Good morning to my Ukrainian readers
You will excuse me, I hope, for opening this article in an unusual way, but I want to greet you on a wonderful, late summer morning, when I sit down in front of my computer, just outside Vienna in Austria, Thank you for your interest in my writing and communicate a few feelings.
From outside my 200-year-old house, on a beautiful Renaissance square – only partly disturbed by a mass of parked cars – I hear the sweet noise of kids, eager like swallows, returning to their schools (there are two of them facing the square) after the holidays. They are excited and happy at reuniting with friends, as of yet innocent of the larger world. The morning is full of sun, but not too warm, a normal day in a normal country, no violence, no fear. Yes, the other day there was an air alarm. It had been announced beforehand. In other words, there was no alarm, just a test. This is, what life should be about: Happiness, eagerness, normality, children going to school, parents going to work, too many cars, a European way of life.
This is, what the Russian warlord and his gangsters want to destroy. I do not believe for a moment that they will succeed. I believe and have believed from the first moment that Ukraine, the lost daughter of our common European family, will move safely into the European House, not now, but in the foreseeable future, and maybe sooner than some of us dare to expect. The Ukrainians to me are the true Europeans, defending Europe and European civilization, defending what I will call the European park against invading Barbarians.
We, the rest of the family, cannot thank you enough. This beautiful and peaceful Austrian morning I am looking forward to being back with you in October.
“The Ukrainians cannot win, it is claimed. The resources are insufficient, their summer offensive stalling, an arrangement with Moscow, however unpleasant, must be found… Why be an optimist, when you can be a pessimist?”
“The reality, indeed the miracle, is that Ukraine is alive, fighting, and winning, a state of affairs that the F-16 fighters will improve. They cannot be delivered fast enough.”
Vienna
It is considered politically correct to look askance – most recently in connection with the decision to supply Kyiv with Western fighter jets – at the Ukrainian war effort. The Ukrainians cannot win, it is claimed. Their resources are insufficient and their summer offensive stalling, an arrangement with Moscow, however unpleasant, must be found. Such sentiments are uttered, treacherously and wrongly, in smooth platitudes about the brave Ukrainians and their fight. I take this black view as an expression of habitual thinking, partly inspired by the always present Russian propaganda drum, a kind of human weakness: Why be an optimist when you can be a pessimist?
In February 2022, when Russia attacked Ukraine, just about everyone — except the Ukrainians — predicted a Russian triumphal march through Kyiv within a month or two, the Russians especially. They brought their parade uniforms, but forgot, in their arrogance, their ammunition, their medicine, food, and fuel. In the course of the spring, they were driven out of northeastern Ukraine, a first strategic victory, which well over a year later seems to have been forgotten in the public debate.
From Moscow to Berlin and to Paris — initially also in London and Washington, where, however, they quickly came upon better ideas — the attitude was that the Russians are the stronger and therefore must win, the Ukrainians are the weaker and therefore must lose. Many, inside and outside Russia, are still preoccupied with Russia as an empire and cannot accustom themselves to the thought that the former colonies of this empire are capable of establishing themselves as nation-states, fighting successfully for their independence.
In the case of Russia´s war against Ukraine many skeptics overlook, in a mixture of convenience and wishful thinking, that the staff work of the Russians was and is miserable, that there is no visible overall strategy, and that the troops in the field barely possess the tactical means, which are the prerequisites for a military victory. The Ukrainians, aware of their material weakness, are constantly thinking away from traditional military norms. In front of Kyiv, they time and again lured massive Russian units into the death traps of the surrounding swampy terrain, or they halted kilometer-long Russian tank columns with a lucky shot or two from a shoulder-mounted rocket launcher, hidden behind a street corner or in a ruined building. To this day, the Russian defeat at the gates of Kyiv constitutes an irreparable loss of prestige for Putin the Warlord, reinforced by the Russian retreat from Kherson in November 2022 and now being repeated at the slow, careful advance of Ukrainian units towards the Sea of Azov and the Crimea, next year´s great goal.
Putin, Defense Minister Shoigu, and Chief of the General Staff Gerasimov are all around the age of 70. They think in terms of iron and steel and manpower, which is expendable. President Zelenskyy and those close to him are a generation younger. They know about computers, drones and other cutting-edge technology, and having at their disposal so few soldiers they treat them gently. As I see it, Putin fights the First World War, and Zelenskyy fights the Third World War.
Many Western leaders and commentators operate with in the Kremlin mindset, as they continue their unimaginative and incorrect talk about, what they call the Ukrainians’ poorly run offensive. What did they expect? A leisurely summer promenade to the Crimea, an easy recapture of Donetsk? They must have forgotten that 10 years ago the Ukrainians barely had an army and are now pressuring Russia’s armed forces in the Donbas and on the Black Sea coast.
The bigger strategic picture is disturbed by artificial concerns. The reality, indeed the miracle, is that Ukraine is alive, fighting, and winning, a state of affairs that the F-16 fighters will improve. They cannot be delivered fast enough.
Author: Per Nyholm
Danish journalist since 1960, based in Austria, columnist and foreign correspondent at the liberal Danish daily newspaper Jyllands-Posten. This text was translated and adapted for The Ukrainian Review by Stanislav Kinka. Per Nyholm´s latest book, “Journeys in the Land of Blood” (Barcelona and Copenhagen, 2023), is freely available to any serious Ukrainian publisher, who might want to publish it.
