Holding a PhD in history from Columbia University, Gilbert Doctorow worked for many years in the field of international business, particularly in the USSR and in Russia. Now based in Brussels, he devotes himself to geopolitical analysis. In 2025, he published War Diaries. Volume 1: The Russia–Ukraine War, 2022–2023. . Volume 2 is forthcoming.
Guillaume de Sardes: The war opposing Russia and Ukraine (supported by NATO) has now been going on for almost four years. Despite negotiations conducted by the Trump administration for nearly a year, there is still no clear mechanism for resolution nor any agreement on what would constitute a peace treaty acceptable to both belligerents, making it hazardous to predict an imminent end to the conflict. What is your opinion on this matter? Does a diplomatic outcome in 2026 seem possible to you? Under what conditions?
Gilbert Doctorow: The ‘negotiations’ conducted by Donald Trump since his inauguration are negotiations in name only, as we see very clearly from what has been going on these past couple of months. His emissaries, Witkoff and Kushner, meet first with one side to the conflict and agree on a peace outcome acceptable to that side. Then they do the same with the other side to the conflict. But the two approved outcomes are irreconcilable. In effect, all sides are stalling for time. And therein lies the great danger for all of us in Belgium and more broadly in Europe. The longer the war continues, the longer the present tyrants called commissioners in the EU Institutions and tyrants called prime ministers in Germany and the UK, or president in France, all of whom have historically low popularity ratings, will remain in power. And while in power they can implement their plans to remilitarize, reindustrialize and so prepare for an all-out pan European war in 2030 if not earlier. Hundreds of billions of euros are being spent right now in preparation for a conflict that can only lead to the utter destruction of Europe, if not the world if it turns nuclear, which is entirely possible.
Most of my colleagues, particularly those in the alternative media, continue to predict an end to the war via Russian victory on the field of battle and the surrender of the Ukrainian miitary in the coming weeks or months. However, they all have been saying that since the first months of this war. Not being a military expert, I went along with their assessment until one day, about six months ago, I said ‘basta’, enough believing fairy tales. From the start of the war, every time a Russian victory appeared imminent, the United States and or the Europeans escalated the conflict and its finale moved away like the horizon. Even today, when the Russians truly have improved their position vis-a-vis the Ukrainians in terms of numbers of men deployed and in terms of having taken most of the defensive line of heavily fortified cities that the Ukrainians built up between 2014 and 2022, still the notion that the Ukrainian army will collapse, will capitulate, cannot fight on is not persuasive. They will lose the Donbas, but they have and will continue to have forces to the West of the Dnieper, where the Russians will not follow them because that Western part of Ukraine is truly Ukrainian speaking and nationally minded, so that its conquest and occupation would be far more expensive in blood and treasure than the Russians want to put up. Moreover, now that the European Union has formally committed 95 billion euros from its budget to supporting the Ukrainian war effort for two more years, Zelensky has no reason to agree to Russian terms.
Accordingly, if the Russians do not change their strategy, the war will go on indefinitely, either in active phase or as a frozen conflict that deprives Russia of its real objectives, namely regime change that removes the ultranationalists from power in Kiev and conclusion of a peace that addresses the root causes of the war, up to and including the refusal of NATO in December 2021 to agree to Russian demands that the security architecture of Europe be redesigned to provide security to all parties, including themselves.
So how can this war end quickly ? I insist that the Russians can end the war in a matter of days or at most weeks if they use their Oreshniks and other cutting-edge military technologies to deliver a decapitation strike against the civilian and military decision-making centers in Kiev, Lvov and elsewhere in Ukraine. The logic for this was summed up very nicely in words attributed to Josef Stalin when he was asked why he ordered the execution of not only real but also potential opponents : ‘нет человека, нет проблемы” – ‘a man is eliminated and we have no more problems.’
This kind of closure is in the interests not only of Russian and Ukrainian civilians and soldiers who are dying every day it continues. It is in our interests here in Belgium and more broadly in Europe.
Do you think that the efforts of the Trump administration to find a path toward peace are sincere? While one can easily imagine the advantages of a “forever war” for the United States (massive arms sales to Europe, exports of LNG, the decline of the rival German economy, the relocation of European companies to the United States), the benefits the United States might derive from peace appear less clear.
The imagined advantages to the USA from a never ending war in Ukraine are just that : imaginary. Latest statistics on US LNG exports to Europe show that they are running at only one-third of the level needed to meet the enormous import pledges made by the EU when it negotiated a less onerous tariff regime with Washington just months ago. (source : today’s Financial Times). Meanwhile, the notion of vast European purchases of US weapons systems as the EU rearms also is questionable. The patent unreliability of the US as a defense partner today and the need to find use for automobile and other factories that are now idle in Germany and elsewhere in Europe due to the war-related loss of consumer markets under inflationary conditions means that Europe has to spend the military budget for equipment procurement at home, not on imports from the USA.
Meanwhile, the war’s continuation stands in the way of Trump’s overarching foreign policy objectives of normalizing relations with Russia so as to draw it away from the Chinese embrace that poses a great security threat to the USA if it finds itself in a war with two allied nuclear superpowers at once.
How do you assess the role of European diplomacy in this conflict?
Insofar as European diplomacy is in the hands of the Vice President of the EU Commission responsible for foreign relations and security, Kaja Kallas, this role is entirely destructive, not constructive. Before taking this post, Kallas was the prime minister of Estonia, a country of 1.3 million, that like the other Baltic states, Latvia and Lithuania, was on the forefront of Russia-haters among EU Member States. Even before moving to Brussels, she was on record as saying that Russia must suffer a strategic defeat, must be ‘brought to its knees.’ In the past week, she said publicly that a cap must be put on the Russian armed forces, not on the Ukrainians. With this type of talk, with her insistent promotion of the confiscation of Russian state assets on deposit in Euroclear (Belgium) to provide for massive loans to Ukraine for its war effort, Kallas’s continued tenure in office closes the door to any peace settlement.
But, let us remember that the problem is not limited to this one individual. Her predecessor Josif Borrell, was of an equally shallow intellectual and educational level, even if he came from an EU Member State (Spain) many times the size and importance of Estonia. It was Borrell who said that the fate of Russia and the outcome of the conflict would be decided on the field of battle, not in diplomacy. It wa he who famously and arrogantly claimed that Europe is a garden surrounded by a jungle, meaning the Rest of the World.
If no diplomatic solution is found, the conflict will be settled by force of arms. In that scenario, do you think Russia will be satisfied with the four oblasts (five including Crimea) that it has already annexed, or do you think it might go further, notably by taking Odesa and its surrounding region? Beyond the fact that Odesa is historically a Russian city—it was founded in 1794 by decision of Empress Catherine II—its incorporation into Russia would make the strategic naval base of Sevastopol unreachable by Ukrainian maritime drones and would ensure the security of Russian commercial shipping in the Black Sea.
As you suggest, if the war continues into 2026 it is almost certain that the Russians will take Odessa. The historical reasons you cite will, of course, be given by Moscow to justifiy the seizure, but the reality is the importance of Odessa in several dimensions including the following : by taking Odessa Russia will effectively cut Ukraine off from the sea, which mdans not only reducing their ability to strike Sevastopol and the Black Sea fleet, but also removes from Ukraine one of the most attractive reasons for British and French interest in Ukraine. Both countries have had plans to use Odessa as their own navel base in the Black Sea to contain Russian naval operations and threaten Moscw. A land-locked rump Ukrainian state will be a very economically disadvantaged country that is unable to pose a military threat to Russia. Also important is that by controlling Odessa, the Russians will have a link-up with the Russian-speaking enclave in Transnistria, which Russia-haters in Europe plan to make their next flash point with Moscow.
Ukraine is today a depopulated country (its population is said to have fallen to around 22 million, with 2 million having fled to Russia and 6 to 8 million to Europe and other countries), its infrastructure and energy system are severely damaged, its government has been delegitimized by corruption scandals, and its army, which has suffered considerable losses likely underestimated by Western media, is facing steadily rising desertions. In this degraded situation, how long do you think the Ukrainian army can still hold out against the Russian army?
The 95 billion euros now being readied by Brussels to support the Ukrainian war effort can buy a lot of gear and a lot of mercenaries to man the gear. Moreover, for the reasons I stated above, the Russians have no intrerest in occupying Ukrainian territory west of the Dnieper. For these reasons, in principle, the war can go on for a long time even with the weakened Ukrainian armed forces of today. Also we must consider that the war has evolved from an exclusively artillery war, where the Russians had a 10 :1 advantage in artillery tubes and ammunition, to a drone war which operates on much lower manpower levels so that you don’t need an army of hundreds of thousands of infantry to stay in play, just a few hundred graduates of video games who are skillful operators of drones today.
The most likely outcome of this conflict is a Russian victory. Given your extensive experience in the world of business, do you think that once this victory has been achieved on the ground (which is arguably already the case) and acknowledged by the Europeans (which is still far from being the case, as the European Union continues to defend the idea of “peace through strength,” that is, a peace negotiated on an equal footing by the belligerents), commercial relations between Russia and the European Union could resume? If so, at whose initiative and through what kind of projects? Can one imagine divergent policies within the European Union itself?
Indeed, it is very likely that commercial ties between Russia and Europe will resume, at first very slowly, but then with greater acceleration. Surely the first domain to reconstitute iself will be energy and revival of European imports of Russian pipeline gas.
