“The Great War in Ukraine lasts longer than the Great Patriotic War”, – such a narrative spread in Russian opposition circles in January 2026. Thus, Putin’s opponents tried to demonstrate the Kremlin leader’s strategic fiasco.
Comparison with the Soviet-German confrontation of 1941–[1945reallylookedsymbolicbutonlyfortheRussiansthemselvesTheso-called”GreatFatherland”remainsafetishintheRussianFederationbutinotherpartsoftheworlditisnotcustomarytoseparateitfromtheSecondWorldWar
But this week another historical milestone, full of real global symbolism, was overcome. 1568 days – that’s how long the First World War lasted in 1914–1918 years. We are living in conditions of full-scale war for the 1571st day.
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A war that contemporaries called “The Great War”, “La Grande Guerre” and “Der Grosse Krieg”. The war that buried four empires and radically changed the map of Europe. War described by Remarque, Hemingway, Hasek, Junger, Barbus and Dos Passos. This legendary war turned out to be less long-lasting than the large-scale Russian-Ukrainian confrontation.
Characteristically, in both cases, no one prepared for an exhausting and protracted armed conflict. Both then and now, the war deceived its initiators and involuntary participants, following an unpredictable scenario.
In 1914, the German plan to quickly crush France in 6–8 weeks failed almost immediately. As well as the Russian operation in East Prussia, which was to be followed by a further offensive deep into Germany. As did the hopes of the British Expeditionary Force to return home by Christmas. All initial military calculations turned out to be completely untenable – but this did not stop the war. In European capitals, the principle “if you have started, you must continue” prevailed.
The same principle worked in 2022, when the Kremlin’s blitzkrieg attempt in Ukraine failed. The abbreviation “SVO” still remains a mocking reminder of a small victorious operation, instead of which Russia received years of bloody carnage.
However, it cannot be said that the Ukrainians turned out to be much more insightful than the aggressor: after all, in 2023 we were also waiting for a victorious counteroffensive and a quick defeat of the Russian Federation. Unfortunately, it turned out differently.
In both cases, modern technology quickly came into play and changed the face of warfare beyond recognition. If the First World War put an end to the strategic efforts of the 19th century, then the Russian-Ukrainian confrontation nullifies the tested strategies of the 20th century. As in 1914–1918, the history of military art has to be rewritten.
However, the current technological breakthrough has turned out to be less versatile than in the years of the First World War. Machine guns, barbed wire, poison gas, tanks, zeppelins, submarines: in fact, all this diversity has been replaced by His Majesty the Drone acting in one or another role.
On the one hand, ubiquitous drones have once again turned maneuver warfare into positional warfare. They destroy manpower and military equipment as efficiently as possible; make the battlefield transparent and create an almost insurmountable kill zone.
On the other hand, drones are actively used to somehow compensate for the positional stalemate at the front. They allow you to bypass the enemy’s defenses and systematically hit his rear – even the most distant. Covering hundreds and thousands of kilometers, drones destroy the economic potential of the enemy and thus replace the naval blockade and unlimited submarine warfare – the tools used for this purpose by Great Britain and Germany in 1914–1918 years.
Similar to the First World War, the Russian-Ukrainian confrontation became a typical war of attrition. Both sides are trying to bleed the opponent, strangle his economy and suppress his will to resist.
As in the 20th century, special attention is paid to the destabilization of the enemy’s rear by means of the exacerbation of class contradictions. The old narrative “while the poor suffer and die, capitalists profit from war” was replaced by a more modern one: “While ordinary people suffer and die, influential corrupt people profit from war.”
However, there is currently no clear winner in the current war of attrition. Both today’s Ukraine (contrary to the Kremlin’s hopes) and today’s Russia (contrary to our own hopes) have turned out to be quite stable. More stable than the powerful states involved in the First World War.
In those days, 1,568 days were enough for a revolution to start in an extremely exhausted Germany, and Berlin capitulated without losing a single square kilometer of its own territory in the battles.
The then Russian Empire lasted even less, collapsing under the weight of military problems as early as 1917.
And we and our enemy crossed the 1,570-day milestone, left the First World War behind – and continue to fight.
The difficulties that exist at this stage of the war are not considered critical either in Moscow or Kyiv. No one knows how many more months or years it will take to completely exhaust Russia or Ukraine.
Such endurance can be surprising and even paradoxical. After all, a person of the 21st century is more pampered and accustomed to comfort than the average European of the 1910s – and, therefore, less adapted to the difficulties of wartime.
Probably, the tolerance of our contemporaries should have broken faster than that of Russian or German ordinary people during the First World War. But for a long time, a full-scale war did not require inhuman patience from the majority of Ukrainians and Russians: both sides began to face serious problems in the rear later than the participants in the military confrontation in 1914–1918 years.
Obviously, the solution lies precisely in the fact that our war is not a world war. In the 2020s, military actions directly affect only Ukraine and Russia. International economic ties are not destroyed. Both we and our adversary have a circle of external partners who do not fight themselves, but directly or indirectly help to wage a war of attrition. We have been afloat for the fifth year thanks to the collective West. Russians – thanks to China and other countries of the Global South.
But if in our case the exhaustion of the enemy takes more time than in 1914–1918, it does not follow that the end result of a grueling war will be any less painful.
As you know, the outcome of the First World War traumatized and disappointed not only the defeated – which is quite natural – but also the winners. In France, Great Britain, and Italy, the opinion prevailed that the results of the bloody military confrontation did not justify the terrible price paid for them.
And it is quite likely that we will have to experience the same bitter feeling.
Mykhailo Dubynyanskyi
