Western weapons won't decide war in Ukraine

Top Ukrainian officials are presenting the Biden administration with a list of targets deeper in Russia, as part of an ongoing effort to persuade the US to lift restrictions on the use of American weapons against Moscow.

David Silbey is a professor of history at Cornell University, specializing in military history, defense policy and battlefield analysis. Despite the success of Ukrainian attacks into Kursk, he says there is no simple solution, or magical weapon, that will suddenly change the battlefield dynamic.

Silbey says: “The Russo-Ukrainian War has been marked from the beginning by a continuing belief that if only the West gave Ukraine *this* weapon — M1 tanks, Leopard tanks, F16s, ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile System) — the course of the war would change. Now, it’s if only the US would allow Ukraine to use the ATACMS deeper into Russia. 

“The problem is that none of these technological wonder solutions have fulfilled that war-winning vision. They’ve all been useful, but this war is not going to be won because of some high-tech super weapon — a lesson Western commentators should have learned after decades of fighting experience in places like Iraq and Afghanistan.”

For interviews contact Adam Allington, cell: (231) 620-7180, adam.allington@cornell.edu.