“Win the war, lose the peace” – this formula has been actively used by more than a dozen Ukrainian political scientists and journalists for several months; I have not been able to establish authorship, although it seems that the chronologically first formula came from the mouth of David Williams, who paraphrased a statement from Ursula von der Leyen’s speech at the Lugano Ukrainian Reconstruction Conference, which comes from the 1947 Truman Doctrine.
When predicting the future, the so-called inertial scenario always appears in the field of view – the most probable scenario that occurs if the subjects do nothing to switch to other, more preferable, less probable scenarios that require active intervention.
I want us to be aware of the inertial scenario.
I have no doubts about our victory in the war. There, too, everything is not simple (Russia was defeated, but Ukraine has not yet won, and now Russia is doing everything possible to make the defeat mutual, because it justifies its own defeat; more detailed here). But in war, at least it is clear what to do, and not only at the tactical level (the Armed Forces of Ukraine beat the enemy, all the people support and help), but also at the level of strategy (see the Sustainable Peace Manifesto “The World After Our Victory”). So, we do what we need to do and bring our victory closer.
Let’s look further from this point. What is the state of affairs immediately after the victory?
1. We won. The transition from war to peace is much more difficult than the transition from peace to war. The country has lost a hundred thousand of its best people. The country lies in ruins, some cities are destroyed to the ground, in some regions a real humanitarian catastrophe. There is a huge hole in the budget, because the economy has been greatly reduced. Our best people, the military, are returning home exhausted, the first priority for them is to restore health and life. Also exhausted is a significant part of the active minority – those who worked tirelessly for victory in the rear. The whole society is stricken with severe trauma.
2. Reforms have not been made – they are “out of time”, but no one was particularly going to carry them out. Ukraine has not fulfilled its obligations, therefore, it does not receive enough money for restoration from international partners and donors, nor does it receive membership in the European Union. The Ukrainian political elite insists on both money and membership (“European integration first – then reforms”, “winners are not judged”, “you owe us because we saved you”, etc.), but this rhetoric of international partners does not convinces. First, they did not forget the numerous preliminary deceptions. Secondly, they are afraid of the emergence of a new cohort of oligarchs who will appear on the theft of their money, and then they will answer to their voters. Third, no one in the EU wants a big country that is a problem, not an opportunity.
3. The restoration of the country has been put on pause. The end of hostilities and martial law actualizes the issue of returning or not returning those who left: European governments will gently push out those who have not taken root, and stimulate those who can to take root (after all, everyone needs educated, hardworking people). Millions of families face a choice: women with children return home to men, or men join their families. The decision will be made in accordance with the assessment of the situation at that time.
4. There are no well-paid jobs in Ukraine, because jobs in the private sector need private investment, and the public sector is already overloaded. The conditions for creating one’s own business do not stand up to comparison with neighbors (a significant part of the businesses have already moved to the countries of Central and Eastern Europe). Schools and hospitals, without which life is impossible, are being restored to a minimum. Only the liberated territories and completely destroyed cities need huge funds just to start life. Inflation, contained in 2022-2023 thanks to international assistance, is starting to unwind – after all, in the absence of donor money for restoration, the state will be forced to turn on the printing press in order to rebuild at least critical infrastructure.
5. The situation is aggravated, but does not cause protest: in Ukraine, people usually protest against injustice, and not against the deterioration of living conditions, and this happens as a result of sudden events, and not a slow “cooking a frog over low heat.” And there is no one to protest: the active minority is exhausted, and, perhaps, split by artificial squabbles. Controlled media and social media correspondents stigmatize any criticism of the authorities as undermining national unity. By the way, Russian propaganda has not gone away either, even if Russia is already beginning to collapse under the influence of a military defeat.
6. Control over all law enforcement agencies (including anti-corruption), over the parliament and the media belongs to one small group of people. The oligarchs, who usually supported political pluralism in Ukrainian history for their own interests (and thus in some cases played a positive role), have effectively disappeared from the scene as a result of the war. Decentralization reform is being rolled back, local leaders are faced with a choice: swear allegiance to the central government or be repressed, at least limited in their abilities and doused in dirt, and certainly without the resources to rebuild.
7. The political elite receives full control over life in a devastated country and does not understand that this control should be partially conceded in order to restore. The dialogue between the Ukrainian authorities and international partners is reminiscent of a dialogue between an autopilot and an answering machine. At best, European integration is moving according to the “Kindergarten” scenario, although it would be correct to call it “Orban.ua” – we are becoming like a big Hungary, where formally there is democracy, a free market and the rule of law, but in fact control over politics, the economy and the media is concentrated in the hands of one clan that opposes its country to Europe and gives away some money to grateful paternalists in exchange for unfailing support (there is little chance that such a country will be gladly accepted into the EU). In the worst case, we have an essentially Russian scenario “Kill the dragon and become a dragon”, which means a posthumous victory for Putin.
8. Against this background, the key reforms of previous years are curtailed, and those who implemented them risk going to jail. The corruption vertical closes at the top, anti-corruption bodies are under control, supervisory boards are destroyed, public organizations are either bought (not always for money, often for access to the media and to government offices) or pushed to the margins. Court positive bloggers explain to the people in simple language why this is the way it should be.
9. The most politically dangerous group are the popular military and volunteer leaders. The most popular and active of them are “removed from the board” by criminal trials for exceeding their powers, violating the rules and making decisions that caused material damage to the state (I think you perfectly understand how officers and generals exceeded their powers during the war, and volunteers violated the rules). The depletion of society, the huge unsatisfied demand for justice and awareness of the scale of our losses requires revenge on at least someone. Protests are marginalized, statements about the superiority of justice over justice are not heard in conditions of low legal culture.
10. Since the international partners did not provide any money or membership in the European Union, the people declare that the West has abandoned us, merged and deceived us. This clear and obvious thesis well explains poverty and devastation, unemployment and rising prices. For the next 25 years, Ukrainians experience acute resentment for this behavior of the West. We are turning into a nation of resentful winners, unable to draw conclusions (either the defeated or the successful winners draw them). Here comes China with very lucrative loan offers… Western intellectuals wisely shake their heads, repeating the phrase “Ukraine will never miss a chance to miss all chances.” This is how a generation goes. Everything that will happen after that is another generation, another story.
A feature of inertial scenarios (let me remind you, inertial is the most likely scenario that occurs if the subjects do nothing) is always that they are formed by very well-visible trends. These alternative scenarios are formed by active actions of subjects, unnoticed or new trends and “black swans” (jokers), and the inertial one is always clearly visible. God’s windmills are slow, and therefore there are almost no sudden events – everything that happened to us over the course of decades was foreseen by trend watchers.
Therefore, if you do not like what is written, you should first go through the points and ask yourself which specific points you do not agree with because you deny the trends described there. And then evaluate how much your denials affect the whole picture. And think about what you can do.
Usually, no one likes the inertial scenario, it causes disgust. That’s why he exists, to motivate his disgust. After all, good (desirable) scenarios require the persistent and coordinated efforts of an active minority – those social forces that are able to look into the future and act to improve it. The active minority always determines the direction of development, while the passive majority determines its speed. But the active minority can be exhausted, dispersed, split, beheaded, humiliated, forced out of public space. And then the inertial scenario of the future unfolds as it is shaped by powerful trends.
It would be appropriate to conclude the text with a call for joint work and an outline of an action plan to move from the business as usual to the desired one. But I will put an end here. We have not yet passed the stage of awareness, we have not reached the stage when understanding the state of affairs prompts decisions and actions. Remember Colonel Boyd’s Observation-Evaluation-Decision-Act cycle? To recoil from the abyss, you must first look into it. Welcome, take a look.
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