Ukraine’s people face a winter from hell. Thwarted on the battlefield, Russia is stepping up systematic, daily attacks on civilians, their homes, schools, hospitals, workplaces, and the vital infrastructure that sustains human life. Wave after wave of terrifying daytime ballistic missile and jet-drone strikes on Kyiv and other cities are destroying supermarket distribution hubs, pharmaceutical and medical facilities, logistics centres and warehouses. The result is sharply rising civilian casualties and growing shortages of food and other essentials. As a freezing winter approaches, Russia will again try to blow up Ukraine’s water supplies and power grid, cutting off electricity to millions. This is Vladimir Putin’s version of darkness at noon. He’d rather kill everybody than admit he’s lost.
Russia’s leader reportedly told Donald Trump this week that his “special military operation”, now in its fifth year, was going to plan. Trump may believe him. Western analysts certainly don’t. Failing militarily and taking huge casualties, his regime is under growing domestic economic and public pressure to wind down the war. Yet Putin seems to think one last big push can finally break Ukraine’s will. Trump’s renewed meddling – after months of inertia, he sent his patsy envoys, Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, back to Moscow last weekend (they also visited Kyiv for the first time) – perpetuates Kremlin delusions of victory. Now there’s talk of more talks. And all the while, Putin kills and kills. Each day is a crime against humanity.
This prospect of daily mass killings, rampant war crimes, malnutrition, homelessness and renewed, large-scale displacements of Ukrainian civilians – this intensifying Russian campaign of terror – is intolerable. So why don’t the western allies and Nato intervene to stop it?
The principal reason is chronic US ambivalence and unreliability, which has turned Ukraine into a seemingly irresolvable forever war. Former president Joe Biden tossed lifebelts to the Ukrainians in 2022, then left them to sink or swim. Trump has since tried to drown them. Despite halting the ground invasion and taking the fight to Russia’s heartlands, Ukraine is more vulnerable than ever to air attack. That’s largely because Trump has backtracked on allowing Ukraine to produce Patriot missile interceptors and paused weapons deliveries. Europe has so far failed to fill the gap. Trump’s fawning and feting of Putin, seen at last year’s nauseating Alaska summit, and his bullying of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, undermine Ukraine’s resistance, European security and hopes of an expedited settlement. Vulnerable civilians pay the price.
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Many Ukrainians are weary of war. About 60% oppose ceding Donbas land to Russia but a similar number would support a ceasefire, backed by western security guarantees, that freezes current positions, a recent poll suggests. Most Russians also want it to stop. And like Moscow, Kyiv is feeling the financial pinch, notwithstanding a $100bn EU loan. There’s plainly a deal to be done. But Putin (like Trump over Iran) ignores public opinion. The indifference of authoritarian leaders to the popular will, let alone global opinion, is another reason forever wars proliferate. Whether the conflict is Ukraine, Gaza or Iran, ordinary people, watching from the margins, feel powerless to influence events. Familiarity deadens the senses over time. The horror of it all is scary and upsetting. It’s easier to look away.
Efforts to halt the US-Israel war on Iran, which began in February and has now extended to the Red Sea (Trump, remember, said it would only last a few weeks), and relentless post-2023 violence in occupied Palestine, are hampered, as in Ukraine, by the absence of credible, independent peace processes. This is another major factor fuelling the modern forever war phenomenon. Trump clumsily inserted himself into the Kyiv-Moscow argument, blatantly favouring one side. At no point did he trouble himself about the rights and wrongs of Putin’s war of choice. He aimed not to save lives but to win a Nobel peace prize (plus lucrative Russian energy deals).
Self-serving motives have similarly upset hopes of rescuing Gaza’s civilians from the Israeli military and Hamas. Trump’s “board of peace” and 20-point plan are primarily vehicles for his ego and greed, not a plausible route out of a political, military and humanitarian dead-end. As for ending the Iran debacle, the US president has lost interest. His refusal, like Putin, to accept the obvious, admit he failed to achieve his war aims, and seek a compromise with Tehran undercuts regional mediators and Gulf state allies, who rightly fear fighting will drag on indefinitely. Desperately needed: impartial, UN-empowered peace envoys to knock heads together.
Forever wars develop and grow entrenched in the absence of authoritative, universal legal frameworks respected and observed by all. The contempt shown by Trump, Putin and Israel’s leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, for basic principles of the post-1945 world order – rule of law, national sovereignty, oversight and enforcement by the international court of justice and international criminal court – directly contributes to the prolongation of conflict. Once the rules are cast aside, anything goes. That has ineluctably led to war crime atrocities such as those experienced in Gaza since the 7 October massacres; in Bucha, Mariupol and other towns and cities across Ukraine; and in Minab, southern Iran, where a US Tomahawk cruise missile allegedly killed more than 100 schoolgirls in February. Almost invariably, the culprits escape punishment. It’s impunity made law. It’s forever anarchy.
Another increasingly common feature of endless wars is the obstruction of full public scrutiny and accountability through independent media and UN investigations. Since the war with Hamas began, Israel’s army has tightly restricted international journalists’ access to Gaza. Despite the efforts of brave reporters, this policy has inevitably disguised and distorted the true picture of what happens there, not least for Israelis. Likewise, the US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, releases only limited, selective information about Iran-related operations. This has led, for example, to under-reporting of the extent and cost of successful Iranian strikes on US bases in the Gulf. Russian state media routinely censor news from Ukraine. Most Russians have little idea how badly the war is going. Generally speaking, public ignorance facilitates abuses and prolongs conflict.
Forever wars are ultimately caused by failing, foolish leaders. For sure, generals foul up. In battle, things rarely go as expected. Clever strategies backfire. But the core problem is politicians who promise too much, underestimate their opponents, ignore less macho, peaceful alternatives, think they are above the law, will not admit mistakes – and, without shame or compunction, lie to your face. This is an age-old problem with no quick solution. But Ukraine’s people, facing a season from hell, urgently need additional assistance now.
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Western democracies cannot sit on their hands as the civilian toll from Moscow’s barbarous onslaughts mounts daily. Nato must finally switch to the offensive, make clear more war crimes will not be tolerated, threaten to strike Russian drone and missile launch sites from the air (as previously, repeatedly, urged here) – and force Putin to back off before his forever war becomes everybody’s war.
