A year into Russia’s full-scale invasion, Ukraine stands steadfast.
The Ukrainians have displayed remarkable resilience and courage in defending their country. They have managed to stop the blitzkrieg Russian President Vladimir Putin had hoped would bring him a quick victory and have carried out a successful counter-offensive in the east and south.
As a result, Russia does not control a significant portion of the territory whose annexation it proclaimed last September in violation of international law, and it is suffering mounting losses.
Despite the less than stellar performance of the Russian army, Putin is showing no signs of abandoning the conflict. In his February 21 State of the Nation speech, he openly labelled the conflict a war, dropping the “special military operation” narrative he used earlier, and vowed to continue going “further” into Ukrainian territory to push the “threat away from our borders”.
The West has so far demonstrated that it stands by Ukraine. On February 20, US President Joe Biden made an unannounced visit to Kyiv, where he met with his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy and pledged that Washington will back Ukraine “for as long as it takes”.
The following day, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni also travelled to Kyiv to meet with the Ukrainian president. She affirmed Italian support for Ukraine and said that her government intends to supply Spada and Skyguard air defence systems to the Ukrainian army, in addition to the SAMP-T/Mamba, which it had already decided to deliver together with France.
A few days earlier, at this year’s Munich Security Conference, other European leaders pledged their support for Ukraine and even recognised they had been too slow to provide it with the weaponry needed to push Russia further back towards the pre-February 24 lines of control.
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German Chancellor Olaf Scholz called for the West to deliver as many tanks to Ukraine “now” despite his own months of dithering on the decision to do so. British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak endorsed allies sending combat aircraft to Ukraine and providing training to Ukrainian pilots on the most advanced jets.
The West has also shown unwavering commitment to economic sanctions on Russia aimed at weakening the Kremlin, decreasing its war chest, and constraining its ability to invest in its war-making capabilities.
The latest major sanction – a ban on Russian refined oil products – came into effect on February 5. US Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland has said that the G7, the group of leading world economies, is discussing plans for new sanctions which could be announced during the bloc’s February 24 virtual summit.
But Western support for Ukraine has also been lacking in certain respects. The West has not endorsed writing off Ukrainian debt, while proposals that assets seized from the Russian central bank and blacklisted Russian oligarchs be given to Kyiv as compensation have yet to progress. It has also faced bottlenecks in terms of production and struggled with getting third countries to approve transfers, which threaten its ability to supply Kyiv with sufficient ammunition.