End Game in Ukraine

War is a test of will and capability. The test has been run. We now know the will and capability of the parties.

I have repeatedly predicted that the war will end real soon now, and repeatedly been wrong. My repeated error was to assume that individuals would respond rationally to the situation, once it was revealed. Rational individual behaviour for a Ukrainian who is not yet in the army is to go into hiding, and most Ukrainians have done so. Outside of the capital, the streets are empty, and those in the capital still wandering around are the “golden boys”, strangely immune from conscription. If you are in the Ukrainian army, rational behaviour is to desert, mutiny, or surrender, and while a large number have done so, most have not. Those who fail to make the rational decision will die soon, if no deal is made.

知己知彼，百战不殆 . If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.

The western ruling elite knows neither itself nor the enemy, and among the many things the elite does not know, our elite has its head in the sand about what the war has revealed. Given that respective will and capability is now known, the rational collective action is to cut whatever deal can be made. Which will be, like the various World War I armistices that ended each war of attrition within the greater war, a very bad deal, because if you keep on going, you lose what few bargaining chips you have. Wars of attrition tend to end like that, because by the time reality becomes undeniable, the losing side is out of chips.

After World War I, the German high command cut a rational deal, which is to say, an absolutely horrifyingly bad deal in which they conceded disarmament and vast amounts of territory that they still controlled when they signed to deal. That was not a stab in the back, though Germans tended to perceive it as that. A government was installed in Germany which did, however, stab Germans in the back. A rational Ukrainian deal is going to look like the deal that ended World War I.

A rational deal, given that the West is has few bargaining chips left, is that sanctions end, Russia gets Donbass and the Ukrainian coast as its internationally recognised borders, gets a lot more territory than it currently controls, a mutual security arrangement with Nato guaranteeing the security of both, the Ukraine is disarmed, forever excluded from becoming part of Nato, and becomes Finlandised, and that a transit corridor between Russia and Kalingrad is excluded from Nato. Trump, being a great negotiator, and Putin being a terrible negotiator, could probably get something better, maybe a whole lot better, but the chips on the table are what they are. An achievable deal is going to wind up looking something like that. If it does not look much like the deal that ended World War I, it would not be rational for Putin to agree to it. (Albeit lots of people negotiating with Trump, like lots of people negotiating with Bill Gates, have wound up with deals that in retrospect do not look very rational.)

Our elite, however, is not rational. Any remotely realistic deal would be denounced as a stab in the back. “RussiaRussiaRussia” “Trump is a Putin stooge.”

Russia does not want to conquer all of Ukraine. It very much does not want to conquer the parts where the population is non Russian. But it also does very much want to eliminate the Ukraine’s military capability, which if no deal can be made might require it to destroy everything and kill everyone insufficiently Russian in the Ukraine. Which would take a long time. If I was a Ukrainian, would be practising my Russian.

The settlement of the Chechen war offers a model. Chechnya is not an assimilated part of Russia, but is now a separate and very well treated nation within the the greater Russian Empire, Those Chechens still alive seem to feel that they got a pretty good deal, and are sincere and enthusiastic Russian patriots. This was, however accomplished by an eliminationist policy. Those Chechens that did not buy into the deal, died, and the deal was not settled until Chechnya was levelled to the ground. There was enormous destruction, enormous refugee flight, and enormous civilian casualties.

What happened was that Russia found individual Chechens who were individually quite willing to make a rational deal, a deal that was quite generous, and those individuals are Chechnya now. Similarly, when in the course of destroying Ukrainian military capability, it finds itself conquering turf where direct Russian rule is unwise, it is going to find individuals who are willing to take the deal of a Finlandised Ukraine.

In that case, a Finlandised Ukrainian government up to the Nato border, and Nato refusing it recognition, and a state of war or near war between Nato and Russia. If no deal between Nato and Russia recognising the outcome, and granting mutual security and recognised borders, then next up, the Kalingrad corridor and Baltic coast, assuming the nukes do not fly first.