To the last Ukrainian: For a brief moment, Ukraine was beacon of freedom. Now, it is clear that for all our talk, no one in the West really thought they could beat Russia. Worse, it is clear that many never wanted them to.

According to Zelensky, Russian forces currently control around one fifth of Ukrainian territory, mostly in the east and the south. As he pointed out last Thursday in an address to the Luxembourg parliament, this is an area that is much larger than the entire Benelux region.

For Russia, this has come at a considerable cost. Reliable open source intelligence estimates put Russian losses at over 31,000 soldiers killed, 3,300 armoured vehicles and another 2,500 trucks destroyed, 200 lost aircraft, 175 helicopters, and 13 ships or boats. All of this for a “special operation” that was supposed to take no more than a long weekend including the victory parade, with the invaders welcomed as liberators.

Dear as this has been for Russia, for Ukrainians the price has been much, much higher. Reliable estimates of Ukrainian military losses are hard to come by, but something around half of the Russian figures is probably in the ballpark, though they could easily be much higher. Zelensky has not been totally shy in talking about losses; the other day he said the Ukrainian forces were losing 60-100 fighters a day, with another 500+ wounded, in fighting in the east.

These are staggering losses (recall that Canada lost 158 soldiers over the course of more than a decade in Afghanistan), but they don’t even begin to compare with what has happened to Ukraine’s civilians and to its cities. […]

The solidarity that NATO showed in the early days of the invasion has long evaporated. A clear schism has emerged between the countries of the east who have skin in the game — Poland and the Baltics in particular, but some plucky Balkan countries as well — and the old central European powers led by France and Germany. As usual, it has fallen to the Americans, supported by the Brits, to hold things together. Except the leaders of both of those countries have serious problems at home. Boris Johnson is facing a growing rebellion in parliament over the fallout from Sue Gray’s “Partygate” report, and he may yet be pushed from office. Across the pond, poor, elderly Joe Biden has to try to govern an America that is barely holding itself together.

All of which spells bad news for Ukraine.

There were plenty of warnings.