The US and Israel’s war on Iran has been a blessing for Russia, as disruption to global oil supplies has sent the price of oil soaring. In response, the Ukrainian military has been targeting Russian oil infrastructure with an increased intensity. The Ukrainian military’s targets have also recently expanded to include the warehouses and distribution hubs of the massive online retailers Wildberries and Ozon, which between them control nearly 70% of the online retail market in Russia. This shift in targets is an attempt to transform the political stakes by disrupting day-to-day civilian life across Russia to a degree not yet seen. The Russian military has responded in turn by increasing the intensity of its aerial bombardments of Kyiv and other cities.
The war in Ukraine has now dragged on longer than WWI with no end in sight. On both sides there is a growing gulf between the triumphalist rhetoric of the ruling elite and the reality of living in a country engaged in long-term conflict. Fearing for their survival, these ruling elites have invariably resorted to escalating the war, or threatening escalation, in the hope of diverting attention from the day-to-day misery civilians are facing and restoring their authority. The result is that any peace proposals get rejected out of hand. The attempt in November 2025 by president Trump to impose a peace plan was dead before the year’s end as the Zelenskyy regime, backed and encouraged by the pro-war European powers (especially Britain, France and Germany), refused to even consider it.
The Trump administration spending its first months in office calling into question the US’s commitment to NATO prepared the ground for the European powers’ later refusal to cooperate. For the ruling classes of Europe, the war is being fought to decide who will be able to exploit the people and resources of Ukraine, as well as commanding a geostrategic advantage in the region. The real reason the pro-war European powers urged Zelenskyy to reject Trump’s proposed peace plan is that it agreeing to it would have limited their ability to do achieve these aims. For it’s part, the US has not in practice changed its position on the Ukraine war since Biden was president. The US’s industrial, technological, and military muscle remains firmly behind continuation of the war.
US imperialism seems to be stuck in a kind of death-spiral, whereby every attempt it makes to reinforce its position on the global stage makes it look even weaker. The Trump administration’s policy toward NATO has forced European nations to re-emerge as more independent powers. Trump’s failure to make good on his boast to end the Ukraine war “in a day” upon entering office has shattered any lingering pretence that the US can unilaterally force other capitalist powers to toe the line. And that’s not to mention the mess the US has gotten itself into in Iran. The longer these conflicts continue the more clear it becomes that the US can no longer play the role of unchallengeable global policeman. Once again we are witnessing the American empire collapse in real time.
Given the imperialist character of the war, any peace will be an imperialist peace without the independent intervention of the working class. However there are signs of a working-class fight back in Ukraine. In 2025, protests in multiple Ukrainian cities forced the Zelenskyy government to shelve reforms that would weaken anti-corruption safeguards. And National Police figures recorded 341 attacks on army recruiters in 2025, compared with just five in 2022, with 620 attacks were recorded in the first four months of 2026. This is probably a reflection of the fact that in order to keep the war going, the Ukrainian army has had to resort to forcibly conscripting men of fighting age by kidnapping them off the street.
The European powers’ militarization policies will inevitably be used to justify attacks on working-class living standards via cuts to public services and jobs. The role of us socialists in this situation is to make clear the link between the imperialist war in Ukraine and the decline in peoples’ living standards. We must also campaign on a program that includes: an immediate end to the fighting on all fronts; rejection of imperialist ‘peace’ plans negotiated behind the backs of working people; the immediate withdrawal of the Russian military from Ukraine; the immediate end of arms shipments to Ukraine from the US, European and other powers; and democratic, unhindered self-determination for Crimea and the Donbas region.
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