Afrasianet - Mohamed Farag - Western investment in more Russian-Ukrainian war means more possibilities of Ukrainian suicide, not only on the frontlines, but also "historical suicide" and "political annihilation."
Despite Kiev's recent attacks on Russian soil, Russia's Ukraine negotiations are ongoing in Turkey, and it seems that the field does not carry serious changes in the strategic reality in favor of Ukraine or the West.
Various sources say that more than 40 aircraft were damaged, and Moscow does not give details on the extent of the damage, and if we believe the Western version in terms of the extent of the damage, this does not change much for Russia, which has more than 4,200 aircraft, including 833 combat aircraft (according to Global Fair Power).
Even during the war, Russia continued to export weapons, and with reference of course to the decline in export rates; between 2015-2019, Russia was in second place in the world in arms exports, with a share of 21% of the total arms exports in the world (according to the well-known SIPRI Center), and between 2020-2024 (according to the same source), Russia became in third place, after the United States and France, with a share of 7.5% of global arms exports.
That Russia fights a war and continues to export weapons shows that defeat in the military field is unlikely, but this does not negate that Russia, because of the attack itself, suffered a security breach first, and its absolute protectionist image was damaged second, and had to deal with a new factor in the negotiation process third. Ukraine can try battlefield adventures against Russia, with the support of the West, but Western investment in more war means more chances of Ukrainian suicide, not on the frontlines. Not only, but also "historical suicide" and "political annihilation".
The readings of the Russian thinker, Alexander Dugin, after the first year of the confrontation, are still working effectively in anticipating its future, and he put 3 possibilities for its results:
1. A minimal Russian victory: Russian control of Lugansk, Donetsk, Zaparozhya and Kherson, which seems to be achievable, especially after the Russian statement on the buffer zone.
2. Half-victory, in which Kharkov, Odessa and Nikolaev are added to the regions in the minimum victory.
3. An absolute victory, in what Dugin called the complete liberation of Ukraine.
French historian and futurist Emmanuel Todd and Dugin intersect with a central idea about confrontation: Ukraine is an existential battle for Russia, but not for the United States, so both argue that more investment in the war cannot dissuade Russia, but will increase its counter-investment in arms until its goals are achieved.
While Dugin considers in his article (Ukraine in the Great Game) that Ukraine did not exist historically in its modern political framework, Emmanuel Todd considers that there are 3 Ukraine:
1. Extreme Ukraine: Rural in the West, its tradition is Roman - Catholic, recently made political elites.
2. Anarchic Ukraine: Individualistic Orthodoxy in the middle, which has not succeeded in creating a state; produces a military and security elite.
3. Non-standard Ukraine: Russian industrialization in the east, the Soviet era was the basis for its inception, and was the source of the middle class (which Todd considers the basis for building a state - nation), but this middle class migrated to Russia, and this analysis is consistent with various reports issued by the United Nations and the International Labor Organization, which showed during the years before the war, the number of immigrants from Ukraine to Russia, specifically from the eastern regions.
After the start of the Atlantic-Russian confrontation in Ukraine in 2022, Ukraine is not faced with the options of victory or defeat, but in fact it is facing the test of political survival, after losing its industrial eastern flank, which turned into an "unnormative Ukraine" due to discriminatory policies against Russians (not Russians) in the east, Ukraine today finds itself facing the test of preserving a state without its main lever historically (industrial class and middle class).
In 2014, Yanukovych realized this equation, and it has nothing to do with his personal relationship with Russia or the extent of his support for it, as he knows that Ukraine will not exist depending on a chaotic center and an extreme West! A relationship with the EU will not help build a state in light of the collapse of the internal component.
In his book "The Defeat of the West", Emmanuel Todd argues that Ukraine is living in a state of suicidal unrealism, and that Kiev's strategy demonstrates Ukraine's underlying pathological attachment to Russia; before the confrontation, Russia was demanding 3 clear points (preserving Crimea, that the population of the Donbass have an acceptable status, and that Ukraine stands on the sidelines in the Russian confrontation with the West).
It was not difficult for Ukraine to accept these conditions; the Czechs and Slovaks, after the collapse of the Soviet system, separated from each other, and were founded from the womb of Czechoslovakia, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, but Ukraine did not even think about these solutions, as if to say "we want the West, we do not want to separate from Russia", and so Kiev's strategy was like political suicide!