Timothy Garton Ash is the author, most recently of Homelands: a Personal History of Europe.
Unless the United States gives bolder leadership on long-term security for Ukraine at NATO’s Vilnius summit this week, historians may one day ask, “Who lost Ukraine?” And the shocking answer might be: U.S. President Joe Biden.
I say this after talking to a wide range of people in Kyiv last week. There’s still the extraordinary fighting spirit that I found on my last visit in February. But in five months, some people seem to have aged five years.
While the Biden administration worries at every single step about escalation, Vladimir Putin has continued to escalate – notably with the blowing-up of the Kakhovka dam. In a recent poll, 78 per cent of Ukrainians said they have close family members or friends who have been wounded or killed since Russia’s invasion last year. The pain is partly masked by the adrenalin of resistance, but after the war, the country will face a tsunami of trauma.
Senior defence officials have acknowledged how slowly this summer’s counteroffensive is progressing. The big push by Western-trained and equipped brigades is yet to come. Crucially, Russia is stronger in the skies, hence the constant Ukrainian insistence on the need for more air defence.
In a survey this May, 87 per cent of Ukrainians said they were optimistic about their country’s future, but there’s an increasingly sober mood in private. Experts estimate as many as one in every five Ukrainian children is now outside the country. The Kyiv School of Economics has shared their projection that, on current trends, the work force will decline from 17 million to 11 million. It’s a daunting challenge to produce the jobs, housing and schools without which millions of Ukrainians will not return from abroad.
So when I say, “Who lost Ukraine?” I don’t mean losing the war. I mean losing the peace: a country exhausted, ravaged, traumatized, still robbed of some of its territory, a land in limbo. For this is now Mr. Putin’s brutal, vengeful objective: if he can’t force Ukraine back into the Russian empire, he will try to ruin it.
U.S. military support is essential for Ukraine to win the war. Long-term security is essential for it to win the peace. Without security, there will be little investment, fewer returnees, and no successful reconstruction. And that ultimately means NATO membership. While U.S. assistance to Ukraine has been massive and indispensable, Europe is now ahead in its strategic stance toward the embattled country. The EU has done what NATO has not: unambiguously committed to Ukrainian membership. As elsewhere in central and eastern Europe since 1989, this is already having a transformative impact on the country’s politics and policies.
Europeans are also ahead when it comes to calling for a strong statement from the Vilnius summit on Ukraine’s future NATO membership. In what one Kyiv think-tanker called a “magic transformation” of the French position, President Emmanuel Macron has come out strongly in favour. Germany is more hesitant, but Kyiv’s biggest problem is now in Washington.
Ukrainians are realistic. They know they can’t join NATO while there’s a war on. They want what they call a “political invitation,” which would be implemented only when conditions are right. As a bridge to that moment, they seek security commitments from leading NATO powers. Those powers would undertake supplying the military means necessary for Ukraine to fight off the aggressor, akin to what the U.S. does for Israel, but from multiple partners and with a clear path to eventual NATO membership.
At this writing, Mr. Biden is still not there. On Sunday, he told CNN that Ukraine is not ready for NATO membership and that Israel-style security arrangements should be available “if there is a ceasefire, if there is a peace agreement.” Cross-checking this with public and private statements by senior U.S. officials, one detects a rather hard-nosed stance. NATO membership is to be deployed as a future reward for Ukraine negotiating the best peace it can get.
If this were to be the outcome of the Vilnius summit, there would be massive disappointment in Ukraine. Left to fight on for another 500 days, without a firm promise of future security, even the bravest of the brave would find it difficult to rebuild their battered, exhausted, traumatized country. But if the West gives Ukraine the means to win this war, adding a firm promise of future NATO membership, then Europe will be much more capable of defending itself against a weakened Russia.
The final decision will only be taken this week, over the leaders’ table in Vilnius. Come on, Mr. President. Do the right, the bold, the truly strategic thing. History is watching you.