Cards on the table: I don’t think that Vladimir Putin is set to launch World War Three over the British and American agreement for Ukraine to fire their missiles into Russia.

This is not something to say lightly, but I think it’s true. I’d even bet on it (granted, that might be a bet that no one would be able to see me lose). 

Firstly, the consequences of a nuclear exchange — and the Kremlin is heavily hinting towards the use of nuclear weapons — would be apocalyptically destructive for all sides. Secondly, and relatedly, China has warned Russia against using nukes. Thirdly, and also relatedly, Russia has drawn various red lines which have since been crossed.

Fourthly, I just don’t see how the use of American ATACMS and British Storm Shadow missiles in Russia is such a grave escalation of the war that it merits such a dramatic response. Are they going to tip the balance of the war in Ukraine’s favour? 

Not being any kind of military expert, I looked up informed opinions. An unnamed diplomat speaking to the BBC said that Joe Biden’s authorisation of the use of ATACMS was “an overdue symbolic decision”. Evelyn Farkas, meanwhile, deputy assistant secretary of defence under Barack Obama, claims that the missiles could have a “positive psychological impact”.

A symbolic decision which could have a positive psychological impact? That doesn’t sound like a massive gamechanger to me.

Granted, some other commentators are more optimistic about its efficacy. David Axe, writing at Forbes, claims that ATACMS are “uniquely effective”. On the other hand, he also writes that “the U.S. Army is keen to maintain its own inventory” and that it will not be long before “the missiles are all gone, the politics of the war change and Ukrainian forces must rely more on locally-made munitions”. 

Britain has no surplus of Storm Shadow missiles either (or anything else). “The missile is in demand among allies,” Michael Evans of The Times informs us, “And Ukraine has been given only limited supplies.” Again, it does not sound like this will tip the conflict towards Ukraine.

So, I could be right that it won’t kick off world war. But if it does not make a major difference in the conflict, which is seeing Russia take six times more territory in 2024 than it did in 2023, what’s next? 

If Starmer seriously wants to “double down” on support for Ukraine — and is not just trying to strengthen Zelensky’s hand in future talks — how much more dramatically can Britain, and other Western powers, intensify their involvement? If there is a long-term plan here then it’s eluding me. It might well be eluding Keir Starmer as well, who is refusing to explain British strategy. David Lammy can talk about the need for “guts” but I think this is a time for “brains” as well.

“At present,” Chris Bayliss wrote for The Critic this month:

… most pro-Ukrainian commentators in the West are committed to nothing less than the total liberation of all of Ukraine’s pre-war territory, including Crimea. Yet they have tacitly conceded that there is not going to be a major NATO intervention, so this task is to be left up to the Ukrainian Armed Forces by conventional means alone. This seems like a position one might reasonably have held in the first months of the war … It may have still seemed plausible in early 2023 … But based on any objective reading of the military situation in Donbas, it doesn’t seem like a position one can continue to hold in good faith as 2024 draws to a close.  

Compromise might not be fair, of course, but the world isn’t fair. (Even World War Two, the biggest hammer in a hawk’s rhetorical toolbox, ended with the abandonment of much of Europe to the communists.) It might not secure permanent peace, but its critics need substantive arguments for how they could. Rhetoric has an essential function for morale but it cannot take the place of analysis in strategy. 

What concerns me is that Western elites might find the prospect of compromise so futile and repugnant that they will grasp at any means of heightening their involvement — perhaps up to and including NATO intervention.

With this in mind, it is important to appreciate the fact that while the Kremlin might be making empty threats, that does not mean its threats will always be empty. One might justifiably assume that a playground bully who makes empty threats is actually a terrible fighter. Putin does have nuclear weapons at his disposal. (Yes, many of them might not actually work — but you don’t need many of them to work to do immense harm.)

To embrace the thought that one should never risk nuclear war is to embrace absurdities like that President Kennedy was mistaken in the Cuban Missile Crisis. But it is still essential to acknowledge that optimists have to be right every time. Pessimists only have to be wrong once.

Yes, I appreciate that it sticks in the craw to hear the Russians fume about escalation as missiles hit housing blocks, and North Korean troops enter Ukraine, and cyber-attacks hit Europe. But you can’t always depend on a rival to have the cooler head. As the horrifying attritional war grinds on, our leaders should be thinking about its endgame — and, yes, an endgame short of nuclear twilight.