Kyiv's long road to economic stability

For over a decade, much of the West has been pondering how to manage Ukraine's inevitable subordination to Russia.

- CHRYSTIA FREELAND

Yes, we've said we stand with Ukraine. Yes, we've said that we will support Ukraine for as long as it takes. And yet we have consistently failed to give Ukraine the support it needs to win. We have even repeatedly discouraged Ukraine from using its own resources as effectively as possible to defend itself.

It is time to change that halfhearted paradigm. We need to recognize that Ukraine can win and that a Ukrainian victory is in the interests of the geopolitical West (and if we don't believe that, we should say so). And then we need to devise a plan for a Ukrainian victory.

Our defeatism started with the 2014 invasion of Crimea, when the West told Ukrainians to stand down and tacitly accepted Russian control of the peninsula. On the eve of the 2022 full-scale invasion, we prepared to support a long Ukrainian guerilla war against Russian occupation and were cautious about giving the Ukrainian government weapons that we assumed would only fall into Russian hands. As the Kremlin's tanks crossed the border, we offered President Volodymyr Zelensky an escape route, so he could lead Ukraine's government in exile.

Even after the Ukrainian people showed that they had the will and the strength not to be conquered, we have been collectively hesitant about giving them the tools that they need to win. Worse, we have even cautioned them against using their own weapons to maximum effect.

It is time to stop equivocating. It is time to stop settling for stalemate and planning for Finlandization. Ukraine can defeat Russia, and NATO allies and our Asian partners will be stronger if it does. So, it is past time to plan for success.

It starts with Ukraine's capacity for victory. Since the war began, Ukraine has consistently outperformed Western expectations. Kyiv did not fall. Ukraine, with no navy of its own, has destroyed much of the Russian Black Sea Fleet and broken through its maritime blockade.