[SS from essay by Dan Altman, Associate Professor of Political Science at Georgia State University.]
Two ideas dominate discussions about how to bring the war in Ukraine closer to an end: the West should either pressure Ukraine to make concessions to Russia or support Ukraine’s efforts to win on the battlefield. Both approaches rightly recognize that negotiations will remain futile until changing circumstances compel one side to accept peace terms that it rejects today. Nonetheless, neither approach is likely to end the war.
Withholding arms from Ukraine could eventually force it to offer concessions to Russia as part of a desperate attempt to end the war, but advocates of this approach overlook how it would also affect Russia’s war aims. Moscow would react to its newfound military advantages by doubling down on its most extreme demands—further territorial gains in places such as Kharkiv and Odessa, regime change, demilitarization, and more. Any willingness in Kyiv to make concessions would be offset by Moscow’s newly expanded war aims. The result would be Russian gains on the battlefield, not peace.
Actual_Cygnus on
As usual, the mouthpieces of the warmongers convincing us that the opponent won’t last. Well our record in Vietnam and Afghanistan don’t exactly corroborate that.
This is telling us “don’t look up!”
Major_Wayland on
It is kinda confusing to read that “negotiations would be futile blah-blah” when no attempt is even made to conduct them, and when we see “peace conferences” to which one of the warring parties is deliberately not invited.
3 Comments
[SS from essay by Dan Altman, Associate Professor of Political Science at Georgia State University.]
Two ideas dominate discussions about how to bring the war in Ukraine closer to an end: the West should either pressure Ukraine to make concessions to Russia or support Ukraine’s efforts to win on the battlefield. Both approaches rightly recognize that negotiations will remain futile until changing circumstances compel one side to accept peace terms that it rejects today. Nonetheless, neither approach is likely to end the war.
Withholding arms from Ukraine could eventually force it to offer concessions to Russia as part of a desperate attempt to end the war, but advocates of this approach overlook how it would also affect Russia’s war aims. Moscow would react to its newfound military advantages by doubling down on its most extreme demands—further territorial gains in places such as Kharkiv and Odessa, regime change, demilitarization, and more. Any willingness in Kyiv to make concessions would be offset by Moscow’s newly expanded war aims. The result would be Russian gains on the battlefield, not peace.
As usual, the mouthpieces of the warmongers convincing us that the opponent won’t last. Well our record in Vietnam and Afghanistan don’t exactly corroborate that.
This is telling us “don’t look up!”
It is kinda confusing to read that “negotiations would be futile blah-blah” when no attempt is even made to conduct them, and when we see “peace conferences” to which one of the warring parties is deliberately not invited.