frontline today.
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