Three years into Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine, Rym Momtaz, Yuliya Bidenko, and Eric Ciaramella discuss Ukraine’s military and societal resilience, and Europe’s role in securing the country’s future.
After three years of war on its soil, Ukraine is grappling with manpower shortages and increasingly uncertain Western military support in the face of Russia’s continued aggression.
Rym Momtaz sat down with Yuliya Bidenko and Eric Ciaramella to unpack the situation on the ground and the war’s broader implications for European security and the transatlantic alliance.
[00:00:00] Intro, [00:02:01] The Military Situation on the Ground, [00:11:17] Ukraine’s Mobilization and Societal Priorities, [00:18:43] Europe’s Role in Ensuring Ukraine’s Security.
Yuliya Bidenko, February 8, 2023, “How Ukraine Forged a Culture of Resilience,” Europe Inside Out, Carnegie Europe.
Eric Ciaramella, January 30, 2025, “Triangle of Sadness: Prospects of Trump-Putin-EU Peace Talks on Ukraine, with Eric Ciaramella,” Carnegie Politika, Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center.
Eric Ciaramella, December 5, 2024, “Rational Security: The "Ukraine in the Membrane" Edition,” Lawfare.
Rym Momtaz et al., December 5, 2024, “Taking the Pulse: Are Information Operations Russia’s Most Potent Weapon Against Europe?,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.
Rym Momtaz et al., January 9, 2025, “Taking the Pulse: Can Poland’s EU Presidency Be Credible Without Deploying Troops to Ukraine?,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.
Rym Momtaz et al., November 21, 2024, “Taking the Pulse: Would Freezing Ukraine’s NATO Membership Process Advance Peace?,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.
Rym Momtaz, November 5, 2024, “Behind the Scenes, Preparations for Russia-Ukraine Negotiations,” Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.
Rym Momtaz
Hello and welcome to this month’s Europe Inside Out, I’m your host Rym Momtaz, the Editor-in-chief of Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe’s blog where, twice a week, we publish punchy, short analyses on all things strategic in Europe.
This month marks the third year of Russia’s large-scale invasion of Ukraine – a devastating war the Russian government continues to euphemistically call a “special operation”. It has killed all too many Ukrainians, as they valiantly continue fighting for their nation. US President Donald Trump has made ending this war one of his top international priorities – on the campaign trail he promised to end it in twenty-four hours, that turned into one hundred days after inauguration. So the clock is now ticking and there is a flurry of backroom diplomacy with not only the fate of the Ukrainian nation hanging in the balance, but also the European security architecture, and in a way the terms of the transatlantic alliance or the transatlantic bargain.
There is a lot to break down when it comes to the state of play in Ukraine right now – so we will start with an overview of the military situation on the ground as well as the Ukrainian political context and how civil society is getting on three years into this war. Then we’ll discuss the ongoing diplomatic efforts and, finally, the meta stakes in terms of European security and the transatlantic alliance.
I’m very pleased to welcome Eric Ciaramella, senior fellow in the Russia and Eurasia Program at Carnegie in Washington DC, and Yuliya Bidenko, a Ukrainian national, a visiting scholar at Carnegie Europe and expert on Ukrainian resilience.
Welcome to you both.
Yuliya Bidenko
Thank you. Thank you for having me.
Eric Ciaramella
Great to be with you.
Rym Momtaz
Let's start with the situation on the ground, and I'm going to start with you, Eric. Nearly three years since Russia's large-scale invasion, January 2025 is actually the month where Moscow's troops have suffered their second highest losses in a single month, but at the same time, they're still advancing in Eastern Ukraine, and they're slowly rolling back Ukraine's presence in the Russian region of Kursk. What's your analysis? What's happening right now.
Eric Ciaramella
Thanks, Rym. Well, the war has been really difficult for the Ukrainian side for the past year. As you rightly point out, the Ukrainian army has been facing incremental losses on the battlefield as Russia has thrown just massive numbers of troops and equipment in various directions, particularly concentrated in the east and south of Ukraine. This is coming at a tremendously high cost to the Russians in terms of lives lost and equipment that they're burning through. But like you say, the Russians are still making incremental —and I would say even accelerating —gains in some areas. There's been a lot of focus on the strategic hub of Pokrovsk, where the Russians have been bearing down now for some months. And if that city falls to the Russians, there's a very significant concern in Ukrainian military and intelligence circles about the threat that would be posed to neighboring Dnipro, which is the main industrial hub of Ukraine. And Yuliya can tell us about its importance for the Ukrainian economy and broader resilience. But there is significant concern here about some of the strategic implications of the loss of certain territories in Eastern Ukraine.
Rym Momtaz
How would you describe then the morale of the Ukrainian troops and the Ukrainian leadership in the face of this situation on the ground?
Eric Ciaramella
I would say resolute, but increasingly worried about sustainability. As we've read in various corners, including analyses by my colleagues here in DC, Michael Kofman and Dara Massicot, there's a significant challenge in terms of manpower on the Ukrainian side. That also dovetails with concerns about the predictability and sustainability of Western military support. These two things go together: armaments and manpower. And last year's delays in the US Congress for almost eight months on the Ukraine aid supplemental certainly dented morale. But again, all of these issues have to be dealt with in tandem. The recruitment and mobilization process, which is a Ukrainian decision to make, and then, of course, the continued armaments from Europe and the United States.
Rym Momtaz
So Yuliya, I want to bring you in here. What you're hearing, does it jive with what you see on the ground because you still have family in Ukraine, you go pretty regularly back into the country. How do you assess the situation?
Yuliya Bidenko
Well, I would like to remind that except these developments on a front line, Russia still uses its favorite tactic to attack Ukrainian cities. During the first week of February, we have lost a lot of civilians just in their offices and homes. It could be, you name it, Sumy, Poltava. Kharkiv is also under attack. It's my home city, so I'm pretty familiar with the situation. Recently, it also was Izyum city which was liberated by Ukrainian troops in 2022. And civilian people who just applied for some administrative services were killed by Russians. But I would like to add here that it is not a very efficient tactic in the terms that it could break Ukrainians, and to really make some shifts in public opinion toward the losing territories or just stop fighting. Because Eric mentioned the morale and that Ukraine is probably running out of human resources and manpower. But I have a lot of acquaintances and even colleagues and former students on the front line now, nearby Pokrovsk, by the way, or even nearby Kharkiv, Kupyansk, and Zaporizhya. They’re all telling me that we cannot stop to fight. We cannot stop fighting because we have no many choices.
People saw what Russia launched in Izyum and in Bucha, in occupied territories, and they already have the list of people who are involved in resistance. So a lot of Ukrainian soldiers and civilians clearly understand that occupation could be even worse, that the front line is moving.
Rym Momtaz
So you would say that the Ukrainian population as a whole is still pretty resilient and resolved to continue fighting for their own land, even though they're clearly aware of the challenges that they're having to face. So I wonder if you could also address the question about mobilization. This is a criticism that comes back very regularly. When you're speaking to Western officials, they say, well, not all Ukrainians are fighting, there's a manpower problem. Why haven't the Ukrainian officials and authorities lowered the mobilization age till eighteen years old so that they could draft more young men and more young, able people?
Yuliya Bidenko
I'm sometimes a bit critical toward these statements made by Western politicians who were or are still responsible for delivering some military aid to Ukraine. Because if we got everything that we already have, it could save lives for Ukrainian soldiers. We lost a lot of people on the battlefield because we were running out of missiles, running out of weapons. And I would say—as a teacher at university who still teaches Ukrainian students—that to lower the age, it wouldn't probably solve the problem because we have a lot of other, let's say, types of men who could be very useful on the front line. We have one million of people who are just out of their job, and they didn't renew their data via the special mobile app or via a special service system in person. The second point here is also used sometimes by Russian or pro-Russian media to show this bussification process when, for example, some men in the Ukrainian cities just catched up by representatives of the stations. But I would say that even in my bubble, most people my age or between their thirties and fourties, they joined voluntarily the army in 2022, and thanks God, they are still alive and still there.
There were very rare cases in real life because we need to separate what the media shows us and what is the real statistic. But to be true, to lower the age wouldn't be very efficient now. And probably it will be catastrophic in the long term, because a lot of teenagers who are still in Ukraine and willing to enter Ukrainian universities and will rebuild the nation in five years, let's say, in ten years, they probably will leave the country for Europe as a refugee because they're still allowed to do this. So there are a lot of manipulations here. And I really think that the Ukrainian government is also responsible not to communicate this properly, but I also can understand Ukrainian political leadership who are not very into the idea to mobilize everybody. And actually, my last point here is that military experts and even those who are in the trenches now, they say that they would prefer probably to have more mature men, not the youngest one, because they need to be trained properly, they need to be experienced in a way, and they need to understand what they are fighting for.
Rym Momtaz
Eric, I wanted to bring you back in because I do wonder: Say the Ukrainians do lower the age of mobilization, do they have enough kit for all these new people to go fight in a way that would be effective, or would we just be sending them as cannon fodder to the front line?
Eric Ciaramella
It's a complex question and you have to look at a lot of different angles here. It's not only the pure number of people that can be mobilized. Like Yuliya was talking about, it's also the quality and efficiency of training, and ensuring that there is a proper training regimen that can be conducted both inside Ukraine and NATO countries' territories. There are some reports that people who are mobilized only get a couple of weeks of training, and then they get sent into their brigades with the hope that the brigades do a bit more training, and it's very inconsistent. That gets to a second point, which is that there's a lot of variability in units on the front line. Some units are extremely well-staffed and have lines of people waiting to sign up because they're seen as having very good commanders with the best Western kit, commanders who really know how to employ the forces, who listen to their troops, so on and so forth. Then others where some of the commanders are less respected, they're seen as old Soviet-style thinking, just using their troops as cannon fodder. The Ukrainian military and civilian leadership really need to also rebuild some trust in the system by overhauling the force management.
And there's been some encouraging signs in recent days where President Zelensky and the Ukrainian armed forces have announced a shift to a core structure. Right now there's dozens of brigades, each with their own autonomous part of the front line that they're patrolling, and it's not very well coordinated. And so an effort to create a higher echelon, more functional coordination across these units could do quite a lot to improve morale. But I think, again, like Yuliya is saying, I think the problem is that in Western political narratives, we end up with these simplistic arguments of only "go down to eighteen, and then all the problems are solved". That's clearly not right. We have to think about the armament pipeline, the training, the commands, the force management, and all of that. It has to work in tandem. That's why I think it's really important for this new team in Washington, and for European governments that care about Ukraine, to really find a way to work together with Ukrainian leadership on a joint strategy that addresses all of these different facets of manpower.
Rym Momtaz
I'm glad you brought in Washington because Yulia, we've also heard a lot over the past year that there's a lot of political infighting in Ukraine, that there are more and more issues among, let's call them factions within the Ukrainian authorities and within the Ukrainian government. The last thing we heard from President Trump's special envoy to Ukraine, Keith Kellogg, is that he was saying that there will be a need to hold elections before the end of the year, especially if a truce is achieved with Russia. Of course, right now, there's martial law that's in place, and under martial law,it's illegal to hold elections. But Yuliya, is Ukraine actually prepared and in a place where it can hold free and fair and representative elections at this stage, or even over the next few months by the end of the year?
Yuliya Bidenko
Well, Thank you for addressing this complex issue. But I would say that if mobilization really could be a borderline or something which Ukrainians are debating a lot, elections actually is not that type of issues. Because according to Kyiv International Institute of sociology, more than 60 percent of Ukrainians can see the elections are not, let's say, the first-time issue.
It's not even a priority. People are even against this idea. As a person who started my expert and civic activity with the Committee of Voters of Ukraine more than fifteen years ago, and as a person who trained the poll station members, the members of electoral commissions, I would say that it is impossible now to have the elections, not just to satisfy some people in Washington or even in Europe, but to organize election that way to elect the representatives of the whole Ukrainian society, because it's an essence of any elections, just to transfer people will into mandates, and especially when we're talking not only about the presidential ones, but also we have a Parliament which also needs to be renewed. The first argument now that Ukraine has 25 percent of territory occupied, who will represent these people? The second, that as we started with, the frontline is very long, it's huge, and how to provide some security for civilians, for voters here, because, again, there were attacks on Ukrainian cities every single day. I cannot imagine how to organize elections, let's say in Kherson or Kharkiv, which are under Ukrainian control, but explosions are every day there.
Even if Russia will declare any ceasefire for this special day, let's imagine this —which is less imaginable for me —they really wouldn't attack Ukrainian cities. I still cannot predict the turnout because most people would prefer not to take part in such risky act of political behavior. My last argument here is that probably Ukrainian society is really traumatized, and people could be easily manipulated. And that is why both they could be manipulated by, let's say, pro-Russian discourses or media or bloggers, as well as government, too, because they also have monopoly now to present a wired, united news marathon. So free elections and democratic elections, they suppose security, they suppose most of the society taking part in the elections, and they should be, equal and transparent for people, and to secure the right to have their own choice and not to be manipulated by political actors.
Rym Momtaz
Right. So clearly, elections, even by the end of the year, even if there is a ceasefire or a tenuous ceasefire, are not exactly something that most of the Ukrainians would welcome at this stage. But there's this question about a ceasefire, Eric. Clearly, President Trump wants to reach that. He wants to engage in a negotiation with the Russian President, Vladimir Putin. And there have been plans. We're starting to get a framework for what that could look like. Can you succinctly walk us through what is happening right now in terms of backroom diplomacy between the US and Russia with maybe some Europeans when it comes to efforts to get to a ceasefire in Ukraine?
Eric Ciaramella
I don't know that there's much going on, to be honest. I think there's a lot of dealers being put out from all the parties to understand a little bit more about what the trade space is. I get the sense that the Trump administration and General Kellogg are in listening mode, trying to understand the Russian, the Ukrainian, the European positions, what's doable. But really, they came into office with these big promises, like you said at the beginning, twenty-four hours, whatever. And clearly the plans, I think, were not very well-developed, and they're confronting the fact that this is an extremely complicated set of issues. It wasn't that the Biden administration was unwilling to embark on any diplomatic effort. It was that the interests of Russia and Ukraine fundamentally seem to be non-overlapping, and that one party, namely Russia, is not interested in some fair, just, compromise deal, and Ukraine is not the problem. I've been encouraged by some of President Trump's statements, including the one he gave to the World Economic Forum in Davos, where he was asked, "Well, will there be peace when you come here next year at this time?" And he said, "Well, you'll have to ask Russia".
Ukraine is ready for a deal. And to me, that is indicative that Ukrainian side, President Zelensky has succeeded, I think, during the American presidential transition in showing Trump that Ukraine is not the obstacle to any negotiations, and that really to get Russia to the table, there's going to need to be a rethink about how we apply pressure and how we change the incentive structure in Moscow, because like we talked about in the beginning, the Russians are winning now on the ground, and so there's very little reason for them to agree to a ceasefire, even with the losses that they're suffering. So I predict that we're going to be in this feeling out and listening stage for another couple of months. I think as we get closer to the big international meetings in the summer, the NATO summit, the G7 summit, there's going to probably be a move for some direct diplomacy. You'll see President Trump talk to President Putin. You'll see a lot of European leaders reaching out to Trump, Trump and Zelensky talking. I think you could start to get some movement on some of the core issues. But again, for me, the big one here is Ukraine's long-term security and the issue of security guarantees, which to date no one has put out really a credible vision of how we can make this work in the context of a ceasefire.
Rym Momtaz
You mentioned security guarantees, and from where I stand here in Paris, it's become clear that basically the Trump administration is looking at the Europeans to provide the bulk of what would be the credible security guarantees needed for Ukraine. And obviously, the Europeans still haven't come up with a credible unified plan that they could put in place. It's also about them. Ukraine's security has to do also with Europe's security. If Ukraine ends up falling apart or falling in the hands of Putin, then he gets that much closer to the EU, and we all know that he still has an expansionist agenda. So this question of the negotiation that is going to happen at some point, whether it happens now or in a year or in less than a year, the Europeans are very worried about being at the table and not being around the table with the Americans and the Russians. And to them, it has to do with setting the stage for a new European security architecture, and also in a way setting new terms for the relationship with the US, doing more for themselves, relying less on the US for their defense as the US starts to focus more and more on China.
So do you think that the Trump administration is thinking about it in these terms, or are they just thinking they need to stop this war because they don't want to send billions and tens of billions of dollars anymore into a war because they need to use those means and that money elsewhere on, for example, the competition with China?
Eric Ciaramella
Many in the Trump administration, to a certain extent, understand the stakes for European security and by extension for American security and prosperity. But they believe that Europe should shoulder more of the burden because this is Europe's backyard. And so I think if Europe wants to be seriously at the table in any talks, it needs to have a credible offer about what it's going to do for Ukraine going forward and how it's going to be part of implementing any deal. I think that's why you see some of these proposals about peacekeeping forces, why you see President Macron leading forward on this, why you see European Commission making noises about some additional funding and financial support for Ukraine. I think Europe needs to think big here, and it's not only about Ukraine, you're right. It's about the broader European security and about the transatlantic bargain. What is the division of labor between the United States and Europe for security on the European continent, of which Ukraine is a member? And so I hope that as the reality of the situation and the seriousness of the states set in in European capitals, we'll move from this incremental, very responsive strategy of let's just see what Trump puts out, and then we'll try to crisis manage our way out of this to, actually, we need a really bold vision with serious long-term financial commitments.
We need to talk about eurobonds. We need to talk about the frozen assets, again, which European governments like France, Germany, Belgium have been the main obstacles to.
Rym Momtaz
Using Russian frozen assets that are in Europe.
Eric Ciaramella
Exactly. That's a couple hundred billion there, raising debt. All of these things to finance both the European rearmament so that Europe has the capabilities to balance out the division of labor within NATO, but then also has the capabilities to support Ukraine, and come up precisely with a formula of what American support will be needed in terms of enablers and intelligence and all of that, which I think the United States will be willing to provide if Europe can lead on this initiative. And I've just not seen the leadership at a European level. It's been very discrete and haphazard, and I hope that a really European vision can come together in the next few months to insert into this discussion.
Rym Momtaz
Europe leads in terms of providing troops, in terms of providing much more actual heavy weapons, with the US just doing the backup and the logistical and the intelligence support. Yuliya, you're between basically the EU countries and Ukraine. Do you get a sense that European societies, as well as their governments, are serious about the need to take a real stance in Ukraine for Ukraine's security, but also for their own? And are they willing to make the sacrifices needed.
Yuliya Bidenko
Well, I would say that recent statements from the European Union leadership, like Ursula von der Leyen or Kaja Kallas, they admitted that actually Europe has been under-investing in their security in many, many senses. A lot of European countries apart or the European Union or Europe in general, they rely too much on the United States here, not thinking about their own defense, developments, and security guarantees for them. We can see now that Baltic states or Poland or let's say Czech Republic or Nordic states, they are much more bold and, I would say, sober about the risk and issues they are facing with due to the war in Ukraine. Some, let's say, Slavonic or Eastern European or Central European countries, they do understand that if Ukraine will fall, probably in ten years, Ukrainian soldiers who are trained so well already will be part of Russian attacks, because it's also part of Russian tactics. For example, they use people from Donbas, which was occupied ten years ago, to fight with Ukrainian army. I think it's a vision and a wake call for Europe, but not every European society is now so much great with this idea.
There will be elections in Germany, and the rhetoric there is not so much decisive as, for example, the consensus between Polish political parties about their security or Estonian ones, where they made a great coalition even between very different political factions. So yeah, it's not consensus yet, I would say, but I think there is a clear understanding that they need to do something with their security and defense strategy altogether.
Rym Momtaz
So I guess that's a glass half-full take on how the Europeans are dealing with this. They've clearly had to evolve because of this war, and they have made some progress, but they're still a way to go for them to actually become real strategic actors when it comes to their own security without relying so much on the US.
I really want to thank both of you, Eric and Yuliya, for this very interesting discussion, and I'm sure we will have you back on this podcast very soon. Thank you both.
Eric Ciaramella
Thank you so much.
Yuliya Bidenko
Thank you.
Rym Momtaz
For those who are interested in learning more about Ukraine and Europe's East, I encourage you to follow the work of Carnegie Europe on X and LinkedIn.
Our producer is Mattia Bagherini. Our editor is Futura D’Aprile of Europod. Sound editing by Daniel Gutierrez. Sound engineering and original music by Jeremy Bocquet.