Ukrainian expert: the West wants not to defeat Russia but to exhaust it at the expense of Ukraine

Translation of excerpts from a July 30 interview of Ukrainian diplomat Oleh Shamshur to the Obozrevatel:

"...The Chief of the General Staff and President Macron himself stated: the war in Europe has already begun. Yes, it continues for now outside the conditional 5th article, but de facto there is a war. This is not a perception, but a statement. And if we look not only within the EU, but at Europe as such, we are already in a state of conflict, the French say. Moreover: the West, in a broad sense, has already been drawn into these wars – albeit in a hybrid manner, albeit not in a direct phase.

Now, about the probability of a war in Europe in a more intense phase. It is absolutely real. It is not so much a question of "or" as "when". The French say 3-5 years. Some, like Grinkevich, even say 1.5 years. And this is not political panic - this is the position of people who have full access to intelligence data. And if this is their horizon, then it is justified. And here we come to a fundamental point. We are not simply dealing with "Putin's plans". We are dealing with a state model that is built for war. Russia today is a military economy. All its institutions, including social ones, have been rebuilt on the rails of permanent conflict. Not just the elites, but millions of Russians are financially interested in the war not ending. Why? Because these gigantic payments for many regions became the first "real money" in decades. In other words, Russia cannot get out of the war. It does not want to - this is secondary. It cannot. This state exists only as long as the export of internal chaos continues. Let us recall the Russian ideologist Surkov - "Russia lives only when it is able to export its internal instability." And this is not a metaphor...

And one more thing. When European leaders talk about one and a half, three, five years before a possible war, it looks strange. Because these same leaders admit that Europe will reach 5% of GDP defense spending only in ten years. 

- Is it difficult to reconcile these two theses? 

 - Exactly. When European leaders talk about one and a half, three, five years before a possible war, it looks strange. Because these same leaders admit that Europe will reach 5% of GDP defense spending only in ten years. It seems that now in the West, especially in Europe, the chosen course is not to defeat Russia, but to "exhaust" it at the expense of Ukraine. And here is the main mistake. Russia cannot simply be exhausted - it must be defeated on the battlefield. Otherwise, it will recover, adapt, and in a year and a half or five years we will no longer have a hybrid, but a front. Or fronts...

The world will go through a series of conflicts. Not necessarily a global war in the classic style of the 20th century. But regional fronts are no longer a scenario, they are a prospect. And the balance of power before the start of this new phase depends precisely on how the war in Ukraine ends. The recent statement by the Chinese Foreign Minister is precisely about this. China cannot allow Russia to be defeated, because this defeat will be China’s defeat in its global game with the US and the West. The longer the war in Ukraine lasts, the more the West is drawn in – the more advantageous it is for China. It will gain time. It will gain weakened partners. It will gain a window to prepare for a major confrontation...

The main safeguard for Putin’s plans and, more broadly, for the entire coalition of aggressors, is transatlantic unity. There are two levels here. The first is Europe. It seems to have finally crawled out of a warm bed. It has started to move, but without a sense of urgency... The lack of frank conversation with one's own society is a fundamental problem. Europeans need to be honest: what is at stake is not fuel prices, but survival...

The second level is the United States. And here it is more complicated. Because the Trump factor is no longer just an element of chaos. This is, excuse me, a permanent reformatting of the very architecture of the West. What is pushing Trump? First of all, the idea of America First. In his head, America is a victim: everyone exploits it, and it pays. And so he, they say, restores order. Plus his characteristic personalization of politics: "I said to raise defense budgets - you raised them. That means I am effective." But the problem is deeper: Trump, it seems, does not see the value in alliances as such. He thinks transactionally: "What you give me - that's what matters." Remember the tariff wars with the EU, the agreements that he considered victories... But these "victories" destroy the fabric of allied relations. And it is this fabric that is the basis of the Western world...

 

The problem is that Americans can only understand the error of this path when the consequences are already obvious and painful. This is the case when geopolitical stupidity is corrected not by analysis, but by a catastrophe. If they manage to do it before the catastrophe, that would be good. But for now, unfortunately, as you said, the stars are not in favor of the democratic world, and especially for Ukraine.

 

- Why do you think this is so? Why are Europeans already talking about the inevitability of war, but then adding: in 10 years we will raise defense budgets by 5%, if possible. This is dissonance. Do they hope that Putin will not dare? Or that Trump will not leave Europe?

 

– It sounds trivial, but it seems that their subconscious is triggered: “we’ll weave between the drops.” That is, everyone sees the threat, everyone is horrified, but deep down there remains the hope that “it will somehow pass by.” That it will all be possible to settle this in some gentle way. But this is self-deception. It won’t work out peacefully. It simply won’t work out...   

- What about the loud statements? The commander of the US ground forces in Europe and Africa, General Christopher Donahue, said that if necessary, NATO is capable of capturing the Kaliningrad region in a short time. Major General of the German Armed Forces Christian Freuding proposed preemptive strikes on Russian airfields and military infrastructure in order to counter missile and drone attacks on Ukraine. Are these real plans or just rhetoric?

 

– I would like to believe that these are not just words. But Putin sees everything: drones are not shot down over Ukraine, Russian missiles fly over NATO – no response. So why should he take these statements seriously? To him, it looks like a bluff. And that is precisely why Medvedev allows himself what he allows himself. This is not drunken delirium – this is a systemic test of Western tolerance for the Kremlin’s insanity. And as we can see – no reaction. After all, no one blocks Medvedev’s social networks. And this is also a signal."