On the battlefields of Ukraine and western Russia, a spread war has on the ground, the Ukrainian troops defending against Russian progress which can sometimes be measured in a few yards. The cost was strong victims on both sides.
President Trump’s decision this week to suspend military assistance and information sharing could reorganize the battlefield, to interrupt combat or potentially give Russia a decisive advantage.
With the help of Europe, both with support for weapons and intelligence, Ukraine could continue the fight throughout the summer without additional American aid. But the loss of one of its most important benefactors will allow Russia to attack Ukrainian defense lines, according to analysts.
“Despite the disadvantage of ammunition and forces, the Ukrainians admirably prevented all kinds of Russian breakthrough,” said Seth G. Jones, main vice-president of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, in an interview.
Trump administration officials suggested that the break in support could be relatively short -lived if the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, complies with the White House requests. Trump, in his speech at Congress on Tuesday evening, said that he had appreciated that Mr. Zelensky had declared earlier in the day that he was ready to “come to the negotiating table”.
For the moment, the Trump administration exerts maximum pressure on Ukraine, and relatively little on the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin, or the Russian army, which continued to attack the Ukrainian cities. If the United States is considered a completely unfair peace broker, Ukraine could seek ways to continue the fight with the support of Europe.
The Russians have still not established air superiority since invading Ukraine three years ago. They failed to combine military units in joint operations and suffered so many victims that Mr. Putin made 11,000 North Korean troops to help relieve tension, military experts said.
But it was before Mr. Trump launched his weight behind Russia.
“The immediate blow will be on the morale of the troops – strengthening the Russians and depressing the Ukrainians,” said Alexander Vindman, a former Ukrainian Army officer who sat on the National Security Council in 2019.
Trump’s decision affects billions of dollars in weapons and ammunition in the pipeline and in order. It stops deliveries of Pentagon Stockpile equipment as well as aid through Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative, which provides funds that kyiv can use to buy new military equipment directly from American defense companies.
Ukraine should also lose advanced weapons, including surface -to -surface ballistic missiles, long -range rocket artillery, parts and maintenance and technical support.
Above all, the break on American military aid will stop the delivery of interceptors missiles for the air defense systems Patriot and Nasams, which saved an incalculable number of lives while they protected Ukrainian cities from missile and drone attacks.
The intelligence break will remove the information that Ukraine uses to target the Russian forces.
According to Trump administration officials, retaining aid is supposed to put pressure on Mr. Zelensky to sign an agreement to give American companies access to Ukrainian minerals. If he concludes an agreement, said an official of the Trump administration, the intelligence sharing will continue and the military supplies already allocated by the Biden administration take place again.
But the quantity of new military aid Mr. Trump would be willing to provide is not clear.
Russian forces have attempted to recover the territory more in the Kursk region, Russia, which Ukraine seized last year and preparing for more fights along the main front lines in the region of eastern Ukraine.
“They regenerate in place and tried to repair certain damage from the offensive last fall,” said Dara Massicot, Russian military specialist in Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “I would expect another push to start probably by May.”
Ukraine, which has strengthened its own production of weapons, and Europe is not without their own resources.
Europe, in particular France and Great Britain, provides Ukraine satellite images which can be used to find Russian targets on the battlefield. However, European satellites have not been as focused on Russian military movements as American spy satellites, and Ukrainian officials concede that if the intelligence break continues, there will be consequences.
And if the delivery of deliveries extends beyond the beginning of summer, Ukraine would lose its supply of certain advanced weapons, in particular advanced air defense systems, surface ballistic missiles, navigation systems and long-range rocket artillery.
A prolonged shortage of these weapons would harm Ukraine’s ability to strike longer range targets and could make Ukrainian cities and troops more vulnerable to missile, rockets and drones attacks.
The Trump administration sent some of the weapons that the Biden administration has promised in Ukraine, including “hundreds of multiple guided launching rocket systems (GMLR) and anti-banque weapons and thousands of artillery rounds,” the Pentagon said on Monday.
According to Mr. Trump’s directive, these deliveries would stop, at least until the president determines that Ukraine had demonstrated a commitment of good faith towards peace negotiations with Russia, said a senior administration official.
However, “the nature of the types of weapons systems that Ukrainians are currently using are different from those on which they depended very strongly in the first months of war,” said George Barros, an expert in Russia at the Institute for the Study of War. “The industrial basis of the defense of Ukraine has increased considerably, and they could produce many things they need.”
In fact, in recent weeks, the rhythm of Russian assaults has slowed down along the hottest games on the front, and the Russian troops “have undergone heavy losses during their offensive actions,” said Colonel Oleksii Khilchenko, a Ukrainian brigade commander in eastern Ukraine, during a telephone interview.
“Associations that previously involved 10 to 15 soldiers have now been reduced to attacks in small groups that can go up to five soldiers,” he said.
Barros said most of the victims of the Ukrainian troops inflicted on Russia were caused by homemade drones and other weapons produced in Ukraine.
“It is therefore not as if the Ukrainians on the front line would lack their most basic tools right away,” he said.
But what Ukraine will miss, according to him, him and other experts are interceptors for the patriots, who helped the country’s air defenses.
European countries have patriotic interceptors, but they should sacrifice certain parts of their own air defense umbrella. This could be a big demand at a time when NATO allies can no longer assume that the United States will help defend them if it is attacked.
European leaders said they would meet in Brussels on Thursday with two things on the agenda: how to support Ukraine and how to consolidate their own military capacities.
We did not know where the Satellite Starlink Internet service is in Mr. Trump’s break. Operated by SpaceX by Elon Musk, Starlink has been essential to the Ukrainian army since the first days of war, allowing soldiers to communicate and share information without having to use text messages on cellular networks which can more easily be intercepted.
During a meeting tense at the Oval Office last week, Trump told Mr. Zelensky that he was not in good position. “You don’t have the cards at the moment,” said Trump.
But no one can predict what the break in helping and sharing intelligence will mean for the war, military officials said.
“Saying that the Ukrainians” do not have the cards “tell me that those around Potus do not really understand the nature of the war or why men and women are really ready to fight, even if they are more numerous,” said Frederick B. Hodges, retired gender and former commander of the high-level American army in Europe.
Ukraine could win, or at least be in a much better position, if Europeans provide support “they are able to deliver,” he said. “And they will have done it without the United States, the result will be lost credibility and loss of influence.”
The other scenario – where Russia succeeds in Ukraine – could be even darker for the Trump administration, said military experts. A Russian victory could embrace the expansionist objectives of Mr. Putin, which ultimately led to a major war in Europe.
Mr. Jones, from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, noted that the United States has tried in the past to stay outside the wars of the big-pour-pour in Europe and failed.
