Dear American friend, why the hell should You care about Ukraine?
Summary of Topics
“Why should we send even a cent more to that corrupt country on the other side of the world when we can’t even take care of our problems back home?”
That sums up a view that is still in the minority in the United States but a view that is slowly growing. As a Finnish citizen and future American, I hope to shed some light on the question for my American friends. To be frank, I am frustrated at how poorly that question has been answered for the public in the States.
Simply put, supporting Ukraine to victory with our European and global allies increases Your and your children’s safety and wealth, guarantees a lower price on the gas pump, and is the right thing to do for a country fighting for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It is an investment with a great payoff without shedding any American blood.
In short, it is an investment that pays dividends for all Americans whereas the alternative makes you weaker, poorer, less safe, and most likely results in massive American deaths.
Why should you listen to me?
I grew up in Finland, a neighboring country to Russia with whom we’ve had 40 wars in the last thousand years[1 ]. My grandparents’ generation paid for our right to exist with blood to Russia as the Ukrainians are doing right now. I grew up studying wars from Hammurabi and Ramesses II to Hitler, Stalin, FDR, and Churchill to the conflicts of the 21st century. I’ve studied history, and been an avid follower of American and world politics since I was a kid. I served in the military, and still am an active intelligence officer in reserve in the Finnish Defence Forces. I might not be an expert and scholar but I have some perspective that most don’t have.
Russia’s long history as an Agent of Chaos
For the past 20 years, Russian President Vladimir Putin has over and over again fought against American hegemony not just with speeches but with active means of hybrid warfare. He wants to bring old Soviet satellite countries such as Ukraine back to Russia’s sphere of influence and by doing that to build Russia as a countering force against American interests[2 ]. The stronger Russia becomes the more chaos such as political interference[3 ][4 ][5 ], cyberattacks[6 ], industrial espionage[7 ], assassinations[8 ][9 ], and simply turning other countries against the US[10 ], Russia can do, which it has already been doing in the past 23 years under Putin’s rule. These are means of hybrid and information warfare[11 ].
Disinformation[12 ], bribing foreign journalists[13 ], governmental officials[14 ], and politicians[15 ], supporting destructive internal divisions[16 ], planting false narratives[17 ], and meddling in the elections of other countries have been core activities of Russian foreign policy since the 1920s[19 ][20 ]. These were then led by Cheka, the earlier version of KGB, and are now organized by modern Russian intelligence agencies FSB, SVR, and GRU. The same tactics have been used against the US and Europe during Putin’s regime, are being used as we speak, and will be used long after Putin’s demise. As part of this, Putin is building a new axis of authoritarian countries with China, North Korea, and Iran where Russia is the connecting centerpiece. Iran and China have supported Russia’s invasion of Ukraine with equipment while Iran even opened a new front in Gaza using Hamas as a proxy to divide and weaken the West.
And make no mistake, Putin and Russia won’t stop in Ukraine, if they are allowed to win. Since the violent Mongol rule in Russia in the 1200s there has been a culture of constant fear of someone conquering and attacking Russia, especially by surprise[21 ]. The Polish invaded Moscow in the 1600s, Napoleon 200 years later, and Hitler tried it 80 years ago finishing just 10 miles short of Moscow. The Russian strategy has been the same since Ivan the Terrible in the 1500s: to conquer more and more land around Russia to create a buffer zone. We can call this Russian Imperialism or whatever we like, but in concrete terms, it is about expanding the sphere of influence and territory around Russia as much as possible. The only thing that has stood between Russia and its sovereign neighbors is having the strength to fight back, either with deterrents or with actual war when needed. Agreements have been and will be worthless. Ask the Chechenyas when Russia signed a peace treaty with them in 1997 which Putin nullified in 1999 by bombing their capital into rubble[22 ] while setting up filtration camps for genocide[23 ]. Oh wait, you can’t ask them, because they are all dead.
Why does helping Ukraine make You safer and wealthier?
Suppose Russia is allowed to win in Ukraine using its imaginary redlines with insinuations of nuclear threats. In that case, it will bolden countries such as Iran and North Korea to develop and use their nuclear capabilities as leverage to do whatever they want. Russia has already backtracked these redlines over 50 times[24 ] during the Ukraine war but it doesn’t seem to diminish their power when it comes to deterring Western leaders or media. How weak do you think China will see the US when a country with allies with tens of times larger GDP, ten times larger population, and military capabilities than Russia doesn’t have the will to support Ukraine to win?
It is an open path for China to take Taiwan with force. Taiwan produces 90% of the world’s semiconductors and advanced microchips, which are used from the device you’re using to read this to cars, military systems, and most electronic products. That would result in a global economic meltdown unless the US puts boots on the ground to fight China resulting likely in massive American deaths.
Do you see where this is going?
Which option can create stability not just in the world but in your neighborhood and personal life?
Do you think the gas price will be lower in the more stable world or in a world that has an empowered Russia fighting against Europe, Iran against Israel and the Middle-East dominance, North Korea against South Korea, and China against Taiwan??
How do you think the cost of living will rise in that world? Might I say, it would dwarf what you’ve experienced in the past couple of years?
“Can Ukraine even win?”
War is a battle of Wills. Ukrainians have the resolve that my grandparents’ generation had when the Russians attacked Finland in 1939. The fighting lasted until 1945. There is no reason, why Ukrainians cannot win but they need the resources to win, to restore the 1991 borders that existed before Russia occupied Crimea in 2014 and made eastern Ukraine a warzone.
“But we gave them a lot of support and their counteroffensive didn’t succeed?”
No. The US and its allies started well but were then over and over again deterred by the Kremlin. Whether it was drunken ex-president Medvedev or chief “diplomat” Lavrov hinting at Russia’s nuclear capabilities, the US and Germany hesitated not to cross Putin’s imaginary redlines regarding the delivery of anti-tank weapons, Western tanks, long-range missiles, air defense weapons, fighter jets, and the list goes on. Slowly we’ve given almost all of them to Ukraine but that’s how we made the counteroffensive less effective.
We gave Russians nine months to fortify and mine the whole of southern Ukraine without giving Ukraine adequate means to prevent it. Western support in military equipment has been a drip-drip method and a play of “no, we’re not giving you that because of this and this excuse….okay we might give you them….okay here you go”. How can you plan for a counteroffensive when you don’t know what the hell you get and when you get it?
For the Ukrainian counteroffensive, we gave 85(!?) modern tanks[25 ], less than three tank battalions or a tank brigade. Ukraine finally got its 31 Abrams tanks from the US when the counteroffensive had run for five months. At the same time, the US has over 6,000 Abrams tanks which were produced especially for the Russian threat, and of which at least 3,500 are rotting in storage. Europe has 2,200 Leopard 2 tanks. The excuses for not giving Ukraine e.g. 10% of the US stock and 20% of European stock are mind-boggling. That would give over 1,000 modern tanks to Ukraine. Most likely they don’t need that many but if needed there is no reason we couldn’t do that. It is a matter of Will.
Do we want Ukraine to win?
Tanks are only one part of modern warfare. You need to have all the different capabilities and know how to use them in tandem. This is called combined arms warfare. You also need armored personnel carriers, air defense systems, artillery, long-rage missiles including cruise missiles, and fighter jets among else. We’re just now getting to the point where Ukraine will receive most of these. Still, the long-range missiles that could make Crimea unattainable and break the Russian logistics in Southern Ukraine are missing. These are crucial capabilities to achieve victory. The US delivered 20(!?) mid-range ATACM missiles with cluster bomb warheads instead of the longer-range versions with almost double the range and equipped with a powerful unitary warhead. The punchline of this joke is that the US has nearly 1,500 of them in stock and Lockheed Martin can produce 500 of them per year[26 ].
领英推荐
Again, do we want Ukraine to win?
Need for time, training, and serious numbers
The thing with combined arms warfare is, that it’s bloody hard. Ukrainians don’t need just equipment training but warfare training with these new capabilities. Six months of training is needed for equipment and company or battalion-level tactics. The army corps-level training they need takes at least 12 months. There is no reason why we didn’t give all these capabilities with the training during the last year and a half. Ukraine would have been ready for this summer’s counteroffensive and for the next one. And they could now wage more effective warfare during the winter months to destroy Russian logistics. If all the equipment and warfare training had started last year’s summer, they would have been ready this summer and with the equipment could have prevented effective Russian fortifications during that time. The results would have been different and the land bridge to Crimea most likely would have been cut off as well as the Kerch bridge between Russia and Crimea. It would have been the D-day for Ukraine and the beginning of the end for Russians. And remember, it took almost a year after the D-day for the Allies until the Nazis were defeated in the World War 2.
As the tank case above illustrates, another point is to have enough of these systems. According to Lockheed Martin, the manufacturer of F-16 fighter jets, there are currently 3,100 F-16s operated in the world[27 ]. The US alone has close to 1,000. Getting 5% of that total sum, 150 F-16s, to Ukraine shouldn’t be a deal breaker. Sweden has also expressed its willingness to deliver some of their Jas Gripens to Ukraine. This would enable crucial local air superiority and new operational capabilities in any counteroffensive.
“Okay, what’s the price tag for Ukraine to win?”
150 used F-16s are worth $3 to $10B[28 ][29 ][30 ]. 600 used Abrams[31 ][32 ] and 400 used Leopard 2 tanks cost closer to $10B[33 ]. Add similar amounts to a couple of thousands of armored personnel carriers, artillery, air defense, missiles, ammunition, etc. and you would get a price tag of around $50 to 100B. For Europe and the US, that amount is pocket change. Even if we double or triple that number. That with proper training would kick Russia out of Ukraine. We can still do this and have Russians out of Ukraine by the end of next year or the summer of 2025.
For the US we are discussing amounts comparable to 5% of the annual military budget[34 ] or about 0.2% of GDP. The alternative scenarios will cost 10 to 100-fold to the US and its citizens[35 ][36 ][37 ]. It’s a no-brainer investment for the security and wealth of Americans, especially when all this support bolsters American manufacturing and jobs.
“The sanctions haven’t worked and Russia isn’t collapsing. How can we win?”
The sanctions have worked. They were never a quick fix but make no mistake, the Russian economy is bleeding and bleeding hard. Russian state’s oil and gas income has plummeted almost three quarters(!?) since the start of the war. This has created a $15 Billion monthly deficit in the Russian federal budget compared to 2021[38 ]. To understand the scale, the Russian annual military budget has been between $50 and $90 Billion[39 ], of which most have gone into corruption[40 ][41 ]. Russian officials will tell you how they’ve created alternative income sources to fill the gap but in truth, they are cannibalizing their economy with taxes and by burning their savings.
The war in Ukraine is costing around $1 billion every day for Russia[42 ][43 ]. Even with the $300 Billion plus available reserves[44 ] that they had before the war, their economy is in a phase where they burn their furniture to keep the house warm[45 ][46 ][47 ]. If the West stays strong and even tightens the sanctions, it is just a matter of time before the early 1900s type of civil unrest breaks out in Russia. Those were the end times of the former Russian Empire. Czar Nikolai II had waged an unsuccessful war against Japan while trying to expand Russian territory in Manchuria. Poor living standards, a worsening outlook for the future, mounting war casualties of the size that Russia has endured in Ukraine today (over 300,000 dead or wounded), and the mounting bad news of the war took people to the streets. It resulted in Bloody Sunday in 1905 and general strikes of nearly half a million people later the same year. The Czar had to create reforms to stay in power but furthermore, these events are considered an important shift in Russian society. Lenin called them a general rehearsal for the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917.
Russians won’t stand endlessly a combination of fighting bloody wars outside mother Russia while the people are starving due to their leader’s incompetent decisions. The last Czar of Russia, Nikolai II, got shot for it. This is not the Patriotic War of 1812 when Napoleon invaded Russia or the Great Patriotic War of the 1900s when Hitler invaded Russia. This is closer to Russia’s war in Afghanistan in the 1980s. At that time, the will and resolve of the Afghan people together with the Americans and Ronald Reagan led to Soviet Russia’s defeat. Where is that resolve now?
The weakness of Russian military capabilities
While the Russian economy is driving off the cliff, its industrial, and especially military capability isn’t doing well either. It is fragile and nothing like Stalin’s mobilized war economy in the Soviet Union. When Hitler was invading Russia, there was a unifying resolve fuelled by communism to protect the motherland. Not to mention the 400,000(!?) jeeps and trucks, 14,000 airplanes, 13,000 tanks, and countless other military and civilian material support delivered by the US and Allies during that time to help Soviet Russia’s war efforts[48 ]. Against this backdrop, our current support for Ukraine is close to a joke.
Russia has used most of its cruise missiles. They can produce 60 to 110 monthly[49 ] but those are most likely with diminished capacity and guidance systems. Ukraine's air defense is shooting them down with almost 90% accuracy[50 ]. They’ve lost most of their usable tanks and armored vehicles which they can again build only a handful in a month[51 ][52 ]. They can retrofit some of the old tanks but mostly the 60 or 70-year-old T-55s and T-62s because they lack modern technology and components[53 ][54 ]. They can’t produce or import these components due to sanctions, even when trying to subvert them. These old tanks are no match for the modern Western tanks. Drones need to be bought from Iran. They have practically no capability to produce modern fighter jets[55 ]. Even for basic dummy artillery shells Putin needed to please Kim Jong Un to get one million of them from North Korea. A third of them are likely duds or otherwise faulty[56 ]. And drafting no matter how many Russian men in their twenties doesn’t help[57 ]. They are cannon fodder with third-grade equipment and non-existing training and won’t turn into tank drivers or fighter jet pilots any time soon[58 ]. Russia has a history of turning its economy into a war economy so its capabilities could be much different in a few years. Still, in the foreseeable future, it looks very bleak.
What is holding us back?
So what are we waiting for? We in the West with our global allies have all the capabilities and capacities to bring this war to an end as soon as possible with a Ukrainian victory. Putin is relying on our self-deterrence and weakness. That’s his only card to play. So far it has shamefully worked resulting in drip-drip support just enough for Ukraine not to lose but not to win either. The nuclear threat was heightened only in the first couple of weeks of the war when we didn’t know for sure if Putin had gone to the deep end with his isolated paranoia.
When it was clear that the Russian army was amazingly bad and ill-prepared, Putin lost the possible tactical advantage that he might have gained by using a nuke in Ukraine. If Putin had used nukes then, he might have capitulated terms for Ukraine’s surrender. After it was clear that the Russian army was terrible and the Ukrainians could courageously push them back, that window of opportunity was lost. Now using nukes would only make things worse for Putin. He would lose all support from the world, especially from China. Internally people’s, oligarcs’, and military’s support would be trembling. It is questionable if they would even execute his order to launch a nuclear attack. And the main thing is he wouldn’t gain anything from it. It wouldn’t change a thing on the battlefield because his conventional armed forces are ineffective. He has only to lose from using nukes.
That said, the West, President Macron in France, especially Chancellor Scholtz in Germany, and even President Biden in the States have self-deterred from all the redlines from Moscow. We’ve stepped over plenty of them. Nothing has happened.
“The Will To Do It”
Almost all warfare is at its core a battle of Wills. It was so for Finnish people in the Winter War in 1939, a nation of 3.7 million people at the time fighting solely against the world’s largest nation, the Soviet Union, with a population of 170 million. Putin is relying on the lack of the will in the West. Ukraine has it but without the support of modern military equipment and training, the war will drag on longer, the destabilizing effects will grow, and you as an average American will pay a bigger bill than by taking decisive action now.
Soviet Russia sent the first man in history to space in 1961. The first American hadn’t even orbited the Earth when President Kennedy asked Werner von Braun, the chief architect of the Apollo Program, what it takes for the US to get to the Moon. Braun was quick to answer:
“The Will to do it.”
Eight years later the first man walked on the Moon.
We don’t need to muster the same collective power of a national Will as then. Just a fraction of our military equipment, training, tightening the sanctions, and ramping up our military production capabilities is enough. If we fail to do so, we might very well end up in a situation where we need that collective Will that took us to the Moon.
They had the Will then. Do we have it now?
Take Action:
PS. About the corruption. Based on international rankings Ukraine is below the mid-point in global rankings but better than Russia or the largest trade partner of the US, Mexico. Countries like Turkey, Brazil, and Argentina aren’t far from Ukraine. That said, there is corruption in Ukraine, and they’ve taken steps to reduce it throughout the war. The support Ukraine needs is tanks, fighter jets, armored vehicles, ATACM missiles, and other non-resellable equipment. In other words, how many Abrams tanks have you seen on sale on the black market? Not to mention the training offered by Western instructors.