Russia’s war in Ukraine dominated the NATO summit in Washington this week as the alliance unveiled plans to intensify support for Kyiv and offer an “irreversible” path to eventual membership in the defense pact.
The measures announced this week—including the establishment of a new NATO command to coordinate training and arms deliveries, the delivery of F-16 fighter jets, and a new security compact—underscore efforts underway in Western capitals to shift support for Ukraine to a long-term footing as Russia shows little sign of abating.
Andriy Yermak, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s closest advisor, said Kyiv was “satisfied” with the outcomes of the summit, speaking at a side event on Thursday. “The alliance made real steps forward,” he said.
But the summit also highlighted a central tension in Western strategy to support Ukraine: Military aid has played a decisive role in enabling Kyiv to fend off Russian forces, but it has fallen short of enabling it to actually win the war.
“We’re basically propping up Ukraine to stay in the battle and make some advances and not outright win the battle,” said Liana Fix, a fellow for Europe at the Council on Foreign Relations. “There’s not a real strategy for the war.”
Allies along NATO’s eastern flank, most notably the Baltic states and Poland, have long called for a surging of support to Ukraine. But the allies with the deepest pockets and most sophisticated weapons systems—particularly the United States—have taken a more cautious tack in a bid to prevent an escalation spiral with Moscow.
The renewed support comes as Russian airstrikes have pounded Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, leading to sweeping power outages in recent months. On Monday, as heads of state and government departed for Washington, Russia struck a children’s hospital in Kyiv in broad daylight, a shot across the bow at the alliance. The new NATO measures come “at a critical time and will help Ukraine avert the worst-case scenario this year,” said Michael Kofman, an expert on the Ukrainian armed forces with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
“The main priority in all these announcements, particularly on the air defense side, is to negate the areas where Russia has a clear advantage,” said Eric Ciaramella, a former deputy national intelligence officer for Russia on the U.S. National Intelligence Council. On Tuesday, Biden announced that the United States, partnering with other countries, would provide five new air defense systems to Ukraine to help the country fend off Russian missile attacks. “It’s definitely necessary to allow the Ukrainians to stop the bleeding and start rebuilding,” said Ciaramella, now a senior fellow at Carnegie.
But analysts are skeptical that the measures announced this week can turn the tide on the battlefield. “The Ukrainians need more to win than just what we have set up,” Royal Netherlands Navy Adm. Rob Bauer, the chair of NATO’s Military Committee, told Foreign Policy on the sidelines of the summit on Thursday.
The Russian armed forces have bounced back faster than anticipated following their unexpectedly poor performance in the early months of the war and are quickly learning how to counter high-tech new weapons systems supplied by Ukraine’s Western allies.
U.S. officials believe that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s ultimate goal of subjugating Ukraine remains unchanged more than two years into the war, moving his country’s economy onto a war footing. Nearly a third of the state budget this year is earmarked for defense spending, and shipments of artillery from Iran and North Korea have left Ukraine outgunned on the battlefield.
On Thursday, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, now deputy chair of the country’s Security Council, posted on X that Moscow sees two acceptable outcomes to the war: “either Ukraine disappears, or NATO does.”
Western leaders have reaffirmed their commitment to remain by Ukraine’s side for the long term, with at least 22 countries and the European Union signing bilateral security agreements with Kyiv pledging their continued support for the country’s defense and security.
“We are demonstrating our commitment to stand with Ukraine in their current fight and into the future,” said U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan at an event on the sidelines of the summit on Thursday.
Yet although the Biden administration played a pivotal role in warning of Russia’s intentions to attack Ukraine and galvanizing Western support for the country, it has offered little in the way of a vision for a path forward for ending the conflict.
It’s an approach that stands in stark contrast to the administration’s handling of the Israel-Hamas war, for which senior administration officials have outlined a dubious but detailed multistep plan to bring about a cease-fire and forge a wider regional deal in an effort to permanently change the dynamics of the conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians.
“There is a gaping hole between saying we want to restore Ukraine’s sovereignty and what we’re actually doing,” said Andrea Kendall-Taylor, the director of the trans-Atlantic security program at the Center for a New American Security. “Right now, it just feels like we’re all saying it but people don’t really believe it.”
The administration has faced criticism from Republicans on Capitol Hill for its failure to outline a clear plan for the war in Ukraine. A multibillion-dollar national security supplemental funding bill, passed by Congress this year after significant delay, included a requirement that the administration submit a report to lawmakers within 45 days outlining its strategy for the war, including “multi-year, establish specific and achievable objectives.”
Ukrainian officials have expressed their concerns about being pressed into a peace deal on unfavorable terms, and the Biden administration has reiterated that it is for Ukraine to decide how and when to end the war.
In the interim, the strategy appears to be to bolster the country’s defenses and hope that Moscow punches itself out. “We’re not in full control of that timeline,” said a senior Biden administration official, asked about a path to a just end to the war. “There is one person who is in control of that, and that’s Vladimir Putin. If he chose to back away and end it, he could do that tomorrow,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the record.
The problem is that Russia is similarly trying to wait out Ukraine and its Western allies.
“It’s ultimately a big psychological game, and Putin thinks that he can win it—that time is on his side and that he can grind down the Ukrainians and our political will to support” them, Ciaramella said.
Despite the pledges of long-term support announced at the summit this week, critics have questioned the longevity of this approach. “It is magical thinking to expect that the current level of allied support can continue indefinitely,” Eugene Rumer, the director of Carnegie’s Russia and Eurasia program, wrote in a recent commentary.
“The challenge before the allies at this summit is bigger than anything they have faced since the Cold War. It is not to keep Ukraine in the fight for the long run but to find a way to end this war without sacrificing Ukraine in the process.”
FP’s Jack Detsch contributed to this report.
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