Can Ukraine stand without America? Military analyst Dmitry Kuznets reviews the survival odds for Kyiv and Europe against Russian aggression

The White House openly says Washington is “the only reason Ukraine exists right now.” While many in Europe and the United States have condemned the president’s attacks on Volodymyr Zelensky and America’s diplomatic outreach to the Kremlin, Kyiv’s supporters also worry that the Trump administration is right about Ukraine’s dependence on U.S. arms and aid. Military analyst Dmitry Kuznets joined Meduza’s daily news podcast to assess what could happen in Europe if Donald Trump suspends support for Kyiv and abandons America’s NATO allies. His remarks are summarized below.

Lessons from the last time

Is Ukraine capable of continuing the war without U.S. military support? Yes, at least for several months, Kuznets told Meduza. When legislative gridlock in the U.S. Congress halted new aid for roughly six months last year, despite critical ammunition shortages, there was no catastrophe on the battlefield or behind the front lines. The army didn’t collapse.

Kuznets argued that Ukraine’s armed forces might be better situated today to weather the sudden loss of new U.S. military supplies, thanks to the growing significance of drones. “Ukraine is not overly dependent on the U.S. for drone supplies and their components,” he explained: 

Russian stipulations and constraints

The Russian military maintains its numerical superiority on most fronts in Ukraine, but Moscow has failed to leverage this advantage to alter the war’s fundamental dynamics. Russia has been unable to break through the front lines and reach Ukraine’s vital centers, meaning the Kremlin cannot end the war today entirely on its own terms without any negotiations.

The terms of any settlement agreeable to the Kremlin will go well beyond what Russia has already seized on the ground. For the past three years, Vladimir Putin has demonstrated his willingness to fight for what he can’t get through diplomacy. “Of course, if Putin could have gotten what he wanted without war, he would have. Apparently, he did not receive such an offer, so the war continues,” Kuznets told Meduza. “From Putin’s perspective, agreeing to anything significantly less than what he can achieve by military force in the near future is also unacceptable, and he will not do that either.”

Moscow has repeatedly stated that it is not interested in temporary ceasefires “for the sake of ceasefires,” and its actions throughout the war bear this out. While the news about peace talks in Saudi Arabia this week attracted attention from Russian milibloggers, Kuznets said he’s monitored no change on the battlefield that suggests a looming settlement. “Negotiations haven’t yet affected the dynamics of the fighting. If the intensity has decreased in some places, it is due to regrouping or other purely military reasons,” he explained.

Where Europe stands

Beyond Ukraine, Europeans are asking themselves how they might fare without U.S. protection if Putin presses his demands elsewhere along Russia’s western border. What happens if the Kremlin sends troops into the Suwalki Corridor or one of the Baltic states? Even with American troops, NATO’s planned response to a Russian invasion of the Baltics assumes it would take six months to liberate the region. But if Russia’s destruction of eastern Ukraine is any indication, there “might be nothing left to liberate,” said Kuznets.

Nevertheless, the hundreds of nuclear warheads between Britain and France should be enough to deter a full-scale war with Russia, argued Kuznets. “It is impossible in the end to set aside the nuclear weapons, which makes it inconceivable to imagine a direct military confrontation between Europe and Russia,” he told Meduza.

However, in the event of a limited conventional conflict, Europe would rely on its air superiority, which “is several times greater than Russia’s even without the United States.” Kuznets warned that Europe might struggle to leverage this advantage, as Russia has failed to dominate Ukrainian airspace — even with its better air force. “Despite having several hundred modern aircraft,” said Kuznets, Russian warplanes “suffered unacceptable losses” and “effectively withdrew from the battlefield for more than a year.”

In the meantime, Western Europe lacks sufficient political will to overcome the financial and technological challenges facing its military industry, such as the production of ammunition and shortages of raw materials for explosives manufacturing, Kuznets explained. If Europe decides to make the necessary sacrifices and fill the assistance vacuum in Ukraine left by the Trump administration, it will still depend largely on access to U.S. weapons markets:

Kuznets was less bullish about the prospects for European peacekeepers. European leaders have not demonstrated the political will to field a large armed force in Ukraine, which would require a plan for how to respond if Russia attacks their soldiers.

Any peacekeeping mission in Ukraine will depend on the mandate it receives, and Kuznets stressed that Russia will likely object to an exclusively European military force. “If there is a European peacekeeping contingent, the Kremlin would want to dilute it with troops from other countries in the Global South, China, or elsewhere,” he said.