German illusions – or: who actually wants Russia to lose?

by Gert Ewen Ungar*

(4 September 2026) (CH-S) Gert Ewen Ungar offers a different perspective: he describes how Germany perceives its own involvement with the Ukrainian Zelenskyy government, whilst highlighting the contradictory consequences this has for Germany.

* * *

“Russia has invaded Ukraine” – that is the German narrative on the war in Ukraine. The act was evil; Russia must lose. Implicit in this is the assumption that this view is shared worldwide. This is a fallacy with disastrous consequences. Germany is living under an illusion.

Germany on the “right” side

In Germany, people are certain that by demanding Russia must lose the war in Ukraine, they are on the right side of history. On 24 February 2022, Russia brutally invaded Ukraine completely without provocation and in violation of international law. With its war of aggression, Russia is pursuing imperialist goals; it wants to annex Ukraine and subsequently invade NATO countries. Russia must therefore be stopped. This can be achieved by arming Ukraine, which must defeat Russia. Solidarity in the form of funding and arms supplies to Ukraine is demanded not only by Germany’s commitment to justice but also by moral principles. Ukraine has been invaded and needs all the support the West can provide to secure victory over the aggressor.

This, in essence, is the narrative put forward by the German political-media complex regarding the war in Ukraine. There are at least two problems with this narrative. The first is that the narrative is highly simplified, misrepresents the events leading up to the war and thus prevents Germany from contributing to a solution of the conflict, as its causes are not adequately understood.

Whilst this misrepresentation of historical events is at least being discussed to some extent in Germany – though, of course, not to the extent it deserves – the second problem remains completely unaddressed. It is this: who, outside the German and Western European bubble, follows the Western narrative on the war in Ukraine and supports the aim of Russia losing this war? The answer to this question is simple: no one.¹

No country in the world has any interest in Russia losing

No country outside the collective West has any interest in Russia losing this war. To put it more accurately: no country outside Western Europe has any interest in the West winning this war. This problem has not even been acknowledged in Germany. That is disastrous.

The reason for this is easy to understand. The war in Ukraine is a symptom of a shifting geopolitical order. The West is losing its power and can no longer dictate its terms. The conflict in Ukraine is a manifestation of this. The conflict stems from the fact that the collective West assumed that Russia would continue to accept rules that it was required to accept, implement and adhere to. This is not the case, as the outbreak of the war makes abundantly clear.

The West has overestimated itself – Ukraine is bleeding dry

The West has overestimated its normative power and underestimated Russia’s potential. The fact that Western Europeans continue to cling to the root cause of the conflict, station their troops in Ukraine and seek to admit the country into NATO shows that, even after more than four years of war, they still have not understood the new balance of power and are not prepared to adapt to it.

This is to Ukraine’s detriment, for it is paying the highest price for this stubborn insistence: the destruction of its statehood, economic decline and the annihilation of an entire generation of men through war. Ukraine is bleeding dry in every respect.

The war in Ukraine as a symptom

The war in Ukraine is a symptom of a newly emerging geopolitical order. This new order is replacing the rules-based order, which is perceived as unjust by most of the world’s states. In Germany, there is a complete lack of adequate reflection on this fact and its resulting consequences for the conflict in Ukraine. Russia must not lose the war in Ukraine, for that would mean that the hated rules-based order – Western hegemony – would remain cemented in place for decades to come. This is the view that is particularly prevalent in the Global South, in the BRICS countries, in Africa and Latin America, and amongst the member states of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO).

Russia enjoys widespread solidarity, whereas the EU and Western Europe do not. If Russia were to lose the war in Ukraine, a significant centre of power within the multipolar order would be weakened before this new order could exert its stabilising influence. This is not in the interests of the vast majority of the world’s states. It is in their interest that the West should lose the proxy war, the military phase of which is being fought in Ukraine and which, through sanctions that contravene international law, is having a negative impact on the entire global economy.

Incidentally, these sanctions clearly demonstrate that the West does not feel bound by international law. There is only one body authorised to impose coercive measures against states: the UN Security Council. The EU has empowered itself to impose sanctions and is now doing so against countries [and individuals, ed.] that defy Brussels’ directives. Naturally, this is not the way to make friends. On the contrary, it fuels the desire to replace this repressive order.

The shift towards a multipolar world order is desired; it is happening naturally and cannot be reversed. The hope associated with it and the promise it holds are enormous. The rules-based order is to be replaced by the democratisation of international relations. This means that sovereign states, based on the Charter of the United Nations, negotiate their affairs with one another through diplomatic channels. The colonial and imperialist Western world order would thus come to an end. Numerous countries would perceive this as a liberating move. The implicit assumption that these countries share the German view of the war in Ukraine is therefore utterly naïve.¹

It is important for Germany and its policy of supporting Ukraine to understand this context. It is important to be able to correctly assess the balance of power and the interests at stake in this conflict. No one outside the sphere of influence of Western propaganda believes the narrative of an innocent Ukraine, striving for democracy and Western freedom, which has been invaded by an anti-democratic Russia and is being prevented from developing. The opposite is the case.

Outside the West, it is clear that the war in Ukraine is an expression of the West’s desire to cling to its hegemony and continue to dictate terms. Yet sovereign states have no place in the Western order.

Germany is taking the wrong stance

One thing is clear: historically speaking, Germany is once again taking the wrong stance. There is hardly any chance that the order to which Germany is clinging will survive the current conflicts. There are too many states that would benefit from the decline of the Western order. Germany’s stance in the Ukraine conflict – its refusal to engage in diplomacy, coupled with its insistence that Russia must bow to Western and German dictates – is therefore an act of enormous short-sightedness. Ultimately, this is to the detriment not only of Ukraine, but first and foremost of Germany itself. German policy is clinging to a system in decline and is thus missing the opportunity to help shape the one that is on the rise.

* Gert Ewen Ungar, born in 1969, he studied philosophy and German language and literature in Frankfurt am Main; he lives in Berlin and works as an educator in the field of social psychiatry. Since 2014, he has been travelling regularly to Russia and reporting on his experiences there. He is a regular contributor to RT Deutsch.

Source: https://www.freidenker.org/?p=26388, 22 August 2026

(Translation “Swiss Standpoint”)

1 Cf. “The West and the Global South. ‘You can’t be neutral in Ukraine War’”
https://swiss-standpoint.ch/news-detailansicht-en-international/you-can-t-be-neutral-in-ukraine-war.html