There’s a minor cottage industry that has sprung up in the last 12 months in which various foreign policy mavens play Nostradamus and forecast “How the War in Ukraine will end,” some with a good deal of detail, some with a very broad hand waving at a map of the world.

Of course, using the words “will end” suggests an air of finality that simply doesn’t exist in the real world. One of the points that Clausewitz made that isn’t quoted enough is that “Even the ultimate outcome of a war is not always to be regarded as final.” And as it has been pointed out by any number of Ukrainian politicians and generals, this war didn’t start last year or even in 2014; the war has been going on in one way or another for several hundred years. Believing that this war will somehow end and all that struggle will cease is, at best, sadly simplistic.

Said differently, irrespective of how this specific war terminates, there will be future wars fought over this same terrain, for the same reasons.

But, outside of Kiev, how this war ends isn’t the most important question. The question that should have the focus of the Pentagon, Foggy Bottom, and the White House – and Congress (and their opposite numbers in Paris, London, Tokyo, New Delhi and a few other capitals) is: What happens next?

Put it in an historical context, in terms that have been applied to this war – a war in which great powers are squared off against another. Russia and NATO haven’t yet started shooting at each other – intentionally. But great powers are committed to the outcome of this war and one of them, at least, is going to be seen as having “lost.”

Other great powers, particularly China, is paying close attention to who is winning and who is losing, and the cost to both the winners and losers. And while China’s immediate interest is Taiwan, the complete portfolio of Chinese interests extends well beyond Taiwan or the Western Pacific. How vigorously they pursue those interest will be affected by the outcome of the current fighting.

This war has been compared to World War I – the War to End All Wars. And after perhaps 1916 there were any number of politicians who were saying that the war would only end in some sort of negotiations. And, generally speaking, that was correct. After two more years of slaughter, a terrible scare during Germany’s last drive for Paris, and a number of other developments that, at the time, left the outcome very much in doubt. Earlier predictions of “negotiations” were so obtuse as to be of no value.

That war was so destructive politically, economically and socially that within just a few years the world seemed to stand on its ear. Before the war even ended Imperial Russia was gone, and the Communists began their rise to power. Within just a few years the Ottoman Empire – already crumbling – was gone; The Austro-Hungarian Empire was gone, the German Empire was gone, and Imperial China had already collapsed in 1912. In the 27 years that followed an economic boom was followed by a global depression; Fascist Italy, NAZI Germany, and Imperial Japan all rose to power, a world war was fought, all the fascist empires collapsed, as did the British Empire. Some 75 million people died violently in those three decades and when all was said and done, more than a third of the world’s surface – and a third of the world’s population – was left enslaved under communism, (a condition that endured for 45 years, and 1.4 billion still live under the Chinese Communists).

All that happened in a remarkably short period: from 1914 to 1945 – 31 years. That’s a year less than the time that has elapsed since the fall of the USSR. None of it was predictable in 1914, or even early 1918. And in 1914 there were no modern ballistic missiles, no sophisticated aircraft, no cyber domain, no atomic weapons.

Consider the possible level of destruction if at the start of that 31 year span the world had had the current interwoven infrastructures, with most countries wholly dependent on stable international trade for energy and food and medicines. Now, add to that the negative impact of the fascist empires fighting a war in cyber-space, and of course, the possession of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) by one or more parties to the war.

Predictions are hard, especially about the future, as Karl Steincke noted. But it is fairly easy to imagine that if this current war escalates or spread, that the next several decades are going to be terrifying.

What can we do about it? If Congress wants to be serious about their task, they need to direct the Executive to focus, align spending accordingly and make the Executive stick to it. Recognize that time is short, and that we cannot do everything; as just mentioned: focus. Internally, the US need to take serious steps towards economic health, focus our federal government on rebuilding our infrastructure and protect it from attack – physical and cyber, restore our energy independence, and develop the various means to defend against WMD. In the next global war the US will not be spared from attack.

Externally, we need to work with our allies, but also press them hard to take up their share of the security burden. That there are still European nations that are spending less than 2% on defense, more than a year into this European war, is a disgrace. 11 of 31 NATO countries spend 2% or more of GDP on defense; only 3 countries (Poland, the US and Greece, spend 3% or more). Yet NATO without the US has ten times the GDP and four times the population of Russia; they should be able to address Russia with only selective aid from the US.

And pray that this war will somehow stop slowly escalating and that we can act in time to forestall a repeat of the second, third and fourth decades of the 20th century, remembering that if we fail, and things “catch fire,” it is likely to be much more destructive.

Copyright 2023 Arrias
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