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Since everything is looking like a Trump win now, what are your actual predictions for the trajectory of the Ukraine war?
As far as I'm concerned, the doomsaying consensus predicting something like an end to supplies, forced armistice followed by Russia rearming to strike later with accumulated force struck me as unfounded and downright strange. If we even accept the premise that Trump would in fact cut supplies and force a truce, it's not at all clear to me that this would be to Ukraine's disadvantage. If anything, UA currently seems to be the side that would greatly benefit from a pause, as they could actually train up their masses of conscripts (probably to a higher standard than is available to Russia, judging by performance of "elite" Ukrainian vs. "elite" Russian troops) rather than burning them as fast as they can be equipped and give their backers time to actually ramp up production of crucial high-tech equipment such as air defense platforms, where it's clear that in the limit the West's ability to produce would outstrip Russia's ability to attrite but they just happen to be stuck on the back foot. Meanwhile, it's not clear how well Russia's losses and departures and weird 8D economic sprezzatura would even hold up under a sudden few months of deafening silence if the guns were to rest, and they don't really have all that much slack left to ramp production up further.
Conditional on Trump forcing a truce, my modal scenario is actually that in a year's time a stronger Ukraine steamrolls a weaker Russia, while conditional on everything continuing as before I would now expect Ukraine losing more and more until its will to fight is broken and it feels compelled to sign a much less advantageous treaty of its own accord. Why is the former scenario not even being treated as a possibility by respectable publications? Is it just that they all tried to convert some pro-Ukraine goodwill into anti-Trump sentiment?
Earlier this year I would've said it'll make a forced Truce more likely, but at this point I don't think the outcome of the election matters that much. The ball is no longer in the West's court after how disastrous this summer was for Ukraine. Ukraine's lack of manpower and conscription failures mean it's basically out of steam regardless of what the west does. There weren't many weapons systems left to deliver that weren't risking overly escalating things anyways. Unless maybe an EU country decides to throw their population into the FAB grinder which seems unlikely Ukraine is SOL.
It'll come down more to how much more Putin is willing to spend and what his goals are. I'm guessing at least the rest of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporozhia and Kherson oblasts. If things really start to degrade even faster for Ukraine maybe Kharkiv and Odessa I'd put at the more maximalist goals, unless he thinks he can just regime change Kiev at some point.
The whole point of Russia invading was to prevent Ukraine from becoming armed to the point that it was a threat to Russia, and it seemed like they waited too long on that. There is no way Russia will sit back and let the US train up and further arm what is left of Ukraine simply due to a temporary cease fire. They aren't that dumb.
Haven’t you been arguing this exact line for at least a year? What difference did the summer really make?
For longer really, ever since people over corrected their priors on Ukraine's chances vs Russia after Russia failed to take Kiev in 2022.
It just solidified things more, there's uncertainty in anything even if all the facts point in one direction you can't account for every variable. If time passes and you continue to get the results you're expecting it becomes more likely you're correct. That's all.
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