If the current war in Ukraine were to end today, Russia would have lost militarily: it may have shifted borders, but it has not achieved its main objective, which was to take the capital and reinstall a puppet ruler to control and subdue it. It has also not achieved its minimum goal, which was to occupy all of Donbass. The major cities of Donetsk under Ukrainian control in 2014 (Sloviansk, Kramatorsk, and Pokrovsk), remain in the hands of Kiev, which has only lost Mariupol.
For three years, Russia has only defended what it initially conquered in the first days of the invasion thanks to the element of surprise and has advanced about 35 kilometers north on the Donbass front (the distance between Avdivka and Pokrovsk) at the cost of hundreds of thousands of casualties. Along the way, Ukraine, which has managed to survive as a state and society, has also taken a part of Kursk from Russia.
For a nuclear power that was supposed to take Kiev in three days, this is a clear defeat. Moscow lost its major gas contracts with Europe, Finland and Sweden joined NATO, and the international reputation of Putin's regime, wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes, plummeted.
But all of this is related to the military aspect. Now comes the diplomatic battle, in which Donald Trump is willing to give Putin not only something to call a victory, consolidating his right of conquest over the annexed territories, but also Europe must bear the cost of this disaster, sidelined by his vice president Vance and excluded from any negotiations.
With his 90-minute call to Putin and his invitation to meet in Saudi Arabia, Trump has just rehabilitated the Russian autocrat and given him a scenario greatly feared by European countries. In 2024, it was just a distant but concerning possibility. Now it is real: several events are beginning to indicate a path towards escalation. Not always does a negotiation table lead to lasting peace. Sometimes, a ceasefire fuels an even worse war. It seems that Europe has finally realized this.
With Trump's victory and the U.S. president's affinity towards Vladimir Putin, from whom a leader who has made insults his trademark has never uttered a bad word, marks the first step towards the worst-case scenario for Europe. The second step came from Russia: Putin has adapted his entire industry to a wartime economy to bombard Ukrainian cities from a distance, deplete their anti-aircraft defenses, and terrorize their population. His electoral farce last spring allowed him to completely sweep away any remnants of opposition.
Spanish Admiral Juan Rodríguez Garat described this possible scenario last spring in EL MUNDO: "These two conditions, Putin's victory in Ukraine and the weakening of NATO, are necessary for the Russian regime to attempt aggression against another European country." Well, we are on that path. Although Putin has not achieved his military victory, Trump is willing to give him a diplomatic victory in Saudi Arabia.
Some military analysts are already pointing out the imprudence of Trump's move: he proposes freezing the Ukrainian front and holding Europe responsible for security guarantees to protect Ukraine. In other words, several European countries, including possibly France and the United Kingdom, deploy their military resources on the front line with tens of thousands of soldiers.
Meanwhile, Russia can move its armies without consequences towards new fronts such as, for example, the Baltic countries, as the Ukrainian front remains frozen. From there, and through a hybrid operation, it can unleash an attack for which Europe, with the U.S. looking towards the Pacific, would find it difficult to react after sending its resources to defend peace in Ukraine.
In reality, Russia's aggressiveness towards the Baltic countries has already begun. Russian state television frequently mentions the invasion of these former Soviet republics since last year, and several Russian electronic warfare teams are causing significant disruption to the navigation signals of aircraft, not only military but also civilian. Gabrielius Landsbergis, Lithuania's Foreign Minister, describes the situation of these countries in a tweet: "The final narrative will be written by historians. They will discuss our decisions. If we fail, they will be harsh. They will wonder why we believed in the fiction we told ourselves and decided to ignore the facts on the ground. They will call it a tragedy, not a victory."
This is also explained by analyst Gideon Rachman in the Financial Times: "Putin wants NATO troops to withdraw from the entire former Soviet empire. European officials believe that Trump is likely to agree to withdraw U.S. troops from the Baltic states and perhaps from more western areas, leaving the EU vulnerable to a Russian army that, according to NATO governments, is preparing for a broader conflict beyond Ukraine."
Ukrainian historian Serhii Plokhy writes: "I look at Vladimir Putin's arguments and recognize the writings of Russian imperial historians. The concept that Russians and Ukrainians were the same people was the dominant idea before the Russian revolution. Putin is speaking to the ghosts of the past, trying to turn them into the monsters of the future."
If all these conditions are met, we would be facing a checkmate by Vladimir Putin against NATO that could be checkmate. If the U.S. does not act against a small Russian intervention, for example, in Narva (an Estonian city inhabited by 90% Russian-speaking population) and the rest of the European partners back down, then what is the point of the Atlantic Alliance?