War in Ukraine

Hal Brands is the Henry A. Kissinger Distinguished Professor of Global Affairs at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) and a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. A columnist for Bloomberg Opinion, he is also the author or editor of several books, including The New Makers of Modern Strategy: From the Ancient World to the Digital Age, The Twilight Struggle: What the Cold War Teaches Us about Great-Power Rivalry Today, and Danger Zone: The Coming Conflict with China, with Michael Beckley.

• Introduction: The Ukraine War and Global OrderHal Brands Part I: Origins and Overviews 1: Ukraine, Russia, China, the WorldStephen Kotkin 2: Why Putin Invaded UkraineMichael McFaul and Robert Person 3: Strategic Fanaticism: Vladimir Putin and UkraineLawrence Freedman 4: The Failure to Deter: U.S. Policy toward Ukraine and Russia from the End of the Cold War until February 24, 2022Michael Kimmage5: How the War Will EndAnne Applebaum Part II: The Conflict 6: The Russia-Ukraine War: Military Operations and Battlefield DynamicsMichael Kofman 7: Russian Military Resilience and Adaptation: Implications for the War in Ukraine and BeyondDara Massicot 8: Planning for the Worst: The Russia-Ukraine "Tiger Team"Alexander Bick 9: U.S. Strategy in UkraineKori Schake 10: Nuclear Lessons and Dilemmas from the War in UkraineFrancis Gavin 11: Fallacies of Strategic Thinking in the Ukraine WarThomas Mahnken and Joshua Baker Part III: Global Dimensions and Implications 12: The Ukraine War and Global CleavagesAshley Tellis 13: Putin's Point of No ReturnAndrea Kendall-Taylor 14: Accelerating Profound Changes Unseen in a Century: Chinese Assessments of and Responses to Russia's Invasion of UkraineBonny Lin and Brian Hart 15: The European Union as a War Project: Five Pathways Toward a Geopolitical EuropeMark Leonard 16: Lose-Lose: The Economic Sanctions of the Russo-Ukrainian WarDaniel Drezner 17: America's Global Role in the Shadow of the Ukraine ConflictPeter Feaver and William Inboden

Brands contends, indeed convincingly, that if this war has proven so globally transfixing, perhaps that's because it reminds us of ugly realities—the viciousness of autocratic aggression, the destructiveness of large-scale war, the fragility of international order—we might prefer to forget.—Cipher Brief