By Vladislav Inozemtsev
13/05/2026
The May 9, 2026, parade in Moscow has gone down in history: remembered only for its brevity, the North Korean soldiers, and the lack of military equipment.
It was held with the permission of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, no incidents were reported, and no cause for concern arose.
They were brought about by events at the front, where, according to ISW, Russian troops gradually began to retreat (in April, the Ukrainian Armed Forces liberated 116 square kilometers) – and some commentators considered what was happening to be the beginning of a turning point in the war.
I wouldn’t rush to such categorical conclusions (something similar happened in the summer of 2023, and early autumn 2022 is out of the question), but it must be acknowledged that Russia’s military efforts have reached a dead end. The generals on Frunzenskaya Embankment are left using AI to draw pictures for Comrade Putin, while the Ukrainian armed forces are using it to control drones, which are destroying more and more occupiers with each passing day.
And here I would like to recall some lessons that are difficult not to learn from the military campaigns of the last few centuries.
Lesson One: The Danger of a Long War for the Aggressor
The main one is that wars (excluding civil wars, uprisings, or ethnic conflicts) have become significantly shorter than they were in previous centuries, primarily due to the increased intensity of combat and the maneuverability of troops. In such conflicts, the parties often switch from defense to offense and vice versa and prolonging a war (let alone turning it into a trench war), if it does occur, does not bode well for its instigators.
In the Middle Ages, war could become a monarch’s life’s work, but in the 19th–21st centuries, strategists focused on achieving quick results, and the failure of the initial plan almost always meant either ultimate defeat or a return to the status quo.
There are countless examples of this. Germany achieved a series of brilliant victories in World War II, bringing most European countries under its control, including Poland, France, and Yugoslavia—but a protracted struggle with Great Britain ultimately resulted in the defeat of the Reich.
Hitler’s blitzkrieg against the Soviet Union likely could have resulted in a significant expansion of German Lebensraum if Berlin had been more realistic about its capabilities and had attempted to negotiate a separate peace with Stalin in September 1941. But the aggressor’s confidence in ultimate victory backfired – and the war ended in Germany’s complete defeat.
To a lesser extent, in the First World War, too, the inability to limit itself to partial success led Berlin to a similar end.
More than a hundred years earlier, overexertion and involvement in long campaigns with dubious objectives had ruined Napoleon in Russia – after he had long ago suffered a humiliating defeat in a protracted expedition to Egypt.
There are examples where a long war following a failed blitzkrieg has resulted in the restoration of the status quo: the classic case is probably the US attempt to “liberate Canada” in 1812, which led to a rapid shift of hostilities to US territory, a short-lived occupation of Washington, and the restoration of the former border.
Two blitzkriegs – which perhaps makes this conflict unique in world history – took place within five months of 1950 in Korea, after which three years of war, in which the leading powers found themselves drawn, still produced no winner.
The examples could go on, but the common thread across all these cases is one: those who fail to capitalize on their initial successes, hoping to ultimately become the greatest military leader in history, end up losing (or at least not winning). The initiating side has never managed to find a “second wind” in the middle of a long conflict.
Lesson Two: The Power of Coalitions
The second important lesson is that in recent centuries, major conflicts involving great powers have become wars of grand coalitions – not so much dynastic or situational ones (as could be seen, for example, in the War of the Spanish Succession ), but ones that were directly involved in the effort to contain an aggressor or dominant power.
The first clear example was the Napoleonic Wars, when most European countries, with the exception of those occupied by France, united against it, leaving it no chance of victory.
Later, it was precisely the strength of coalitions that ensured all major victories, both against individual opponents (as in the case of Russia in the First Crimean War of 1853-1855 or, pardon me, Iraq in 1991) and against alliances of powers (as in World War I or World War II). In cases where each side formed a coalition of similar size and strength, a chance for a status quo emerged (as in the case of Korea by 1953).
However, it is safe to say that over the past two hundred years or more, no single power acting alone has succeeded in winning a war beyond a blitzkrieg in which other participants failed (or were unwilling) to engage. The course of protracted conflicts has shown (notably in the First and Second World Wars) that support for their initiators steadily declined as the conflict dragged on, while the ranks of the opposing coalitions gradually expanded.
This trend also does not indicate that Russia currently has any chance of achieving “all its goals” in Ukraine, as Comrade Putin likes to state from time to time.
Lesson Three: Political Change
The third significant point is that modern wars (especially unsuccessful ones) become a critical element in the restructuring of the political systems of the countries involved.
Almost none of the conflicts during the European Middle Ages (unless they ended in the direct annexation of an independent state) called into question the stability of the political systems of the participating countries.
But beginning in the 19th century, such an outcome became increasingly common (recall France’s defeats in 1814 and 1871), and the First World War became a model for how the hardships of war destroyed the political systems of all countries that could hardly be considered victors: Russia, Austria-Hungary, Germany, and the Ottoman Empire. This case is particularly significant because it involved a protracted trench war, the strategic futility and economic cost of which were obvious, leading to the collapse of the regimes of the countries that initiated it before their formal defeat —and, in fact, precipitated it.
Less dramatic examples of political upheaval following military failure include the 1905-1907 unrest in Russia following its defeat in the war with Japan; the political regime changes in France during the Algerian standoff; or the transition to democracy in Argentina after the defeat in the Falklands. As societies transition away from absolute monarchies (or absolute dictatorships, as in Iraq after 1991), unsuccessful and economically disastrous wars leave their mark on political institutions , and this promises difficult times for Russia: convincing the population that any outcome of the war will be a “victory for Putin” will be much more difficult than political strategists imagine.
Lesson Four: Ruin
Finally, the fourth important point is the economics of war. For centuries, war was an economically rational enterprise, providing rich spoils, new territories and subjects, and generous reparations. This ended a century and a half ago, when France, having inexplicably declared war on Prussia in 1870 and been defeated, ceded Alsace and Lorraine to the victors and paid an indemnity of 5 billion gold francs — the equivalent of $212 billion in today’s money, based on the price of gold as of May 10, 2026. Since then, not a single war has ended favorably for the victor: the costs of modern conflicts are so significant that the defeated country is unlikely to be able to recoup them. An exception is the war in Kuwait, after which Iraq, defeated by the forces of the international coalition, was imposed reparations of $52.4 billion, the last tranches of which were paid only 30 years later, at the beginning of 2022.
Russia’s war in Ukraine has become one of the most expensive in decades – its direct costs amount to at least $200 billion per year, exceeding the US appropriations for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars in any year between 2003 and 2010. No amount of Russia’s “gains” in Ukraine (even if some territories remain – most likely temporarily – under Moscow’s control) will be able to compensate for even a small portion of the Kremlin’s expenditures, not to mention the cost of the war’s consequences and collateral damage. The most likely scenario, as is clear from the above, is massive additional expenditures, either in the form of reparations, which is less likely, or confiscated Russian reserves used for Ukraine’s reconstruction, which is quite possible. This means that, in addition to the low probability of strategic success, Russia will certainly pay a high and irrevocable price for its aggression.
Victory will not come
All of this, I repeat, does not mean that Russia’s war in Ukraine has any chance of ending anytime soon. However, the longer it continues, the less doubt there is that the Kremlin has no chance not only of winning, but even of exiting the conflict “with face saved.”
When Putin calls on Russians to mobilize and work for victory the way Soviet people worked for the front during the Great Patriotic War, he apparently doesn’t realize his own inadequacy. Just six months after Nazi Germany’s attack, the Soviet Union managed to turn the tide of the war, halting the fascist hordes near Moscow and Leningrad; creating a powerful international coalition and receiving from it enormous aid in resources and weapons; and instilling in the people faith in Victory and an understanding of its existential value.
Today, Putin’s calls resemble a parody of Joseph Goebbels’ speech on total war—but his oratorical skill did not save Germany, which had begun its retreat on the Eastern Front, from final defeat. The most Russia could have gained from the war with Ukraine was in the summer of 2022—before Putin was forced to declare a “partial mobilization” and then embrace his “deathonomics”; before sanctions were imposed and Europeans refused energy cooperation; before the West began supplying Ukraine with significant quantities of modern weapons; before Ukraine itself began considering creating a modern military industry.
Since then, the Kremlin has been mired in a hopeless standoff that it is clearly losing – something that will become increasingly obvious with each passing month: just like in Germany, if not in 1944, then at least in 1917.
No one can say in detail how this war will end today—but the acquisition of four (six, eight) regions of Ukraine is no longer on the table, and Putin’s continued leadership of a humiliated and bankrupt Russia looks increasingly uncertain. How many more parades will he be able to hold, even as botched as this year’s?
None of this should surprise anyone. Or, at least, it shouldn’t surprise those who study history outside of Medinsky’s textbooks.