Four years into Russia\u2019s war in Ukraine, the principal actors have been radically transformed. For its part, Russia has morphed into an openly militaristic, anti-Western country. A society that after 1945 embraced the saying \u201canything but war\u201d has now reconciled itself to the role of aggressor.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Western hopes that the full-scale invasion of Ukraine would catalyze resistance to Russian President Vladimir Putin\u2019s regime proved misplaced. Russians merely adapted. Aside from Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin\u2019s aborted mutiny in June 2023, Putin\u2019s grip on power has not been challenged. Dissidents have left, died<\/a>, or fallen silent. Whether through propaganda, fear, or conviction, the public has acquiesced<\/a>.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Ukraine has reforged its identity as a nation fighting for survival. By sustaining a defensive war against a much larger adversary, it has reaffirmed its sovereignty and its place in the European house. But this has come at a staggering cost: the loss of roughly one-fifth of Ukrainian territory<\/a>, hundreds of thousands of people dead or wounded, millions displaced, and profound damage to its infrastructure and economy.<\/p>\n Yet the most consequential transformation has taken place within the Western coalition. The decades-old alliance of liberal democracies was widely seen as the world\u2019s dominant military and economic force, capable of upholding a rules-based order. Certain features were axiomatic: U.S. leadership, NATO\u2019s unity, and a commitment to collective deterrence.<\/p>\n Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky (center) waits for a \u201cfamily photo\u201d with European leaders and U.S. representatives during talks on how to end the war in Ukraine, seen in Berlin on Dec. 15, 2025. Among the group: NATO chief Mark Rutte (back left); U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff (right of Zelensky); and Jared Kushner, U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s son-in-law (far right).Lisi Niesner\/AFP via Getty Images<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n During the Cold War, that order was sustained not only by shared values but also by the power balance between two competing systems: the capitalist West and the communist Soviet Union. NATO\u2019s military strength and U.S. security guarantees created clear expectations about how aggression would be met. When the Cold War ended, the institutions remained but the discipline that sustained those expectations softened, and enforced realities became assumptions.<\/p>\n One such assumption was that the Western coalition would not tolerate disorder in its house. Russia\u2019s full-scale invasion of Ukraine stress-tested that premise\u2014and found it wanting. What began as a united front against Russian aggression in 2022 has given way to a fractured alliance<\/a> with a de facto leader, the United States, now seeking a peace agreement on terms unfavorable to both Ukraine<\/a> and its European allies. This transformation severely undermines long-held beliefs about the West\u2019s unity, resolve, and credible deterrence.<\/p>\n Russia\u2019s invasion did not destroy the rules-based order but, rather, revealed how uncertain the West had become about enforcing it. In its hesitant support for Ukraine, the Western coalition showed that the stable post-World War II order may have turned out to be an illusion. The longer the war in Ukraine goes on, the further it erodes Western credibility and influence\u2014and the harder it becomes to restore the authority that the West once took for granted.<\/p>\n A single rose is seen at a freshly dug grave at a cemetery in Kharkiv, Ukraine, on Feb. 24. Chris McGrath\/Getty Images<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n At the war\u2019s outset in 2022, the West cast itself as a concerned bystander\u2014as it had in 2014, when Putin launched his opening salvo in Crimea<\/a>. For years, some leaders misread Russia\u2019s revanchism<\/a> as the convulsions of a declining empire or mistook Ukraine for a Russian client state, while others feared escalation. A full-scale ground war in Europe left little room for equivocation.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Most Western leaders condemned Russian aggression, promised aid, and imposed sanctions on Putin\u2019s inner circle. But when it came to military muscle, the coalition wavered: Ukraine\u2019s plea to close the sky went unanswered<\/a>, and long-range missiles were supplied only gradually and with restrictions. The ultimate enforcement\u2014sending NATO troops to Ukraine\u2014was never seriously considered.<\/p>\n Rather than exploit Russian overreach\u2014when an ill-equipped Moscow boasted it would take Kyiv \u201cin three days,\u201d and later, when Ukrainian forces shattered Russian lines near Kharkiv\u2014the Western coalition chose to merely manage the conflict. That gave Putin time to recalibrate: He announced partial mobilization, stabilized the front, and adapted Russia\u2019s war footing. Ukraine, meanwhile, received just enough support to continue fighting but not to force a decisive shift.<\/p>\n Washington\u2019s cautious approach to escalating military aid, shaped by concerns about a direct confrontation with Moscow, set a \u201cwait and see\u201d tone for the Western coalition at a moment when Russia\u2019s battlefield position was visibly unraveling. Governments argued over which weapons to supply, how quickly to deliver them, and how much risk they were willing to accept. The Baltic states, Poland, and the United Kingdom aggressively pushed for sending tanks, while Germany hesitated for months<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n A handout photo released by the news service of the Ukrainian Ground Forces shows an aerial view of destroyed buildings in the front-line town of Kostyantynivka, located in the Donetsk region, on Nov. 12, 2025. Iryna Rybakova \/ 93rd Separate Mechanized Brigade\/ AFP via Getty Images<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n These divisions were minor compared to what came next. During his 2024 campaign, now-U.S. President Donald Trump cast support for Ukraine as wasteful. But once he took office, Trump did not fulfill his promise<\/a> to end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. Instead, he upended the U.S. place within the Western coalition\u2014disparaging and sidelining Ukrainian<\/a> and other European leaders<\/a>, questioning NATO\u2019s relevance, and suggesting that allies failing to meet defense spending targets<\/a> might be left to fend for themselves<\/a>. He even threatened<\/a> to encourage Putin to \u201cdo whatever the hell\u201d he wanted.<\/p>\n For Europe, the meaning was difficult to miss: The Western coalition\u2019s center of gravity was shifting, with its historical architect backing away. In European capitals, shock soon gave way to realism, and governments began preparing for a new order<\/a> in which U.S. leadership could no longer be assumed. Trump codified this retreat in the 2025 U.S. National Security Strategy<\/a>, which emphasizes \u201ccore national interests,\u201d urges allies to assume primary responsibility for their regions, and revives a hemispheric doctrine centered on Washington\u2019s own sphere of influence.<\/p>\n This new approach came into focus on Jan. 3, when U.S. special forces captured Venezuelan President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro, and then again on Feb. 28, when Israeli forces killed Iran\u2019s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, during a joint operation with the United States. When Washington adopts the language of force, it matters: It sends a message that power, not diplomacy or rules, ultimately decides outcomes. For Putin, who has long justified his war in Ukraine as a historical correction<\/a>, this shift from the United States reinforces the belief that sovereignty is discretionary.<\/p>\n It didn\u2019t have to be this way. As the cost of the Russia-Ukraine war grew, any U.S. president would have been confronted with mounting economic and security pressure. But the United States could have recalibrated its security arrangements and burden-sharing without splintering the coalition. It could have pushed Europe to assume a larger role, clarified the strategic goals of the war, and increased pressure on Russia to shorten the conflict as costs were mounting.<\/p>\n U.S. President Donald Trump (right) reaches out to shake hands with Russian President Vladimir Putin during a meeting in Anchorage, Alaska, on Aug. 15, 2025. Andrew Caballero-Reynolds\/AFP via Getty Images<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n The United States has rejected its role as the guarantor of the postwar order, and instead of a global village at the end of history, the West finds itself in the jungle. Gone is the aspiration to attract allies and partners through legitimacy, institutions, and cultural pull; Washington\u2019s new language is one of dominance<\/a>.<\/p>\n The notion that the West can return to where it stood in 2022, or even in 2025, is no longer plausible. But the jungle has its own rules. One of them is that predators rarely back down without being forced. As Western unity falters, so does the leverage needed to end Russia\u2019s war on terms acceptable to Ukraine and its European allies. The range of outcomes that once seemed possible narrows, and what\u2019s left becomes harder to achieve.<\/p>\n A child holds a flag as pieces of military equipment captured during the Russia-Ukraine war are exhibited on a train, named \u201cPower in Reality,\u201d by the Russian Ministry of Defense in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, on March 3, 2024.Vladimir Aleksandrov\/Anadolu via Getty Images<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Trump says he wants the war in Ukraine to end. But Putin, who also sees himself at the top of the food chain, does not. The conflict has given the Russian leader what he sought since he came to power a quarter century ago: a unifying purpose for his subjects. By recasting aggression as defense through a relentless propaganda machine<\/a>, he has secured enough domestic support to sustain the war effort and his regime indefinitely.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Putin has achieved this without significantly disrupting everyday life across much of Russia. Military service offers rare upward mobility to men from impoverished regions and marginalized ethnic communities, with compensation high enough to ensure a steady stream of recruits. Tens of thousands of convicts<\/a> have bolstered these ranks in exchange for commuted sentences. Casualty rates are high, but the social impact remains largely contained\u2014helped by the state\u2019s near-total control over information.<\/p>\n Western sanctions have hurt Russia<\/a>, but not enough to incapacitate the war machine. China provides financial and economic support, energy revenues still flow, and domestic factories produce enough ammunition to sustain a prolonged conflict. Russia\u2019s economy has proved more resilient than many observers expected, buoyed by wartime spending, energy exports to Asia, and the state\u2019s growing control over industry.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Having ruled out direct military intervention in Ukraine early on, the United States is now offering concessions that would have sounded like preemptive surrender four years ago. But peace talks have produced nothing because they seek a compromise that does not exist. Putin\u2019s stated goal\u2014the elimination of Ukraine\u2019s sovereignty\u2014has not changed. That objective collides directly with Ukraine\u2019s determination to preserve its statehood and Europe\u2019s interest in not having a revanchist power on its doorstep.<\/p>\n In this stalemate, the search for a settlement is a fool\u2019s errand unless one side changes its demands. For Ukraine, the matter is existential. For Putin, it is a matter of choice. So far, none of the concessions that have been floated\u2014quietly easing sanctions, reintegrating Russia into the Western financial system, or inviting Russia back to the G-7\u2014outweigh the prize that he sees in Ukraine, whose history occupies a central place in Russia\u2019s imperial narrative<\/a>.<\/p>\n The more that the United States signals its readiness to compromise, the more that Putin is encouraged to believe that time and pressure work in his favor, and that staying the course will eventually deliver a Ukraine stripped of real sovereignty and forced back into Russia\u2019s orbit.<\/p>\n In contrast to Trump\u2019s envoys, most European policymakers insist that negotiations must not reward Russian aggression and that Ukraine must decide the terms.<\/p>\n \u201cNothing about Ukraine without Ukraine,\u201d European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has repeated<\/a>. After decades of restraint, Germany\u2019s massive new defense budget<\/a> at least suggests that Europe intends to negotiate from strength.<\/p>\n Members of a mobile air defense unit fire from a Soviet-era vehicle in a sunflower field during a Russian drone attack near Pavlograd, in Ukraine\u2019s Dnipropetrovsk region, on July 19, 2025. Roman Pilipey\/AFP via Getty Images<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n If Western leaders wish to end this war, they have no choice but to dramatically raise the cost for Russia to continue fighting. Europe must close ranks politically and prevent internal divisions from paralyzing decisions on Ukraine. The revenue that sustains Russia\u2019s war effort must be squeezed through stricter enforcement of energy sanctions, a real crackdown on the shadow fleet<\/a> moving Russian oil, and coordination with partners to lower global prices. Ukraine must also receive the sustained military support needed to change the battlefield balance, including advanced air defense and the electronic capabilities that define modern warfare.<\/p>\n As the Russian saying goes, against a crowbar, there is no counter except another crowbar. Putin will negotiate seriously only when he faces credible pressure, and only then can the West start thinking about how to rebuild a world where rules matter. With Trump in the White House, much of that burden would fall on Europe, whose economic and military weight still gives it the capacity to influence the war\u2019s trajectory.<\/p>\n Taking such a stance means making difficult decisions about defining acceptable escalation, spending priorities, and Europe\u2019s long-term security posture. Yet reintroducing real costs for Moscow might be enough to make a viable peace settlement possible. It would begin to repair unity and leverage within the Western coalition, provided that its leaders are prepared to walk away from fruitless talks and pursue an alternative course.<\/p>\n Even without the United States, Europe has the capacity needed to deter Russia\u2014if it can muster the coordination and political will to act. It is already moving in that direction, but the pace matters. In the meantime, Ukrainians will continue to die, and it could only be so long until the yellow and blue flags decorating Western cities from Berkeley to Dundee will no longer be symbols of solidarity but memorials. The price of sustaining Ukraine may be high, but the cost of letting it fall would be far higher.<\/p>\n As for the former anchor of this coalition, Washington should consider whether embracing the jungle is wise for a republic founded on the ideals of justice and freedom. An isolated United States will have less leverage against a hostile and ascending China. Without its wealthy European allies, it will be less resilient in the face of technological and economic shocks.<\/p>\n Upholding the rules-based order is a burden, but it is also a proven foundation for stability. Ukraine, at least, understands that and has made great sacrifice in its defense.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
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