Peace How?

New Thinking for a New World - a Tallberg Foundation Podcast

Amid Ukraine's conflict, George Beebe of the Quincy Institute emphasizes Western support to prevent defeat while advocating crucial negotiations.

As Ukraine’s war enters its third year, it’s past time to dampen the rhetoric and tune up the reality. The war has shifted from failed Russian blitzkrieg, to valiant Ukrainian defense and then recovery, to unsuccessful Ukrainian counteroffensive, and now to war of attrition. But small countries—Ukraine’s effective population is only 1/5th of Russia’s and its economy only 1/10th the size of Russia’s—rarely win wars of attrition.

The conventional wisdom is that Western support can make up the difference. Wouldn’t a more realistic assessment be that such support—assuming it continues in ever greater magnitudes—can only prevent Ukraine from losing? Shouldn’t the expectation be that Russia, having overcome the bumbling and ineptitude of the first year of the war, is likely to push hard this spring at least to complete the seizure of Ukraine’s eastern oblasts? And then what?

Our guest on this week's New Thinking for a New World podcast has some clear ideas about the balance of forces, the risk of a Russian victory, and the contours of a potential negotiation that might lay the groundwork for renewed peace in Europe. George Beebe, director of the Grand Strategy Program at the Quincy Institute in Washington and a Russian expert, insists that such a negotiation requires continued US support for Ukraine. But he also insists that it's time for diplomacy.

Beebe and co-author Anatol Lieven recently published a must-read analysis entitled The Diplomatic Path to a Secure Ukraine and discussed his conclusions with host Alan Stoga.

What do you think? Should the United States push Ukraine towards negotiations?