Olga Usenko
How large-scale interstate wars end has profound implications for political order, territorial control, and long-term stability. This article addresses: What pathways of war termination are plausible in the current phase of the Russia — Ukraine war, and what strategic risks or opportunities do they generate for Ukraine and the wider European security architecture? To answer this, the article develops a comparative, historically grounded framework that synthesizes five war-termination models — burnout, armistice, Finlandization, recurring crisis dynamics, and hybrid occupation, drawn from well-documented historical cases of protracted conflict. Using structured focused comparison, each model is analyzed in terms of its termination mechanisms, territorial outcomes, post-war security architecture, and equilibrium stability, then mapped onto a two-dimensional spectrum (territorial change vs. stability).
The analysis demonstrates that these models produce qualitatively different strategic trajectories, ranging from sovereignty-preserving equilibria to outcomes that institutionalize instability or external influence. A central finding is that most endgames pose significant risks for Ukraine unless anchored in strong and enduring Western security guarantees. The article contributes to war-termination scholarship by adapting classical models to hybrid interstate conflict and offering a framework for evaluating negotiation outcomes in real time.
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