Dr John C Hulsman is the Founder and Managing Partner of John C Hulsman Enterprises, a global political risk firm. He is also a life member of the US Council on Foreign Relations.
It is perhaps unsurprising that the intellectual snares political risk analysts regularly tumble into mirror the failings of humanity in general. ‘Wish-casting’ – that’s to say, the confusion between making objective analytical assessments and putting forward predictions that entirely echo what one would fervently like to happen – is an entirely human failing. But it is absolutely deadly for my profession.
The outcome of the Ukraine War is a case in point. I read the establishment British press coverage daily, with what was once amusement at their fact-free cheerleading for embattled, doughty Kiev, which is now turning to alarm. For the worst thing of all about wish-casting is how emotionally easy it is for the analyst to believe one’s own nonsense, based as it is on rooting for the right thing to happen – rather than analysing the world as it actually is, warts and all.
Before I get going, and to avoid a deluge of hate mail that is beside the point, let me reassure the anxious. In a perfect world, I too want Ukraine to win the present war outright; believe that Russia is undoubtedly the aggressor in the conflict, and am glad that I urged immediate aid to Kiev in the early days of the war to avert Russia wholly subsuming Volodymyr Zelensky’s government. I’ll go a step further and say I think that Valdimir Putin is a very bad man who I do not want dating my daughter.
But now that this virtue signaling is out of the way, perhaps we can get back to political risk analysis, rather than the usual intellectually hapless wish-casting which has so dominated British coverage of the war.
Despite all the cheerleading, Ukraine is not winning.
Perhaps the best argument making clear that Ukraine, despite its vaunted Spring/Summer offensive, is not winning the war is the deafening silence that has descended on its wish-casting cheerleaders. If I had a pound for every commentary I read ahead of Kiev’s push that the tide of the war was turning, and that this was Kiev’s Gettysburg moment, I would now be a rich man. Yet now I hear crickets chirping.
Instead, what my firm foresaw in our traditional January City AM column of political risk predictions has come to pass: after over eight extra months of fighting and further tragic loss of life, that neither Russia nor Ukraine would decisively tip the strategic scales in either’s favour. In other words, both offensives were doomed to only make marginal tactical gains at best. For all the blood and all the treasure expended, much like the charnel house of World War I, neither side would break through.
This is precisely what has happened. In Russia’s case – traditionally always better on the defensive than the offensive – the Kremlin had months to prepare its lines, as the Ukrainians passed the begging bowl around to its western allies for yet more wherewithal, before then having to learn how to use the new kit.
All the while, the Kremlin were laying mines all along the front and digging in, making a breakthrough about as likely as on the western front over a century ago. While Ukraine has made some minor, tactical gains, nothing has happened to change the overall strategic drift toward stalemate.
The cannier members of the pro-Ukraine commentariat have adjusted (as they always do to perpetuate ‘Forever Wars’) by moving the strategic goalposts. After spending the first 15 months of the conflict reassuring the hard-pressed American taxpayer (a country with a little-mentioned $32 trillion dollar debt, about $98,000 per person) that all this financial sacrifice for a third-order interest was fleeting, they have now changed their tune.
Now “we must prepare for a longer war” – a reality that was clear to my firm well over a year ago, but which only now is dawning on the wish-casters. This Houdini-like intellectual sleight of hand is absolutely necessary since, without it, the lack of the confidently promised victory could well lead to the whole house of cards tumbling down. Ukraine, after its miraculous survival, is simply not winning the war, nor is it about to do so into the medium-term.
Despite all the cheerleading, Russia cares more about Ukraine than the West
Even worse for the wish-casters, if there is a long-term stalemate on the battlefield, then outside factors (as happened in 1917-1918) will likely determine the outcome of the conflict. And in geostrategic terms, there is no getting away from the basic notion that Ukraine matters far more to Russia than it does to anyone in the West – particularly a far-away United States.
A simple thought experiment makes this entirely clear. If the US found itself in Putin’s shoes with a restive, pro-Chinese Mexico on its border, it would do everything in its power to subvert that next-door government, returning its neighbour to a reasonably pliant client state. Peer superpower competitor China might flirt with helping Mexico City stand up to America, but in terms of relative strategic importance its efforts would be doomed to failure.
So it is for the Ukraine War. Putin’s view of the world merely follows the standard Russian strategic playbook, which saw off Charles XII of Sweden in the 18th century, Napoleon in the 19th century, and Hitler in the 20th century.
In each case, Moscow amasses unhappy client states on its periphery, trades land for time with the western invaders, and then lets ungodly supply chains and winter do its job for them. No, Putin is not mad. He is merely following the tried-and-true path of Russian strategic thinking.
Until this botched invasion, Putin’s reign had seen the plan work relatively well. Georgia and Chechnya were brought under heel, Russia was dominant again in the Caucasus, and much of the eastern, Russian-speaking portion of Ukraine was occupied in 2014.
But without the whole of the country being pro-Russian, there just isn’t the strategic depth necessary to make the Russian strategy work. Everything Putin has tried to do over two decades in terms of Russian strategy is dependent on the outcome of the war. Ukraine isn’t a priority for Putin, it is the priority.
To put it mildly, the same cannot be said for the United States. According to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, a German research group, the US government has already spent a whopping $76.8 billion in assistance to Ukraine, dwarfing the rest of the world put together. Once again, America seems to care more about European security than Europeans do. After generations of European free-riding off American defense expenditures, this is not a political state of affairs that can, or should, continue.
This massive infusion of funds is even more strategically nonsensical, given that the US finds itself once more with a peer competitor superpower in China, which must be laughing itself silly at Washington’s throwing its precious wherewithal (as happened over Iraq and Afghanistan) at such an unimportant, third-order interest.
The Indo-Pacific, a term only intermittently mentioned in the British mainstream press, is the locus of our new era, where much of the world’s future growth is located, as well as much of its future political risk.
If America and its allies continue to dominate the region, we will live in a western-ordered world. If Beijing dominates the Indo-Pacific, it will come to order the world. It is that simple, and that perilous. For America, Ukraine is just a dangerous sideshow diverting a superpower that can no longer do everything from focusing on the part of the world that fundamentally matters.
Stalemate suits Russia
This fundamental strategic discrepancy means that stalemate suits the Kremlin far more than a Ukraine utterly dependent on America to keep the lights on. All Russia has to do is not lose the war, and that will amount to the Kremlin winning it. As the Prigozhin mini-mutiny illustrated, the Kremlin too has war-weariness, as incompetent generals and a tone-deaf Kremlin have made any number of mistakes, leaving their country viewed as both a pariah and an incompetent one at that. But what no one is doubting is that the Ukraine war is now an existential priority for Russia.
By contrast, the US is just one election result away (and both Republican frontrunners Ron Desantis and especially Donald Trump are decidedly cooler to supporting Ukraine than is the in-the-tank Biden administration) from remembering that its strategic priorities lie elsewhere.
The ‘Roosevelt Rule’ of American strategic thinking makes American grand strategy clear. Given that the Eurasian world island has by far the most people and resources, as Roosevelt cannily noted, all the US must do to dominate the world is see that no other great power dominates either portion of this massive landmass.
Russia, which cannot take over Ukraine let alone threaten NATO, is not about to seize Europe. But a China in possession of Taiwan would come to dominate first the Indo-Pacific and then Asia itself. That the United States simply cannot allow.
Anything that diverts America from following the Roosevelt Rule will eventually be jettisoned. For all these very real reasons, it is entirely in Ukraine’s interests to ignore western wish-casters and cut a deal with Putin from a position of relative strength, rather than wait for the inevitable disappointments to come. It is always better to see the world as it is and make it better rather than to deludedly believe in a world that simply does not exist.
Dr John C Hulsman is the Founder and Managing Partner of John C Hulsman Enterprises, a global political risk firm. He is also a life member of the US Council on Foreign Relations.
It is perhaps unsurprising that the intellectual snares political risk analysts regularly tumble into mirror the failings of humanity in general. ‘Wish-casting’ – that’s to say, the confusion between making objective analytical assessments and putting forward predictions that entirely echo what one would fervently like to happen – is an entirely human failing. But it is absolutely deadly for my profession.
The outcome of the Ukraine War is a case in point. I read the establishment British press coverage daily, with what was once amusement at their fact-free cheerleading for embattled, doughty Kiev, which is now turning to alarm. For the worst thing of all about wish-casting is how emotionally easy it is for the analyst to believe one’s own nonsense, based as it is on rooting for the right thing to happen – rather than analysing the world as it actually is, warts and all.
Before I get going, and to avoid a deluge of hate mail that is beside the point, let me reassure the anxious. In a perfect world, I too want Ukraine to win the present war outright; believe that Russia is undoubtedly the aggressor in the conflict, and am glad that I urged immediate aid to Kiev in the early days of the war to avert Russia wholly subsuming Volodymyr Zelensky’s government. I’ll go a step further and say I think that Valdimir Putin is a very bad man who I do not want dating my daughter.
But now that this virtue signaling is out of the way, perhaps we can get back to political risk analysis, rather than the usual intellectually hapless wish-casting which has so dominated British coverage of the war.
Despite all the cheerleading, Ukraine is not winning.
Perhaps the best argument making clear that Ukraine, despite its vaunted Spring/Summer offensive, is not winning the war is the deafening silence that has descended on its wish-casting cheerleaders. If I had a pound for every commentary I read ahead of Kiev’s push that the tide of the war was turning, and that this was Kiev’s Gettysburg moment, I would now be a rich man. Yet now I hear crickets chirping.
Instead, what my firm foresaw in our traditional January City AM column of political risk predictions has come to pass: after over eight extra months of fighting and further tragic loss of life, that neither Russia nor Ukraine would decisively tip the strategic scales in either’s favour. In other words, both offensives were doomed to only make marginal tactical gains at best. For all the blood and all the treasure expended, much like the charnel house of World War I, neither side would break through.
This is precisely what has happened. In Russia’s case – traditionally always better on the defensive than the offensive – the Kremlin had months to prepare its lines, as the Ukrainians passed the begging bowl around to its western allies for yet more wherewithal, before then having to learn how to use the new kit.
All the while, the Kremlin were laying mines all along the front and digging in, making a breakthrough about as likely as on the western front over a century ago. While Ukraine has made some minor, tactical gains, nothing has happened to change the overall strategic drift toward stalemate.
The cannier members of the pro-Ukraine commentariat have adjusted (as they always do to perpetuate ‘Forever Wars’) by moving the strategic goalposts. After spending the first 15 months of the conflict reassuring the hard-pressed American taxpayer (a country with a little-mentioned $32 trillion dollar debt, about $98,000 per person) that all this financial sacrifice for a third-order interest was fleeting, they have now changed their tune.
Now “we must prepare for a longer war” – a reality that was clear to my firm well over a year ago, but which only now is dawning on the wish-casters. This Houdini-like intellectual sleight of hand is absolutely necessary since, without it, the lack of the confidently promised victory could well lead to the whole house of cards tumbling down. Ukraine, after its miraculous survival, is simply not winning the war, nor is it about to do so into the medium-term.
Despite all the cheerleading, Russia cares more about Ukraine than the West
Even worse for the wish-casters, if there is a long-term stalemate on the battlefield, then outside factors (as happened in 1917-1918) will likely determine the outcome of the conflict. And in geostrategic terms, there is no getting away from the basic notion that Ukraine matters far more to Russia than it does to anyone in the West – particularly a far-away United States.
A simple thought experiment makes this entirely clear. If the US found itself in Putin’s shoes with a restive, pro-Chinese Mexico on its border, it would do everything in its power to subvert that next-door government, returning its neighbour to a reasonably pliant client state. Peer superpower competitor China might flirt with helping Mexico City stand up to America, but in terms of relative strategic importance its efforts would be doomed to failure.
So it is for the Ukraine War. Putin’s view of the world merely follows the standard Russian strategic playbook, which saw off Charles XII of Sweden in the 18th century, Napoleon in the 19th century, and Hitler in the 20th century.
In each case, Moscow amasses unhappy client states on its periphery, trades land for time with the western invaders, and then lets ungodly supply chains and winter do its job for them. No, Putin is not mad. He is merely following the tried-and-true path of Russian strategic thinking.
Until this botched invasion, Putin’s reign had seen the plan work relatively well. Georgia and Chechnya were brought under heel, Russia was dominant again in the Caucasus, and much of the eastern, Russian-speaking portion of Ukraine was occupied in 2014.
But without the whole of the country being pro-Russian, there just isn’t the strategic depth necessary to make the Russian strategy work. Everything Putin has tried to do over two decades in terms of Russian strategy is dependent on the outcome of the war. Ukraine isn’t a priority for Putin, it is the priority.
To put it mildly, the same cannot be said for the United States. According to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, a German research group, the US government has already spent a whopping $76.8 billion in assistance to Ukraine, dwarfing the rest of the world put together. Once again, America seems to care more about European security than Europeans do. After generations of European free-riding off American defense expenditures, this is not a political state of affairs that can, or should, continue.
This massive infusion of funds is even more strategically nonsensical, given that the US finds itself once more with a peer competitor superpower in China, which must be laughing itself silly at Washington’s throwing its precious wherewithal (as happened over Iraq and Afghanistan) at such an unimportant, third-order interest.
The Indo-Pacific, a term only intermittently mentioned in the British mainstream press, is the locus of our new era, where much of the world’s future growth is located, as well as much of its future political risk.
If America and its allies continue to dominate the region, we will live in a western-ordered world. If Beijing dominates the Indo-Pacific, it will come to order the world. It is that simple, and that perilous. For America, Ukraine is just a dangerous sideshow diverting a superpower that can no longer do everything from focusing on the part of the world that fundamentally matters.
Stalemate suits Russia
This fundamental strategic discrepancy means that stalemate suits the Kremlin far more than a Ukraine utterly dependent on America to keep the lights on. All Russia has to do is not lose the war, and that will amount to the Kremlin winning it. As the Prigozhin mini-mutiny illustrated, the Kremlin too has war-weariness, as incompetent generals and a tone-deaf Kremlin have made any number of mistakes, leaving their country viewed as both a pariah and an incompetent one at that. But what no one is doubting is that the Ukraine war is now an existential priority for Russia.
By contrast, the US is just one election result away (and both Republican frontrunners Ron Desantis and especially Donald Trump are decidedly cooler to supporting Ukraine than is the in-the-tank Biden administration) from remembering that its strategic priorities lie elsewhere.
The ‘Roosevelt Rule’ of American strategic thinking makes American grand strategy clear. Given that the Eurasian world island has by far the most people and resources, as Roosevelt cannily noted, all the US must do to dominate the world is see that no other great power dominates either portion of this massive landmass.
Russia, which cannot take over Ukraine let alone threaten NATO, is not about to seize Europe. But a China in possession of Taiwan would come to dominate first the Indo-Pacific and then Asia itself. That the United States simply cannot allow.
Anything that diverts America from following the Roosevelt Rule will eventually be jettisoned. For all these very real reasons, it is entirely in Ukraine’s interests to ignore western wish-casters and cut a deal with Putin from a position of relative strength, rather than wait for the inevitable disappointments to come. It is always better to see the world as it is and make it better rather than to deludedly believe in a world that simply does not exist.