Will Ukraine win the war? The four scenarios we can expect by 2023

In these months, Ukraine has exceeded all expectations: it has managed to protect kyiv, the capital, from the Russian occupation, it has managed to retain international support, and it has liberated a large amount of invaded territories. And, on top of that, keep moving forward.

Today anyone would venture to say that Ukraine is winning the war. The problem is that the dreaded winter has already arrived and Russia is rebuilding its rickety army while continues to bombard the country’s energy infrastructureleaving millions of people without electricity, water or heat.

War is as unpredictable today as it was almost a year ago. The only thing that seems certain is that it’s not going to end anytime soon. “It has become a conflict of attrition, it will last a long time,” says Mira Milosevich-Juaristi, a senior researcher at the Elcano Royal Institute who is an expert in Russia, who recalls that the war in Bosnia, which was a much smaller country, lasted three years. .

Peace or armistice agreement

The contest will be delayed, in part, “because neither kyiv nor Moscow are prepared to negotiate peace“, Milosevich-Juaristi clarifies to EL ESPAÑOL. This makes the first possible scenario, that of a peace agreement, also the least likely. At least in the short term.

Vladimir Putin and Volodimir Zelensky They have reiterated their willingness to sit at the negotiating table. But each one has done so by exposing their conditions. The first demands that the Crimean peninsula be recognized, illegally annexed in 2014, and the four Ukrainian provinces illegally incorporated in the summer as part of Russia. The second, on the other hand, calls for the withdrawal of Russian troops from the entire territory, without exception. Until recently it also required the resignation of the current Russian leader.

[Putin invadió Ucrania y cambió el mundo: la guerra que ha obligado a la UE a reinventarse]

Their irreconcilable positions make it necessary to rule out a diplomatic solution to the war. It does not take away that “the war does not end and freeze, as it happened in Korea“This was dropped by the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs, Josep Borrellin November.

He did so during an event at the Barcelona Center for International Affairs, CIDOB, in which he recalled that “in Korea the two parties reached an armistice and a ceasefire, establishing a line of separation.” This, for Milosevich-Juaristi, would “a defeat for Ukraine” because it would mean giving up a piece of their territory. It is, however, one more possibility.

Be that as it may, for that to happen I would first have to change the situation on the battlefield until I reached to a kind of deadlock.

conflict stalemate

This is the scenario that outlines Shashank Joshi, defense editor The Economist, in an analysis where he maintains that the stalemate of the conflict could begin sooner rather than later. Because it should be remembered that, for months, it is expected that the arrival of winter slows down the war dynamics.

Currently, Russian forces are on the eastern bank of the Dnieper River, in the Kherson region, in the southeast of the country. There, using the river as a natural barrier, Putin tries to rebuild his defensive positions and reinforce his battalions with the 300,000 mobilized reservists.

However, there may come a time when the bad preparation of the new soldiers and the bad conditions to which they are subjected lead the commander of the army, General Sergei Surovikin, to change his strategy. Instead of launching a defensive attack, is limited to defend and fortify their positions near the Crimea.

In this way, Ukraine could regain more territory in Kherson, albeit at a slower pace than hitherto and accumulating casualties along the way. However, this would give Russia room to continue enlisting its units and even to block the Ukrainian advance.

[El apoyo a Putin cae en picado: sólo uno de cada cuatro ciudadanos rusos está a favor de la guerra]

At this point, Putin, unable to win the war on the battlefield, would continue to bombard Ukrainian civilian infrastructure, waiting for the exhausted population to demand that the Zelensky government lay down its arms.

However, Putin could also keep lockdown until 2024, when there are presidential elections in the United States. “The Kremlin leader hopes that Donald Trump will return to the White House and stop supporting kyiv militarily and financially,” Joshi predicts.

With everything, extending the war is a high risk bet: It could be the Russian population that, suffocated by Western sanctions on its economy, rise up against the war and, ultimately, against Putin himself.

Ukraine expires in 2023

The third scenario is perhaps one of the most optimistic, but also one of the most dangerous. He envisions Ukrainian forces pushing further into the Kherson region, retaking much of the territory, while his northern battalions push until they collapse. the russian defense line in the Donbas region.

That would allow them to recover the strategic city of Severodonetsk , which is the gateway to the Lugansk region. In parallel, Ukraine, for dampen Russian terror tactics -which involve bombing entire populations left and right- would use the new air defense systems sent by the US and Europe.

This momentum could lead Zelensky’s troops to open a new front in the province of Zaporizhia in the spring, when the ice melted. From there, advance, advance and advance until you besiege the port city of Mariupol, which gives access to the Azov Sea and puts a stone’s throw away – or HIMARS – the Crimean peninsula.

“With the support of NATO, Ukraine will defeat Russia militarily in 2023 and Moscow will suffer unpredictable political consequences”

German Marshall Fund of the United States

This hopeful future is the one that forecasts the German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMFUS), a think tank that addresses transatlantic issues. “With the support of NATO, Ukraine will defeat Russia militarily in 2023 and Moscow will suffer unpredictable political consequences,” the statement said. think tank. He also predicts that Zelenski will be able to liberate “at least all the territory with the exception of Crimea”, but that the peninsula will end up, either recovered or “besieged”according to statements collected by the agency efe.

It would be then when, seeing his most precious possession threatened, Putin could give an ultimatum: stop or I launch a nuclear attack. The problem is that if he followed through on his threats, the war would turn into a direct military confrontation between NATO and Russia that, in its final consequences, could lead to World War III.

[Las anexiones de Putin conducen a tres escenarios peligrosos y uno acaba en la Tercera Guerra Mundial]

Russia close to victory

In the worst case scenario, the war would turn 180 degrees and would put Russia in an advantageous position. To do this, however, it would have to first manage to stabilize its front line over the winter and build up new tactical battalions with well-trained and equipped mobilized personnel. It would also have to find new suppliers – perhaps in Iran, which has been supplying attack drones for months. to get its defense industry afloatwhich is in the red as a result of Western sanctions.

In spring, Putin, who in the cold months has continued to massively bomb Ukraine’s energy networks, weakening civilians and military, it would decide to launch its offensive. He would advance south, in Khersonand would invade, this time, Slovyansk and Kramatorsk, in Donetsk, appropriating almost all of Donbas, according to another analysis of The Economist.

Faced with this situation, the West could ask kyiv to agree a ceasefire. That, however, would leave Russia the option, perhaps in a few months, of launching the military forces it has deployed alongside its partner, the Belarusian president, Alexander Lukashenkoto a “new special military operation” to try to invade kyiv… for the second time.