Editorials

The Irish Times view on the Ukraine war: Kyiv goes on the offensive

The World Bank has estimated the cost of Ukrainian recovery and reconstruction after the first year of war at a staggering €375 billion

A destroyed bridge in Kupiansk, Ukraine, a town east of Kharkiv that Russians have subjected to relentless shelling since Ukrainian forces retook the area months ago. Photograph: Brendan Hoffman/The New York Times

Wed Jun 21 2023 - 22:52

Two weeks into Ukraine’s long-awaited counteroffensive, only eight settlements have been taken back so far. This was never going to be easy. As Kyiv’s forces advance across broad southern fields, their tanks and armoured cars are being pinned down by Russian attack helicopters. On the ground Russian forces have been adjusting defensive tactics, demonstrating new lethal sophistication and less willingness to sacrifice conscripts.

Hence the renewed appeals from President Volodymyr Zelenskiy for US Apache attack helicopters and the F-16 jets whose promised delivery remains months away.

The shift from defence to offence was always going to expose the Ukrainians to Russian air and artillery superiority. Air defences are effective in protecting the capital from almost all drone attacks, but on the front lines it is another story. The bombardment of Kherson, occupied by Russians for several months last year, has not let up since the explosion two weeks ago that destroyed the Dnipro’s Kakhovka dam, sending torrents of floodwaters into residential areas. Even rescue workers have been targeted.

In the eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions Russian forces have also launched their own “offensive actions”. Diplomatic initiatives, the latest from a group of African states, are going nowhere. A Swedish thinktank’s bleak assessment on Tuesday was that Russia is planning for a prolonged confrontation and neither to end the war nor seek detente. Kyiv’s international efforts have turned to persuading allies of the necessity for reconstruction efforts to begin even as the war continues. The World Bank has estimated the cost of Ukrainian recovery and reconstruction after the first year of war at a staggering €375 billion, equivalent to twice the country’s pre-war GDP. Other economists put the total at over €1 trillion.

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At the Ukraine Recovery Conference in London, state and private investors are being wooed but the task is huge. Investors will need hugely expensive war risk insurance that no private insurer will provide and Ukraine still has to convince it has got corruption in hand and that international money will not go astray. The elephant in the room remains what sort of long-term security guarantees are likely to be forthcoming from allies. Nato’s summit next month is unlikely to be specific and will certainly not offer membership. The levying of reparations on Russia, strongly supported by Kyiv, has yet to be considered seriously.

After the invasion more than €300 billion in foreign exchange reserves held by the Russian central ban were frozen in the West. Some €27 billion of assets of oligarchs and officials close to the Russian leadership was also targeted. Last week Russia was reported to be preparing legislation allowing the state to seize western assets at knockdown prices.

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