How Ukraine Wins -- Benjamin Jensen, US News and World Report
Imagine if U.S. citizens awoke to find their entire navy and majority of their air force gone without a shot fired, seized by special operators posing as "concerned citizen groups." This is the situation confronting Ukraine’s Maidan leadership. 40,000 Russian troops stand poised to invade Eastern Ukraine and conduct a lightening assault towards Kiev. Ukrainian military and police operations to clear roadblocks and occupied buildings in the East continue to stall. Each day new pro-Russian protests break out and "concerned groups" appear with game-changing weapons like surface-to-air missiles. Russia appears to be heeding the age-old Sun Tzu adage to win without fighting.
While the situation is grim, Ukraine can prevail through a strategy signaling its capacity to conduct an irregular defense-in-depth against conventionally superior Russian forces and exerting indirect diplomatic pressure on Moscow beyond the current sanctions. The logic is simple: show the long-term costs of military crisis and confrontation in Ukraine. When you can’t win in round one show your opponent how costly round five will be.
First, Ukraine needs to go beyond conscription to send a costly signal to Russia about the risks of fighting a protracted conflict in Ukraine. The Ukrainian military should shift from large, conventional formations to small hunter-killer bands with anti-aircraft and anti-tank weapons as well as sniper rifles designed to send Russia a clear signal. Big units are big targets. These same systems, channeled to the mujahedeen during the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, proved critical to tipping the military balance by targeting officers. Like the Soviet military, the Russian military remains overreliant on its officer corps.
Second, Ukraine needs to prepare for defense-in-depth partisan warfare. Better to attrite invading Russian forces and extend their supply lines than seek decisive battles you can’t win along the border. Demonstrating the capacity to knock out weapons the Russians will rely on in a land war, such as tanks and aircraft, sends a costly signal to Moscow. Training conscripts to fight conventionally does not. In the early days of World War II, Finland proved it was capable of fighting the Soviets through employing infiltration techniques and hitting a large force where it was weakest – its supply lines.
Third, take an indirect approach to diplomacy. Major NATO nations from the United States to Germany and the United Kingdom are unlikely to risk broader confrontation with Russia over Eastern Ukraine. The same is not true of Romania, Poland and the Baltics. Furthermore, these states, as NATO members, have more influence over Washington and other NATO capitals than Ukraine. In addition, expanding the web of countries criticizing Russia beyond Europe can pay diplomatic dividends. Ukraine needs to reach out to other states that have territorial disputes with powerful neighbors and get them to publicly criticize Russia and join expanding sanctions. This indirect approach also could mobilize countries across the Middle East upset about Russian support for the Syrian regime.
Fourth, take the fight to Moscow. Putin is an autocrat who increasingly polarizes the Russian population. It was not that long ago that mass protests hit the Russian capital and groups like Pussy Riot braved arrest to challenge the Kremlin. Ukraine needs to use encrypted websites and social media to get its message out to Russians. The message needs to be clear and targeted to younger generations: Putin is trying to rebuild a police state much like the Soviet Union. No one’s freedom is safe. The same message needs to ripple through Belarus and Central Asia.
Turning defeat into victory requires targeting Russian plans. It appears Putin is playing a chess game where checkmate is establishing a corridor through Russian speaking populations in Ukraine to Transdniestria. This plan relies on the threat of conventional military force to produce the space for irregular formations to agitate. Ukraine can coerce Russia through showing the limited utility of the Russian military while buying time for diplomatic pressure to take effect.
