Stop Holding Ukraine Back

One Rule: Let Ukraine Strike Back

I hope the graph above clears up any lingering questions about why Ukraine hasn’t yet defeated the Russian army.

If you take that graph as your baseline—and then factor in the delays in weapons deliveries, the consistent withholding of lethal weapons from the battlefield, and the fact that Russia has faced no real limits on its arsenal or its behavior—then the real surprise isn’t that Ukraine hasn’t won.

The real surprise is that they’re still standing.

And by June this year, despite the massive gap in war spending, even U.S. intelligence concluded that Ukraine can win. Yes, even without closing the gap, and matching Russia dollar for dollar on spending, Ukraine can still win.

Let us unpack this layer by layer, because it is not highly complicated at all.

First, Russia pours an enormous amount of money into manpower. And until this war ends, that spending problem isn’t going away. The Russian way of war has always been about quantity over quality—about using humans as cannon fodder. Everything else—tanks, missiles, artillery—is just built on top of that grim foundation.

Ukraine, by contrast, made a deliberate choice: they refused to fight Russia man to man. Instead, they’ve invested heavily in drones, especially cheap, effective FPV drones. That single decision dramatically reduces Ukraine’s cost of war. Russia is now scrambling to catch up—but Ukraine is so far ahead in the drone war that there’s little chance Moscow will ever take the lead. Not going to happen. Yes, Russia’s adjustment may help them cut costs slightly, but the gap in tactical innovation will remain.

Second, Russian weapons are simply inferior to Western systems. Take the famous S-400 air defense system. It costs around $500 million—roughly half the price of a U.S. Patriot battery. And yet, I could show you dozens of videos where Russian S-400s were obliterated by American-made ATACMS, British Storm Shadows, or French SCALP missiles.

Sure, the S-400 is still dangerous to Western fighter jets—but when it comes to defending against modern cruise and ballistic missiles, it’s a sitting duck. Open-source network OnyX alone has visual confirmation of 20 successful strikes on Russian S-400 and S-300 systems.

Now consider the Kh-47M2 Kinzhal, Russia’s so-called “hypersonic” missile. Each one costs between $10–15 million. And for what? They were intercepted the very first time Russia launched them against Patriot air-defense systems in April 2023—and they were intercepted again this week. Russia keeps lobbing them. Patriots keep knocking them out.

Number of Patriot launchers destroyed by Russia:

The number of HIMARS launchers Ukraine has lost in this war? Three. That’s it—in nearly three years of full-scale war.

By comparison, Russia has lost dozens of launchers—to FPV drone strikes, precision artillery, and Western-supplied guided munitions. The precision, lethality, and technological edge of Western weapons isn’t just a battlefield advantage—it’s also a massive cost saver. While it's hard to attach an exact dollar figure to that edge, we can turn to the July testimony of Alexus Grynkewich, Supreme Allied Commander Europe, for a directional answer.

Grinkevich told the U.S. Senate: “Ukraine can win.” And he said it right after allied military support crossed €43 billion in just the first six months of 2024.

That ramp-up flipped the odds, among other things. Even if allies simply maintain their current pace, Ukraine’s position improves dramatically.

Let’s stress-test it: if allied support lands anywhere in the €60 to €80 billion range annually, then Ukraine’s total war spending gap narrows to just ~20% below Russia’s.

And here’s the kicker: the stronger Ukraine gets, the higher the cost for Russia. Not just in rubles, but in tanks, generals, soldiers, and time. Which means Russia’s effective $100 billion spend won’t stretch as far in the years ahead. Every Western dollar narrows the gap—and multiplies Russian losses.

So the real question isn’t just whether Ukraine can win.

It’s whether the allies are willing to repeat in 2026 what they finally got right in 2025.

And here’s the hard truth: there is exactly a zero percent chance that the Trump administration—will authorize another Ukraine aid package that pushes U.S. contributions above $50 billion.

That means the entire burden of lifting support back to 2025 levels will fall on Europe.

So we need to shift our attention. If the U.S. does not release further aid, then 2026 depends entirely on what the leading 2025 spenders in Europe do next. And that narrows the field quickly. The responsibility to keep Ukraine alive—and potentially victorious—now rests on the shoulders of just a few key nations:

• Germany

• United Kingdom

• France

• Netherlands

• Canada

• Norway

These are the core donors who delivered real money and real weapons in 2025—and what they do in 2026 will be decisive.

On that front, there’s good news.

The most important signal comes from Germany. The German government has just approved its 2026 draft budget, which includes planned investments totaling €126.7 billion ($146.4 billion), with €174.3 billion in borrowing.

Within that, Germany is setting aside $9.7 billion in military aid for Ukraine—half a billion more than what it committed for 2025. And Berlin has already made it clear: if the battlefield demands it, another $5 billion could be added without hesitation. This isn’t symbolic. It’s structural.

The U.K., meanwhile, has locked in a £3 billion per year commitment to Ukraine through 2030. That’s not a pledge—it’s law baked into the defense budget.

So now, the two top European powers—Germany and the U.K.—have done what Washington may no longer be willing to do: set the floor. They’ve created a baseline of stable, long-term military aid that Ukraine can count on.

And when you layer that beneath the EU’s €150 billion ReArm Europe Plan, which enables nations to place large orders through EU procurement channels—including weapons destined directly for Ukraine—the equation changes.

Europe isn’t just reacting anymore. It’s positioning to carry the war effort.

So yes, we can start to ease some of the anxiety on the money front. The financial baseline is forming. The real challenge now is how that money gets used.

If the allies invest in the right weapons, abandon their fear of escalation, and finally remove the targeting restrictions that have crippled Ukraine’s offensive potential, they will begin to impose real costs on the Russian war machine. That’s how you flip the equation: lower Ukraine’s cost of war while driving up Russia’s.

Instead, what do we keep doing? Slapping sanctions. Monitoring oil tankers. Calling Xi Jinping.

• As if the problem is a spreadsheet.

• As if the axis of autocrats just happened.

Xi buys oil from Iran and Russia for a reason. He props up Kim Jong Un for a reason.
These regimes are coordinated—not just ideologically, but logistically. And pretending this is anything less than a systemic alliance is pure delusion.

So let’s stop pretending.

The targeting restrictions placed on Ukraine must be removed. Let Ukraine strike where the war originates—deep into Russian territory, into supply hubs, into command centers. Do that, and you may not even need to spend $60 billion to end this war.

Because it will be over.

Lock. Stock. And barrel.

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Credit where it’s due—to Simon Cast, one of our readers, who first nudged me to dig deeper into the issue of targeting restrictions.

And sure enough, it looks like the United States still maintains a ban on Ukraine striking certain assets inside Russian territory. Think about that. If Washington can’t stop Putin from bombing apartment buildings, then it has no business dictating what Ukraine can and cannot strike in return.

This double standard is not strategy.
It’s madness.

And it needs to end.

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