How Ukraine war has become Europe’s ‘Vietnam’

The on-camera wordy duel of US President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last Friday was not a conversation between two presidents of sovereign nations but a sign of geopolitical churning that is imminent in the coming months and years.

Global politics is bound to be upended, something that has not happened in the last few generations. Even if we do not go into the details of a public spat between the two leaders, one thing is clear: transatlantic relations will never be the same again.

Though Zelenskyy seemed forced to reconcile as suggested by his tweet later, the fact remains that Europe now has a new reality to face: taking care of its security without an assured umbrella of the US. Not only that, but the trade and tariff war with Europe is also on the anvil.

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What’s in store for Ukraine?

The US has suspended military and intelligence support for Ukraine, which will make things difficult for Ukraine. It will also give Russia a military and strategic advantage over its forces, forcing Ukraine to agree to the call of the US to ceasefire and, in probability, lose all the territory lost by Ukraine to the Russians. That’s what has been desired by the Russians all along.

Russia has made territorial gains in 2024 and a slow and steady territorial advance in Ukraine in 2025. Ukraine had proposed staged cessation of hostilities by starting with stopping air and naval operations, as complete cessation of fighting at the behest will not be sustainable in the long run and might be a provocation for the next round of hostilities, as was witnessed in the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict. Any peace settlement against Ukraine’s explicit will and, above all, without taking Europe into confidence, will not be sustainable and might be a template for a similar scenario in Europe.

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The US, led by Donald Trump, is also symmetrical with the Russian view on how it will interact with Europe and will have an essential bearing on the future security order in Europe. Trump is in perfect sync with Moscow by helping the illiberal political parties of Europe who have sympathy for Russia and its causes. This was seen when JD Vance and Trump’s friend Elon Musk made a common cause with the European far-right movements like AfD in Germany and the Reform UK party led by Nigel Farage.

A shift in the traditional stance of the US?

The transatlantic alliance has been in place among European and North American states after the Second World War. The basis of the alliance was not only economic and security but also a similarity of the worldviews as reflected in the shared values of capitalism, free market, democracy, human rights, etc. The United States helped Europe come out of economic distress through the Marshall Plan, etc. The creation of the international liberal ‘rule-based world order’, maintained by the hard and soft power of the US. Ukraine will be the first victim of the realignment of the Transatlantic Alliance and the resultant upending of the relations established between them for the past 80 years. This will result in a marginalised Western Europe, increased say of Russia in East, Central Europe, and the Former Soviet space, or ‘Near Abroad’ (Blizhnee Zerubezhe) as the Russians term it.

Three years of slumber for Europe!

The war is in its fourth year now. Even a casual student of history will know that Russia has always been a victor in the battle of attrition. Its victory over Napoleon and Hitler (in the siege of St Petersburg) was the result of these tactics. The famous and catchy statements by Joe Biden patting Ukraine, saying that “we have Ukraine’s back” and “we are with Ukraine as long as it takes”, didn’t help the ground realities. Ukraine’s army, without Western support, was incapable of taking on the mighty Russian war machine. The reason that they could hold together and give a tough fight to the Russians was because the Ukrainian war machine was well-oiled by Western donations, assistance, and above all, intelligence and communications support, which the US has now stopped from its side.

The collective ‘West’ had seen that Trump’s ‘America First’ movement had become a major political force. It has been 11 years since Crimea was reintegrated back into Russia, and probably since the end of the Cold War three decades back, the US has been hinting at Europe to take care of their security, but nothing has worked. All the efforts to work collectively for a collective response minus the US have drawn to naught, and here is where Ukraine stands today.

Thousands of casualties and billions of dollars lost; Ukraine stands poorer since the war started, losing 20 per cent of its territory. The West was looking for a ‘strategic defeat’ instead of a ‘battleground defeat’ for Russia. West appears defeated in both. Though Russia cannot be declared victorious as of today, history will be a better judge of this. The quicksand in which Americans were in Vietnam in the late 60s and early 70s, which eventually led to their ‘defeat’, the Russians and Americans together have proved that Ukraine is Europe’s ‘Vietnam’.

For the rest of the world, the Russia-Ukraine War was only a snapshot of the developing world order and the decline of the West. There are ticklish and contentious issues that still confront them: the ongoing conflict in West Asia involving actors like Israel, Iran and the rest, and the politics of the US is gradually pivoting towards the East, to Asia, especially China and Southeast Asia. The real test of American and Western clout is when it has to address them. Fundamental diplomatic and economic skills are needed to address the challenges here.

Amitabh Singh teaches at the School of International Studies, JNU, New Delhi. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views.