As you read this, the young men and women of Ukraine’s newly trained and equipped brigades are preparing for their spring – more likely summer offensive operations. Despite huge pressure from their allies to demonstrate that the equipment and ammunition that have been committed can be converted into serious territorial gains, Ukrainian officials are at pains to assert that this coming campaign is unlikely to be decisive. Instead, gains are more likely to be slow and incremental than sweeping and extensive.
Over the past year Ukraine has been forced to fight a war of attrition at truly punishing cost. Wars of attrition such as this are never quick, and it is naive to believe that it will be over soon. There is no room for the idea that “it will all be over by Christmas”; it won’t. And probably not the Christmas afterwards either. Sustaining this effort into the medium- (one to three years) and long-term ( two to 10 years) will require a prodigious industrial effort, and a step-change in the supply of military equipment, far greater than what we have already seen. Whatever the situation is at the end of this summer’s series of operations, Russia is not going away. The threat from the east will persist.
