Ukraine benefits from strategic distance - opinion

Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine has entered its fifth year. The war has redefined the modern battlefield and provided everyone, both participants and onlookers, with an endless source of surprises and insights. Some more recent events are of particular significance.

On April 16, 2026, Ukrainian UAVs struck the Tuapse oil refinery and adjacent terminal facilities. Additional strikes took place in the following days. The attack significantly unsettled operations at one of Russia’s main refineries supporting the export market. The incident affected regional logistics and contributed to widespread disruptions in Russia’s energy exports.

Then, in the early hours of Wednesday, June 3, Ukrainian long-range drones hit the St. Petersburg Oil Terminal (one of Russia’s largest fuel export and storage hubs), causing massive explosions and destruction.

The timing of this attack had particular significance. It coincided with the opening of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF), a “Potemkin” Davos. A day after Russian President Vladimir Putin gave a speech there rejecting a call for peace from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine launched a massive drone attack on Russian naval arsenals and a naval base in the town of Kronstadt just west of St. Petersburg.

It is no coincidence that this new, very aggressive strategy of Ukraine’s long-distance strikes deep into Russia’s heartland manifested itself right when the United States was doing its best to make itself a neutral arbiter of the war. Actually, America’s tragic misreading and misunderstanding of the conflict, culminating with the sad and dramatic dressing down of Zelensky in the White House, has, ironically, proven to be a blessing in disguise.

Ukraine, as many of America’s friends have discovered before it, now understands there is a price, at times too high, for being too closely allied with the superpower. America may pursue the same goals as its junior allies. Yet, ultimately, America’s goals, both political and military, as well as the strategy and tactics, may substantially diverge. Also, America’s engagement and conduct inevitably become driven by its domestic policies, with the electoral calendar dictating the pace of war and peace.

The war started with the Biden administration believing in Ukraine’s immediate and inevitable defeat. To be fair, it was not alone in that assessment. To make things “easy” for everyone, it even signaled to Moscow it would tolerate a “small” invasion. And after Russia’s forces rolled up to Kyiv, president Joe Biden called Kyiv and offered the leadership a free “ride” out of the capital. When Zelensky refused to leave and declared his intention to fight on to the end, the administration relented and decided to “manage” the conflict.

The rest of the war was carefully choreographed by US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, the administration’s “wunderkind.” He designed the strategy as a classic war of attrition but without the plan or capacity to sustain it over a long period.

American deep fear of “provoking” Russia guided the war conduct. Every new weapon type, be that tanks, warplanes, or missiles, took years to deliver. Strikes deep into Russia, even when they became a real option, were strictly forbidden lest they upset the “balance of fear.” Russia cultivated those fears and ultimately controlled Washington’s war strategy with rules designed to undermine Ukraine’s long-term resistance.

The United States felt it was “directly” responsible, though not involved, in the conflict; hence, the administration had to manage it in a way that would placate its domestic constituency strongly unfavorable to American involvement in another foreign war. That situation allowed for very well-rationed support to Ukraine but without a path to conflict resolution or even the war’s end. It was slowly evolving into an American self-righteous grandstanding against Russia to the last Ukrainian.

Ukraine was not unique in its predicament. Israel, another American ally, has experienced the downside of strategic proximity. It is not by chance that, starting from the 1990s, Israel has experienced a lack of military ingenuity and extremely unimaginative strategic thinking.

The Gulf War, when Israel submitted to American dictate by not retaliating against Saddam Hussein’s missiles, became the turning point in history when Israel exchanged its freedom of action for extended American support and close cooperation.

This blind reliance on American strategic support and “foresight” led to the three decades of Israel’s inaction. Iran, Hezbollah, and Hamas becoming a real threat to Israel’s existence is a direct byproduct of that lack of strategic distance. The situation culminated in the events of October 7 and the subsequent wars.

Yet the real warning for Israel, and currently for Ukraine, was the Yom Kippur War, when Israel was first bled and then forced to declare a ceasefire before completely crushing the Egyptian army in Sinai. That was a clear warning that relying on a superpower is a “Faustian” exchange.

In the last two years, Ukraine, cut from direct American patronage and support, has managed, through tremendous ingenuity and luck, to develop a military toolkit capable of devastating blows against Russia. These blows, delivered by long-range drones, are hitting strategic facilities and installations all across Russia without red lines drawn by American domestic concerns.

Ironically, when US President Donald Trump shouted at Zelensky about the absence of cards to be played by Ukraine, he inadvertently forced the guest to create a deck of his own. Ukraine, finally free to conduct the war by the rules of war and according to its own schedule, and fighting Russia the only way the regime in the Kremlin understands – with brutal force hitting where it hurts the most – may actually achieve what no meeting in Alaska could.

Strategic distance turned out to be an old forgotten remedy and the remainder of the old Jewish blessing: “Let God bless the tsar and keep him far away from us!”