Ukraine Has Had Its Fill

(Photo by ARIS MESSINIS/AFP via Getty Images)

The Russian armed forces are now less than two miles away from overwhelming the city of Pokrovsk. The conquest of that city will have three major consequences for Ukraine. The first is that Pokrovsk is a key logistical hub, the loss of which would threaten the Ukrainian armed forces’ ability to supply their troops in the Donbas. The second is that, beyond Pokrovsk, Russian troops may find mostly undefended fields as they continue their march west across the Donbas. The third is that Pokrovsk is home to Ukraine’s only coking coal mine.

Coking coal is essential in the manufacture of steel. The loss of Pokrovsk would affect not only Ukraine’s economy, but its ability to obtain steel for its military manufacturing industry. As the tide of Russian troops rushes toward Pokrovsk, the coking mine has been forced to shut down 50 percent of its operating capacity. If the remainder is lost, Ukraine’s steel production could plummet by 60-75 percent.

The battlefield reality is changing rapidly. Russian forces captured over 1,500 square kilometers of Ukrainian territory in October and November, and that pace has quickened in December. And it is not just land, but key logistical and heavily fortified cities that are falling. Perhaps more importantly, troops and weapons are being exhausted. Deaths, injuries and desertions are horrifically high; morale is desperately low.

On December 18, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky conceded that Crimea and the Donbas are lost to Ukraine. “De facto,” he said, “these territories are now controlled by the Russians. We don’t have the strength to bring them back.” Once again making the important distinction between de facto recognition and formal recognition, Zelensky said that Ukraine would rely, not on the Ukrainian military, but on “diplomatic pressure from the international community” to reacquire its lost territory.

But it is not only military change that is rapidly happening in Ukraine. Political change is following rapidly in its wake.

The sociologist Volodymyr Ishchenko, research associate at the Institute of East European Studies, Freie Universität Berlin, says that there is no longer any enthusiasm, or that that enthusiasm is confined to a much smaller group of people than at the beginning of the war: “When the situation deteriorated and hopes that Ukraine could win the war diminished, support for negotiations increased, while support for, and trust in, Zelensky decreased.” 

The eclipsing of support for fighting by support for negotiating has been dramatic as Ukrainians suffer the prolonged devastation of the war. The most recent Gallup poll, conducted in August and October 2024, shows that the 73 percent of Ukrainians who believed at the start of the war that Ukraine should continue fighting until it wins has now shrunk to a mere 38 percent. At the start of the war, in February 2022, only 22 percent felt that Ukraine should negotiate an end to the war as soon as possible. In 2023, that number still sat at only 27 percent. Today, that number has swelled to a majority for the first time, with 52 percent saying yes. Since the poll excluded the people in Russian-controlled regions, the numbers are likely even more telling. In any case, support for the war has dropped below 50 percent in all regions of Ukraine.

Support for Zelensky, who succumbed to Western pressure by turning away from a possible early negotiated settlement and promising victory and the return of all Ukrainian land, including even Crimea, has dropped off even faster.

Once lionized as a war leader and enjoying approval ratings in the stratosphere, by October 2023, those who strongly approved of Zelensky’s performance had dropped from 58 percent to 42 percent. And things have gotten worse since then. The Economist reports that “if elections were held tomorrow, Mr Zelensky would struggle to repeat the success of the landslide win he secured in 2019.” The Economist has seen internal polling that shows that “he would fare badly in a run-off against Valery Zaluzhny,” the general who served as commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine for most of the war.

And it is not only Zaluzhny, the war hero, that could challenge Zelensky. Ishchenko told me that some readings of polls show that he would probably also lose to Kyrylo Budanov, the chief of the Main Directorate of Intelligence of Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense. 

Though Ukrainian’s changing views on negotiating an end to the war and on Zelensky have received some attention in the mainstream media, their changing views on America have not. 

While the Western media reported on Gallup’s findings on Ukrainian support for diplomacy, it did not report on the findings on Ukrainian views of the United States. The polling suggests an erosion in trust for the United States. While 70 percent of those who favor negotiations want to see the European Union “play a significant role” in peace negotiations with Russia, and 63 percent wanted to see the United Kingdom play a significant role, only 54 percent wanted to see a Harris-led U.S. and only 49 percent want to see a Trump-led U.S. play a significant role. 

And it is not just as a mediator that trust in the U.S. is eroding. Gallup’s polling shows that approval “of the job performance of the leadership of the United States,” which was soaring to 66 percent at the start of the war, has now fallen to 40 percent. 

In another indication of frustration with the Biden administration, Trump, who has promised to quickly end the war, has seen the number of Ukrainians who trust him jump to 44.6 percent. President Biden, whose level of trust was at 78 percent a year ago, has seen his level drop to 55 percent. 

Polling suggests that Ukrainians are growing weary of the war and the leaders who continue to manage it. But it also suggests that they are growing weary with and wary of the U.S. leadership’s role in the war. Though the U.S. government may still hope that continuing to fight Russia can advance their policy objectives, the Ukrainian people may be finding it harder to hope that it can advance theirs.