UPDATED February 26, 2025
Three years have passed since Russia invaded Ukraine, and there still seems to be no clear path to the end of violence—though the story seems to shift daily. The United States and Ukraine are engaged in negotiations related to security guarantees and rare elements and minerals.
We first published this reading list on March 1, 2022. Since then,we’ve been updating it on a regular basis. These readings are from two groups: the first, non-governmental organizations and think tanks that monitor and analyze international relations and foreign policy; the second, scholars working in Western and Eastern European history and politics. Some of the material included here is now historical in light of the current situation, but the context provided by them will help readers understand the enormous changes that have occurred in Ukraine, whether over one hundred, thirty, or even three years.
As new reports become available, we add them to this page. All material included in this list is free to read and download. JSTOR hosts an open collection of more than 50,000 open research reports from 187 think tanks and research institutes from around the world. They are always free to read and download.
Research Reports
Michael E. O’Hanlon and Paul B. Stares, “Defending Ukraine in the Absence of NATO Security Guarantees,” Council on Foreign Relations, January 30, 2025.
Ukrainian officials have consistently opposed reaching a cease-fire agreement with Russia unless they also receive clear NATO security guarantees. Anything less, they believe, will leave the country exposed to future Russian aggression. However, there is another path, and a more plausible one: Ukraine can defend itself effectively if attacked in the aftermath of a cease-fire agreement by creating a multilayered territorial defense system for the roughly 80 percent of its pre-2014 territory that it still controls.
Josh Rudolph, “Ukraine: A Good Deal: Weapons. Money. Security Guarantees,” A Foreign Policy Memo For The New US Administration. German Marshall Fund of the United States, January 2025.
If Russia colonizes Ukraine, China would do the same to Taiwan, and neither revanchist crusade would stop there. Brinkmanship would proliferate as nuclear powers including North Korea learn that aggression goes unchecked. Any US president who allows that strategic catastrophe would go down in history as abdicating his mantle as leader of the free world, reducing the United States to a mere regional power atop one of several chaotic spheres of influence.
International Crisis Group, “Europe’s Emerging Order,” Ukraine and Beyond: Shaping Europe’s Security Future. International Crisis Group, February 1, 2025.
Peace in Ukraine requires, first and foremost, that all parties face reality, including the reality of one another’s perceptions. While Moscow may believe that the best settlement of this conflict lies in Ukraine’s surrender and demilitarisation, followed by its acceptance of Russian dominance, it likely underestimates both the challenges of attaining the latter and the implications beyond Ukraine. Even if Kyiv loses decisively on the battlefield, Moscow would face a hostile Ukrainian population, which it or its Ukrainian proxies would struggle to control. Covertly or overtly, this population will almost surely receive aid and support from abroad, with European capitals nervous about the Kremlin’s next steps looking to make life harder for it. Tensions between Russia and Western states will heighten. Moreover, should Russia use its sway over Ukraine to put pressure on Moldova, yet another crisis would ensue.
Loïc Simonet, “A Possible Ceasefire in Ukraine in 2025: Is the OSCE on Board?” OIIP – Austrian Institute for International Affairs, January 2025.
In the corridors of power in Europe, realism is on the rise, even at the vanguard of the hard-liners.1 Some leaders are again tempted by a policy of appeasement, as shown by the telephone call between German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Vladimir Putin on 15 November 2024. In the ‘Global South’, calls to end the war are getting louder, as evidenced by China and Brazil’s joint proposal for peace negotiations (Brazilian Presidency, 2024). Competing crises—such as the great reshuffle in the
Middle East —require urgent political focus.
Davis Ellison, Benedetta Girardi, and Tim Sweijs, “Taking, Holding, and Losing Land,” From the Steppes of Ukraine to the Shores of Formosa: Lessons Learned from Contemporary War for Taiwan. Hague Centre for Strategic Studies, January 2025.
The question here is how land forces can achieve their conventional territorial defence mission while also contributing to a wider campaign. The central theme of the ongoing Russian invasion is how the Ukrainian armed forces survived an attack by what on paper was a superior Russian force with massive firepower and ISR assets, while purportedly to be fully modernised. In addition, Ukrainian forces managed to not only hold terrain but in the later phases of the war, retake land from the Russian invaders. As taking and holding land in the face of firepower, whether through dispersion, mobility and speed, hiding, or hardening, was the central challenge of 20thcentury warfare, the current war shows that this persists also in the 21st century.
Tõnis Idarand, “For as Long as It Works: Russia’s Nuclear Signalling During Its War in Ukraine,” International Centre for Defence and Security (ICDS), January 2025.
Russian signalling, in particular its nuclear threats, has partly served the purpose so far. In an unprecedented situation of large-scale conventional aggression shielded with nuclear threats, the west has tried to avoid an escalation by self-imposing red lines and being hesitant when calibrating its support to Ukraine. The high cost of such cautiousness is being paid by Ukraine.
Jack Sharples, “The End of Russian Gas Transit via Ukraine: Immediate Impact and Implications for the European Gas Market in 2025,” Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, 2025.
Overall, the end of Russian gas transit via Ukraine is having a significant impact on gas flows in Central Europe. For Europe as a whole, the immediate impact in terms of physical supply volumes is more limited. In early January, the loss of Russian pipeline supply via Ukraine was smaller in scale than the weather-driven uptick in demand. In that context, the end of Russian gas transit via Ukraine is one of several factors that will contribute to a year-on-year increase European LNG imports in 2025, which in turn will contribute to the global LNG market remaining relatively tight until the new wave of LNG supply has fully arrived.
David Salvo, “Russia: Stand Firm or Capitulate: The Kremlin Wants It All,” A Foreign Policy Memo For The New US Administration. German Marshall Fund of the United States, January 2025.
The philosophical obstacle to a deal is Putin’s ambition, which extends beyond subjugating Ukraine. Russia’s war is part of a greater aspiration to assert its domination over a perceived sphere of influence, which includes regions of NATO member states with ethnic Russian populations. The Kremlin also aims to degrade US leadership and NATO capabilities in Europe. Russian military doctrine, after all, makes clear that the United States is the primary adversary.
RAND Corporation, “Hate and Dehumanization in Russia’s Narratives on Ukraine,” RAND Corporation, January 2025.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was an act of naked aggression. To spin its unjust war, Russia cloaked itself in a robe of propaganda and disinformation. Russia’s narratives include claims that Ukraine has been overrun by Nazis and needs to be “denazified,” a justification presented by Russian President Vladmir Putin on the day of the invasion. Russia’s narratives include the use of ethnic slurs and other dehumanizing language that seeks to justify and promote violence against Ukrainians. But how successful have these narratives been in mainstreaming their messages and reaching broad audiences?
Kateryna Bondar, “How Ukraine Rebuilt Its Military Acquisition System Around Commercial Technology,” Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), January 2025.
A central aspect of this transformation has been a strategic shift toward integrating commercial technologies into military development, production, and deployment processes. Recognizing that the traditional centralized procurement and manufacturing practices were ill-suited to the rapidly changing realities of the battlefield, the government has implemented critical changes in military research, development, and procurement processes in order to leverage private-sector innovation and expertise.
Elaine McCusker, Frederick W. Kagan, and Richard Sims, “Dollars and Sense: America’s Interest in a Ukrainian Victory,” American Enterprise Institute, January 2025.
Among the most crucial decisions will be whether and how to continue aid to Ukraine in its fight for freedom against Russia. Though many Americans are understandably confused and concerned about the cost of this aid, worrying only about what assistance to Ukraine costs is thinking about the issue the wrong way.
Instead, we should be worried about what not helping Ukraine would cost. Right now, by providing aid to Kyiv, the United States is preventing Russia from directly menacing eastern and central Europe—something that would doubtlessly consume more American resources. Washington may, in fact, be deterring a direct war between NATO and Moscow, one in which United States forces would have to fight.
Ilya Zaslavskiy, “Sanctioned Kleptocracy: How Putin’s Kremligarchs Have Survived the War—and Even Prospered,” Atlantic Council, January 2025.
The start of the full-scale war against Ukraine should be seen in a dual light. On one hand, it is proof that Putin’s plan to use kleptocratic corruption and hybrid and limited warfare alone was not enough to crush Ukraine’s drive for Western integration. But it is also an example of the consequences of two decades of Western appeasement. When Russia invaded Georgia in August 2008, just as the global financial crisis was hitting, Russia’s economy was at its most vulnerable since 2000. Strong sanctions at this juncture might have deterred future aggression.
By unleashing full-scale war in February 2022, Putin took a calculated risk that the West would be as passive in defending Ukraine as it was in defending Georgia
in 2008—or Ukraine in 2014.
Karen Philippa Larsen, “The Rise and Fall of the Wagner Group: Russia Is Seeking Control over Its ‘Private’ Military Companies,” Danish Institute for International Studies, January 2025.
When Putin became president in 2000, one of the first things he did was to introduce the ‘dictatorship of the law’. Formally, this was a promise of ‘law and order’ in a Russia still very much affected by the lawlessness of the 1990s. Informally, it was used to remove the influence of ‘Yeltsin’s oligarchs’, who had become political players, and to re-nationalise companies in order to instate Putin’s associates in the leadership. This official focus on the law has followed Putin throughout his many years as president. It is not surprising, then, that references to Russian law have been used both to deny the existence of the Wagner Group, and later to argue for its legitimacy. The focus on law and legality is a façade that hides the practice of using law as an instrument of intimidation and coercion, which has become normal practice in Russia.
Seth G. Jones and Seamus P. Daniels, “Deterring Russia: U.S. Military Posture in Europe,” Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), January 2025.
Russia’s seizure of Crimea and its related military operations in western Ukraine in 2014, along with its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, prompted the United States to bolster its military presence in Europe. In 2017, the U.S. Department of Defense announced the beginning of a continuous armored brigade combat team (ABCT) rotational presence in Europe and back-to-back rotations of U.S. troops and equipment to Europe. By 2023, the 7,000-person rotational force included four elements: a division headquarters located in Poznan, Poland; a combat aviation brigade; an ABCT; and a sustainment task force. Following Russia’s 2022 invasion, U.S. end strength in Europe grew significantly to over 100,000 personnel as additional forces were deployed, including another ABCT, a High-Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) battalion, and KC-135 refueling aircraft, among other forces.
Karen van Loon and Dick Zandee, “Shifts in Arctic Security: Ripples of Russia’s War against Ukraine” Clingendael Institute, December 2024.
Finland and Sweden’s recent accession to NATO enhances the Alliance’s strategic position in the Arctic by strengthening its northern security capabilities and geographic reach. Both countries bring well-trained, adaptable military forces familiar with Arctic and sub-Arctic conditions, including expertise in cold-weather operations, which is crucial for NATO’s readiness in challenging environments. Finland’s extensive land border with Russia expands NATO’s northern perimeter, increasing deterrence and surveillance capabilities, while Sweden’s strategic position in the Baltic Sea provides NATO better access to the Northeastern part of Allied territory in Europe. With the Finnish and Swedish membership of the alliance, the whole Nordic area that extends to the Arctic region has become a geostrategic continuum of NATO territory. Their advanced defence technologies, such as Finland’s modern artillery and Sweden’s naval capacities including submarines, provide NATO with additional assets that are vital for securing the area against emerging threats, particularly from Russia.
Kaspar Sõukand, “Ukraine’s Attacks and Their Effect,” in The Iron Leviathan: Russia’s Rail Network in Its War Against Ukraine, International Centre for Defence and Security (ICDS), 2024.
The surge of attacks on the railway system in Zaporizhzhia Oblast has also necessitated a reintroduction of unconventional yet battle-tested equipment—armoured trains. Armoured trains, the legacy of the USSR’s Red Army, were first deployed by Russia in Chechnya, where they proved to be an efficient tool against mining and attacks conducted by Chechen pro-independence guerrilla forces. They were designed to protect supply trains and provide cover for the ZhDV engaged in demining the railway tracks. Each vehicle had a repair team able to repair and replace the damaged tracks in a few hours. The four armoured trains and the assigned ZhDV units constituted part of the Southern Military District. Armoured trains saw limited usage during the Russo-Georgian War in 2008 but were scheduled for dismantling after that campaign.
Historians and Other Experts on Russia and Ukraine
Nayantara Hensel, “The Russia-Ukraine Crisis: How Regional Conflicts Impact the Global Economy,” PRISM 10, no. 4 (2024): 102–22.
The conflict between Russia and Ukraine, which began in February 2022, has had a significant impact on the global agricultural market. Almost one-third of global exports of wheat and barley and 75 percent of global exports of sunflower oil are from Russia and Ukraine. Indeed, 400 million people globally rely on Ukrainian food supplies. Unfortunately, the conflict has put a number of countries at risk.
Robin Dickey and Michael P. Gleason, “Space and War in Ukraine: Beyond the Satellites,” Æther: A Journal of Strategic Airpower & Spacepower 3, no. 1 (2024): 20–35.
At the onset of the Russian invasion, Ukraine did not own or operate any satellites; however, the United States and its NATO Allies have made space support available in various forms. Commercial actors have also provided a historic degree of space services to Ukraine. As a result, Ukraine has been able to leverage space systems far beyond expectations based on its capabilities prior to February 2022, which did not include independent access to space. While significant public attention has been directed at Ukraine’s success in using commercial space services at the tactical level, space-based systems have also had notable operational- and strategic-level effects.
David Matsaberidze, “Russia vs. EU/US through Georgia and Ukraine,” Connections 14, no. 2 (2015): 77–86.
The article…explore[s] the main topics of Russian foreign policy since the dissolution of the Soviet Union. On the one hand based on orthodox geopolitics, as a legitimizing narrative for its sphere of influence across the FSU area, and on the other, the narrative of victimization of Russia and Russians by the West after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. […] Russia is fighting against its status as a second rate country, and the evident clash of Western liberal democracy and Russian orthodoxy in the Russian Federation’s foreign policy drive. The Rose and Orange revolutions of Georgia and Ukraine are considered to be major security problems by the Russian Federation, which in turn gives Georgia and Ukraine reason to leave the Russian geo-political axis.
Uzochukwu Uchechukwu Alutu, “The Russia-Ukraine War: Is Africa the Beautiful Bride?” Journal of International Affairs 75, no. 2 (2023): 407–13.
Despite these challenges, many African countries have yet to denounce Russia. The votes cast by African counties on UN resolutions regarding Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, as shown in Table 1, indicate shifting dynamics in the continent’s relationship with Russia, the rest of EU, and indeed the U.S. In particular, the spread of the votes suggests that while Russia has long enjoyed strong ties with many African countries, such ties may be overstated and are not without conditions.
Austin Charron, “Whose Is Crimea? Contested Sovereignty and Regional Identity,” Region 5, no. 2 (2016): 225–56.
While the Kremlin has continually strived to maintain plausible deniability of its support for separatist groups in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region and its direct involvement in the violent conflict there, it has openly celebrated and stubbornly defended its territorial annexation of Crimea despite international condemnation, economic sanctions, and mounting pariahdom. The “reunification” of Crimea and Russia has also galvanized the Russian public behind a reinvigorated sense of patriotic nationalism, with the catchphrase “Crimea is Ours” (“Krym Nash”) serving as a popular and defiant refrain against challenges to the perception of Russia’s legitimate sovereignty over the region. Russian claims to Crimea draw from a deep well of historical mythologies that enshrine the region within narratives of religious identity, valorous militarism, and Soviet nostalgia.
Olena Nikolayenko, Invisible Revolutionaries: Women’s Participation in the Revolution of Dignity, Comparative Politics, Vol. 52, No. 3 (April 2020), pp.451–472.
The Revolution of Dignity falls into the category of what Mark Beissinger defines as an “urban civic revolution,” marked by a large concentration of protesters in the urban space and popular demands for political freedoms. Since 1980, two-thirds of revolutions worldwide were urban civic revolts, and the proposed typology seeks to catalogue forms of women’s participation in this subset of revolutions. Between November 2013 and February 2014, protesters occupied the Independence Square (Maidan Nezalehnosti, or simply Maidan) in the capital city of Kyiv and pressed for the resignation of the incumbent government, the signing of the Association Agreement with the European Union, and state provision of greater political and economic freedoms. The number of protesters swelled from a few hundred to tens of thousands, with the growth of the encampment in Kyiv and the emergence of smaller protest camps across Ukraine. The mass mobilization resulted in the ouster of President Viktor Yanukovych in February 2014 and the conduct of snap presidential elections in May 2014. [p. 452]
Mayhill C. Fowler, “Beyond Ukraine or Little Russia: Going Global with Culture in Ukraine,” Harvard Ukrainian Studies 34, no. 1/4 (2015): 259–84.
Investigating culture in Ukraine outside the ethnic lens raises question of what makes culture “Ukrainian.” Rather than quantity to be assumed, “Ukrainian culture” demands examination. Members of cultural elites…were directly involved creating “Ukrainian” culture. But what was that, exactly? [Cultural elites] were deeply invested in the creation of Ukrainian culture, but no one on what that culture should include. Moreover, this construction Ukrainian culture took place simultaneously with the reevaluation and rearticulation of other ethnic cultures.
Lada Kolomiyets, Manipulative Mistranslations in Official Documents and Media Discourses on Contemporary Ukraine, Harvard Ukrainian Studies, Vol. 37, No. 3/4 (2020), pp. 367–406.
[T]he main reasons for a significant spread of deforming tendencies in translations of the Ukrainian language material appearing, in particular, in the Russian digital media and blogosphere should be associated not so much with the deficiencies of processing the source language material per se as with the subversive and insinuating strategies of indirect (de- and recontextualized) translation. [p. 404]
Beatrix Futàk-Campbell, Political Synergy: How the European Far-Right and Russia Have Joined Forces Against Brussels, Atlantisch Perspectief, Vol. 44, No. 1, Special Edition: Putin’s Russia (2020), pp. 30–35.
Confirming their support for Russia, right-wing populists used the Ukraine crisis and subsequent Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014 to their own advantage. These events have produced a key opportunity for them to differentiate themselves from the domestic political mainstream which was anti-Russian. Le Pen has even publicly declared Russia’s 2014 invasion and seizure of Crimea to be legitimate. During the March 2014 referendum on Crimea’s reunification with Russia, high-ranking politicians of the FN and the FPÖ functioned as independent election monitors while OSCE and UN delegations abstained. Notably FPÖ deputy Johann Gudenus and Aymeric Chauprade (FN) were part of the monitoring team and worked together building on their previous meetings at the various summits as noted above. The Eurasian Observatory of Elections and Democracy, which had previously helped to legitimate elections in Transnistria, South Ossetia, and Abkhazia, also invited the PVV to join; however, Wilders declined to participate. Nonetheless, the international observers concluded that the referendum procedure was “fair and free” and “conformed to international standards.” This was in complete contradiction to the international community’s verdict. The UN General Assembly, by adopting resolution 68/262 in March 2014, concluded that the referendum was invalid. Similarly, the European Commission (2014), together with the European Council, declared that the EU “does neither recognise the illegal and illegitimate referendum in Crimea nor its outcome.” [p. 33]
Carl Gershman, A Fight for Democracy: Why Ukraine Matters, World Affairs, Vol. 177, No. 6 (March / April 2015), pp. 47–56.
“The Maidan uprising was not only a momentous historical event but also a profoundly democratic one, with the protesters embracing a concept of citizenship involving individual responsibility to uphold democratic values and to serve the larger community.” [p. 48]
“I suggest that Putin seeks nothing less than a different kind of world order from the one that followed the end of the Cold War and the breakup of the Soviet Union, which he has called “the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the twentieth century.” That’s why he “[drove] a tank over the world order,” as the Economist put it last March after the invasion and annexation of Crimea. Putin is seeking to reverse the verdict of 1989, as the American writer George Weigel has said, which he considers to be an unjust and humiliating defeat for Russia.” [p. 52]
Jacobus Delwaide, Identity and Geopolitics: Ukraine’s Grappling with Imperial Legacies, Harvard Ukrainian Studies, Vol. 32/33, Part 1: ЖНИВА: Essays Presented in Honor of George G. Grabowicz on His Seventieth Birthday (2011–2014), pp. 179–207.
Russian historic claims to Ukraine are not at all obvious. The term Kyivan Rus’ for the medieval (late ninth to mid-thirteenth century) realm centered on Kyiv “comes from imperial Russian historiography,” and had the function of distinguishing the Kyivan from the Muscovite period in the imperial Russian narrative. After World War II, the notion of an “Old Rus’ nationality” gained particular momentum in Soviet historiography: it “served, inter alia, to establish Russia’s claim to the historical legacy of Kyivan Rus’ and therefore survived the demise of Soviet historiography ” remaining “quite popular in Russia today..” [Kyiv and Muscovy, p. 180]
Alexander J. Motyl, Deleting the Holodomor: Ukraine Unmakes Itself, World Affairs, Vol. 173, No. 3 (September/October 2010), pp. 25–33.
“The first thing Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich did after his February 25 inauguration was delete the link to the Holodomor on the president’s official Web site. Yanukovich’s predecessor, Viktor Yushchenko, had made the Holodomor–the famine of 1932-33 produced by Joseph Stalin and responsible for the deaths of millions of Ukrainian peasants–into a national issue, promoting what Czech novelist Milan Kundera famously called “the struggle of memory over forgetting” as part of his attempt to move the country toward democracy.” [p. 25]
“[T]he Holodomor’s “murder by starvation” remains the single greatest catastrophe endured by Ukraine during Soviet rule. Any attempt to reconstruct a national Ukrainian narrative must take a stand on a trauma of such proportions–especially since all Soviet historians, propagandists, and officials assiduously ignored the famine or dismissed it as an emigre delusion for decades.”[p. 27]
Timothy Snyder, Integration and Disintegration: Europe, Ukraine, and the World, Slavic Review, Vol. 74, No. 4 (Winter 2015), pp. 695–707.
“The aspirations of Ukrainians in 2013 and 2014, and in particular the desire for an association agreement with the EU, now come into clearer focus. The Yanukovych regime had the support of much of the population when its policy was to sign the association agreement and lost it when it yielded to Russian pressure not to sign. Citizens of Ukraine, perhaps more than anyone else, were in a position to appreciate the logic of European integration in its latest form. Ukraine has been near the center of several of the major integrative and disintegrative projects of the European twentieth century. It did not become a nation-state, despite a serious military effort, after World War I; instead, most of the lands of today’s Ukraine became part of the Soviet Union. It was the major German European colony of World War I and was meant to be the major German colony in World War II. No country was shaped more by the accumulating effect of the Nazi and Soviet projects of transformation.” [p. 702]
Kazuhiko Togo, “An Alternative Way to Face the Ukrainian War,” The Journal of Territorial and Maritime Studies 10, no. 2 (2023): 86–96.
If majority views are going to prevail, and Zelensky continues on insisting on his essential war purposes—to achieve full territorial integrity, chase out Russian troops from all Ukrainian territory, including Crimea, force Putin to accept full defeat—there is a real danger for escalation and prolongation of deadly fighting. The end game of the war may be considerable bloodshed of Ukrainians and Russians until that full victory of the West can be achieved.
But if minority views are put on trial, what would the minimal necessary conditions be to achieve a ceasefire? It goes without saying that the most difficult condition is the question of Ukrainian territorial integrity.
Jonathan M. Acuff and Hannah N. Clegg, “How Does This End?: The Ukraine War and the Future of Russia,” Journal of Strategic Security 17, no. 2 (2024): 1–27.
Regardless of the outcome of the conflict, it is unlikely that the war will dislodge the Putin regime. The only plausible scenario in which Putin is removed is the possibility of intervention by the Russian military in domestic politics. In this context, the abortive revolt in June 2023 by Yevgeny Prigozhin’s Wagner Group is instructive. This mutiny has been largely misinterpreted, as it was a response to Putin’s generals having won control over the Wagner Group, not a measurable weakening of the Russian state. Moreover, Prigozhin’s tactical position was so weak that he had already lost before the mutiny began. Given Putin’s command of the security and intelligence organizations, the difficulty in mobilizing sufficient forces to dislodge loyal Russian Army, Air Force, and National Guard forces, and a material incentive structure left unaffected by the war, we see a successful coup d’état by military or paramilitary forces as a slim possibility. The minimal effort required to stop Prigozhin is empirical evidence of the durability of Putin’s regime, not evidence of an emergent movement against Putin.
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