The price of war

Wars are not won by courage alone. They are sustained by money. Strip away the rhetoric, the flags, and the televised heroics, and every prolonged conflict reduces to three essentials: soldiers to fight, weapons to kill, and cash to keep both moving. When the money dries up, defeat follows, sometimes quietly, often catastrophically.  “In the case of Ukraine, the mantra making its grisly rounds in the U.S. Pentagon is  ‘ America will provide weapons it doesn’t have, to Europe for money it doesn’t have, to give to Ukraine for soldiers it doesn’t have” says Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, former Chief of Staff of the late US Secretary of State Colin Powell. 

Ukraine now stands at that edge.

For nearly three years, Kyiv has survived not because its economy could sustain modern industrial warfare, but because Western capitals pumped billions of dollars into its treasury to keep it afloat. Without that lifeline, the Ukrainian military and the country would have collapsed within months. The war was never financially winnable by Ukraine on its own. It was waged on credit.

Since February 2022, Western governments have committed roughly $350–360 billion in combined military, financial, and humanitarian support to Ukraine. Of this, the United States accounts for approximately $175 billion in Ukraine-related spending, with about $106 billion delivered directly to Kyiv. Europe, through national governments and EU institutions, has collectively pledged more than €170 billion, much of which has been absorbed by weapons procurement, refugee support, and budgetary assistance.

These numbers are not trivial. They reflect one of the most significant wartime transfers of public funds since World War II — and at a time when both America’s and Europe’s economies are struggling. And they conceal a more profound truth: this level of expenditure was never politically sustainable and will soon come to a screeching halt.

Western leaders entered the conflict convinced that Russia would falter quickly, that sanctions would cripple Moscow, and that Ukrainian resistance would force a negotiated settlement within months. Europe budgeted accordingly. The United States framed its aid as finite, manageable, and strategically decisive. The first is laughable, the second highly doubtful, and the latter anything but.

All those predictions and calculations were wrong. The war did not end in six months. It metastasized into an attritional struggle that consumes ammunition, infrastructure, and money at an industrial scale. The longer it dragged on, the clearer the financial imbalance became. Ukraine burns cash. Russia, it seems, can and has generated it.  In addition, Russia has deep-pocketed allies — China for sure and India in a pinch.

In Washington, fatigue hardened into policy. Congressional resistance grew. A new administration, inheriting a war it neither started nor believed could be won outright, quietly recalibrated. Military aid slowed. Packages stalled. The message shifted: if Ukraine wants advanced American weaponry, Europe must pay for it. This was not altruism wearing new clothes. It was arithmetic.

Europe, meanwhile, discovered the limits of moral posturing when confronted with the shocking reality of the balance sheets. Inflation, stagnant growth, and social unrest eroded public patience. Governments that once wrapped themselves in Ukrainian flags now face voters asking why billions flow east while wages stagnate and public services shrink. Across the continent, the popular chant is the same: enough.

None of the three key European leaders—Merz in Germany, Starmer in the UK, and Macron in France—has a majority of voters supporting him.

The contradiction is stark. In 2024 alone, the European Union spent more on importing Russian oil and gas—roughly €22 billion—than it provided in direct financial aid to Ukraine. Europe funds Kyiv with one hand and Moscow with the other, sustaining both sides of the war it claims to oppose—a defense contractor’s wildest dream come true, as the largest among them, America’s Lockheed Martin, rises in share price for 2025, as vividly demonstrates.

Russia, by contrast, has structured its war economy for endurance. Despite sanctions, it continues to earn hundreds of billions of dollars annually from energy exports. China has replaced Europe as a principal buyer, absorbing discounted Russian oil and gas and providing Moscow with a steady flow of hard currency. In 2024, China accounted for roughly one-third of Russia’s energy export revenue — a financial cushion the Soviet Union never had.

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This bewildering distinction matters. When Moscow invaded Afghanistan in 1979, it faced an American-engineered grinding war of attrition without an economic lifeline. Oil revenues were insufficient. China was hostile and not willing to alienate Washington. The US exploited the weakness. By the time Soviet troops withdrew, the state itself was collapsing. Twelve years later, the Soviet Union ceased to exist. 

Today’s Russia is not repeating that mistake. It has soldiers, weapons, and—crucially—money. Ukraine does not. Its economy is shattered. Its tax base is hollowed out, and corruption is eating the state from within. Its war effort survives on external transfers that are increasingly contested, delayed, and conditional. This is not a moral judgment; it is a structural one. Wars of attrition favor the side that can pay for time — in people and money. Time is expensive, and it may run out very soon, handing Moscow its victory. 

What Western leaders refuse to admit publicly is already revealed in their budgets. This war has entered a phase where funding it indefinitely is politically impossible and potentially suicidal, yet abandoning it carries profound strategic and moral consequences. Ukraine is being slowly cornered by arithmetic, not ideology.

“This is the Hobson’s Choice facing the West. Ease off on the spending and watch Ukraine’s capability to prolong the war rapidly evaporate, or keep up the needed expenditures and watch the social programs in Europe slowly dissipate and governments fall,” says Mark Kimmitt, former US Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs.

Money does not guarantee victory, but its absence guarantees defeat. The tragedy unfolding in Ukraine is not merely one of invasion and resistance; it is the tragedy of a war based on assumptions that collapsed under the weight of reality. The erstwhile silent front, the financial one, is now vocal and will determine the outcome.

Wars end not when courage runs out, but when cash does.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.