When the house is burning, the arsonists are the first to explain that the smoke was part of the design: as Ukraine and the Middle East rewrite failure into master plan, the real geopolitical trick is not winning but controlling the narrative — and who gets left with the bill.
Trump and Putin may yet find common ground on finishing off the war in Ukraine, while threats to cut intelligence support and weapons supplies once again raise the question of whether Washington is serious, or simply playing another round of political poker.
Rumors of the Ukrainian government relocating from Kyiv to Lviv add another twist: could Lviv become the capital of what remains of a rump state, increasingly cut off from the Black Sea? Many reports are circulating that Western embassies were considering contingency plans to relocate staff to Lviv or eastern Poland should be the already dismal security situation in the capital deteriorate further. Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry said it had received no notification of such plans, and the EU ambassador stated that EU embassies remain in Kyiv.
The battlefield picture, the diplomatic maneuvering, and the mounting pressure for an exit ramp suggest that the old script may be running out of pages.
The uncomfortable question is whether, in reality, this war was lost a long time ago, with the fighting kept alive by political vanity, strategic inertia, and the money flowing through the machinery of conflict. The suspicion that Zelensky and some of his associates have their own reasons for keeping the show on the road is hardly going away, although allegations of personal enrichment require evidence, not just the familiar whispers about resale of weapons and money disappearing in every direction. Meanwhile, the CIA and other intelligence networks have their own institutional interests, and even a president who wants to change course may find that Washington’s machinery does not turn on a dime, if at all.
Looking for the exit?
The international situation is changing so rapidly that it provides more than ample political cover for decisions powerful actors may have wanted to make all along, but could not previously justify without admitting that earlier policies had failed. Governments rarely announce that a strategy has collapsed. Instead, they talk about a new phase, changed circumstances, realistic objectives, burden-sharing, and preventing further escalation. The language changes; the need to find the exit remains.
And then there is the profit motive, which has helped keep the guns firing. Governments, arms manufacturers, contractors, intermediaries, and political networks of patronage can all acquire an agenda of their own once a war becomes a business.
Washington has already demonstrated that intelligence sharing can become a bargaining chip, suspending assistance to Ukraine and subsequently restoring it in 2025. That history means another threat cannot simply be dismissed as empty rhetoric. U.S. and NATO intelligence support has been a significant part of Ukraine’s war effort, and any reduction could alter the calculations on the battlefield and at the negotiating table.
The real question is not whether Washington can apply pressure, it plainly has leverage. The question is how far the administration is prepared to go, what concessions it wants, and whether Europe can pick up the bill if America decides it has had enough.
On October 11, CNN reported that the Trump administration had threatened to suspend intelligence sharing and halt European purchases of U.S. weapons for Ukraine if Kyiv continued striking Russian energy facilities. The news of US threats was attributed to European officials; their claims were not proof that a permanent cutoff had been decided.
In the end, the great geopolitical magic trick is not making a failed policy disappear. It is persuading everyone that it was never a failure in the first place. However, within days, to keep the base of support happy, Trump said the United States was still sharing intelligence with Ukraine.
On the same day, Zelensky reported that Ukraine had received no advance warning from its partners before Russian ballistic missile strikes on Kyiv. Ukrainian officials said technical problems might explain the failure. The distinction matters: an intelligence-sharing relationship can continue while a particular warning fails to arrive.
“Those threats were attributed to European officials; they were not proof that a permanent cutoff had been decided.” — I think this implies the threats were made by Europe but the threats to cut intel were American. Europe was probably cited as a source of this threat. Different sources claimed it was implicit or explicit. I don’t think Europe will threaten to do anything other than back Ukraine, they are almost surely against any threats like that. (Although there are pockets of anti-war sentiment and policy within the EU)
The broader structural criticism is more defensible: once a war becomes embedded in domestic politics, procurement, institutional interests, and national prestige, ending it can become politically harder even when the original objectives are no longer attainable.
Same MO elsewhere
The same pattern is developing in the Middle East in the wake of the US-Iranian war. Saudi Arabia is facing a dangerous escalation. Reporting on October 12–13 described deadly Houthi missile attacks on Riyadh’s international airport, further threats to Saudi infrastructure, and an attack on an administrative building in the Saudi Aramco complex at Dhahran. The conflict is occurring amid the wider U.S.-Iran war and renewed fighting involving Saudi-backed forces in Yemen.
There is also a practical complication with this theory. A president could want to end the war quickly while still believing that intelligence sharing is necessary to prevent escalation, protect European allies, or preserve leverage over Moscow.
Conversely, a president could threaten to withdraw intelligence precisely because he wants to force Kyiv to accept terms that it would otherwise reject.
The European Commission announced on August 24 that it had approved €6.1 billion in new defense procurement for Ukraine, within a much larger European support framework. That is evidence that Europe is already taking on a substantial role, rather than merely waiting for Washington to decide what happens next.
War Hawks Screaming Foul
The cynical interpretation is that Washington could seek to normalize relations with Russia, starting with diesel fuel deals, while European governments absorb more of the long-term cost of containing it. European governments have their own reasons to support Ukraine; however, these lose steam as winter approaches and their economies stagnate or further decline in real terms.
Europe is therefore not simply a passive instrument of American policy. It can resist, negotiate, increase its own capabilities, and pursue a different approach. The real strategic test will be whether European governments can translate their financial commitments into sufficient intelligence, air defense, ammunition, and industrial capacity to sustain their stated objectives if American support becomes less dependable.
Saudi Arabia wants security, stable energy exports, and international investment. Yet, it faces threats to airports, oil infrastructure, and shipping routes at the same time that Washington is weighing how far it will go to help Riyadh.
The most important question is not whether everything went according to plan. It is whether the people making the decisions are now using the consequences of earlier decisions to justify a fundamentally different arrangement—and who will be left holding the bill for decades to come.
Perhaps that is the real art of the exit: not winning the war, securing the peace, or even correcting the original mistake, but controlling the narrative when the original objectives are no longer attainable. The map may change, governments may fall, and alliances may be rewritten, but the political survival instinct remains remarkably consistent.
In the end, the greatest geopolitical magic trick is not making a failed strategy disappear. It is making the world believe it was never a failure in the first place—and ensuring that, when the bill finally arrives, somebody else is left to pay it.
Henry Kamens, columnist and expert on Central Asia and the Caucasus
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