Battlefield And Diplomatic Odds Stacking Against Ukraine

Zelensky wants an accelerated path to NATO membership. He is also asking for a NATO-enforced no-fly zone over Western Ukraine and more air-defense systems for the country to better protect its own skies.

Other key elements of the plan involve permission to use Western-supplied long-range missiles against targets deep inside Russia, the delivery of long-range German Taurus ballistic missiles and significant investment into Ukraine's defense industry.

Most of these demands are non-starters in Western capitals. That much was already clear during Zelensky's trip to New York and Washington in mid-September.

The Ukrainian president managed to get his US counterpart to authorize US$8 billion in further security assistance. However, there has been no progress on lifting the restrictions that the US and other allies are placing on Ukraine's use of Western military aid against Russian territory.

The Western alliance remains divided on this. And the US is particularly skeptical of its strategic value.

Similarly, the prospect of Ukraine joining NATO continues to be remote – not least as it would require the consent of all 32 current member states. The Slovak prime minister, Robert Fico, has openly stated that he will veto Ukraine's accession to the alliance. His Hungarian counterpart, Victor Orban, is also well known for his opposition to Kiev joining the alliance.

More damaging to Ukraine's NATO aspirations, however, is a similar reluctance in both Washington and Berlin. This has been key in ensuring that the two most recent NATO summits in Vilnius in 2023 and Washington in 2024 only reaffirmed that“Ukraine's future is in NATO” but failed to attach a clear timeline to it.

At the end of his meeting with the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, on October 11, Zelensky secured another 1.4 billion euros (US$1.52 billion) worth of air defenses, tanks, drones and artillery, to be jointly delivered by Germany, Belgium, Denmark and Norway.

But Taurus ballistic missiles – top of Kiev's shopping list – are not included in this package. While predictable, this was a major disappointment for Zelensky. As was the fact that he essentially walked away empty-handed from his meetings in London , Paris and Rome .

There is no indication that any of these major allies are likely to withdraw their support. But it is equally clear that they are not prepared to increase it decisively.

This was also evident during the visit to Kiev of the new NATO secretary-general, Mark Rutte , on October 3. Rutte traveled to Ukraine within days of assuming the role to reiterate the continuation of the alliance's support. But as symbolically important as this was, he merely confirmed what had already been agreed rather than announcing anything new.

The EU did marginally better. On October 10 it was announced the bloc was set to extend the training program for Ukrainian troops until the end of 2026. The mission was launched in November 2022 and has trained some 60,000 troops to date. That's about half of all Ukrainian soldiers trained abroad – and three times the number who received training from the US.

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The EU's overall aid to Ukraine now stands at 162 billion euros since the beginning of the war in 2022, compared to 84 billion euros from the US. Two-thirds of US aid is military in nature, and with almost 57 billion euros to date, it dwarfs the contributions by Germany and the UK, the two next-largest donors with around 10 billion euros each.

These are impressive numbers and there can be no doubt that Ukraine would have lost this war long ago without support from its Western allies. Yet, the fact is that what Ukraine's Western partners currently provide is barely enough to prevent a Ukrainian defeat, let alone enable Ukraine to implement its victory plan.

Vladimir Putin has consistently raised his country's war effort to meet any challenges presented over the course of the conflict. Unless the West doubles down on its support to allow Kiev to do the same, not only will Ukraine not win this war, it is in serious danger of losing it.

The high-level meeting planned for Ramstein would have been the opportunity for the West to change gears decisively. Ukraine can only hope that its postponement, rather than outright cancellation, means its allies may yet step up to the plate.

Stefan Wolff is professor of international security, University of Birmingham

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article .

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