When did Western statecraft lose its fear of the unknown?

Responsible Statecraft ^ | Jun 25, 2026 | Matthew Blackburn

[NorseViking]

As Western leaders departed the G7 summit in Évian talking of a “strategic awakening in support of Ukraine,” the night sky over Moscow was illuminated by the fires of a burning oil refinery just nine miles from the Kremlin. This unprecedented Ukrainian drone strike on Russian territory was met in Western capitals with quiet endorsement rather than anxiety.

During the tensest moments of the Cold War, Western statecraft was anchored by a healthy fear of the unknown. Today, that prudence has been replaced by confidence that conflict can be precisely managed. When Franklin D. Roosevelt famously declared that "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself," he was addressing panic during an economic collapse. In contemporary Europe, however, this maxim has been carelessly transposed onto the realm of nuclear redlines.

The prevailing consensus in Europe treats deep strikes into the Russian heartland as a low-cost method of pressuring Moscow into a ceasefire. Assuming Russia is under unsustainable strain, experts continue to argue that Europe can safely coordinate the war, so long as taxpayers accept the costs. Such a view ignores the risks inherent to a broader unravelling of the global security architecture. Unlike during the Cold War, in which superpowers respected defined chains of command and established redlines, today’s historical guardrails have eroded.

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TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Government; Russia; War
KEYWORDS: putinthewarpig; russiansuicide; russiantrollfarm; vladtheimploder

[pierrem15]

How about Russia? Putin struck Ukraine hoping to present the West with another fait accompli like 2014. The Ukrainians resisted far more than he thought possible and he settled into a war of attrition where he bet that Russia's superior resources and Western fear would mean Russia would still win. Now Ukraine is destroying Russia's access to its own resources.

He doesn't have the means to strike Europe to block supplies: conventional attacks will just cause NATO to invoke Article 5 without actually doing much and any nuke attack raises the very real possibility that Russia gets nuked in return.

[NorseViking]

The only countries that can strike Russia with nukes are the US and France. Would they risk their existence over Poland and Germany? As for Article 5, what can NATO put on the table conventionally that isn’t there?

[pierrem15]

And also Britain.

Conventionally, Europe has working air forces, Russia does not, along with sufficient littoral navies so that Russia would lose almost all of its warships in European waters immediately. And the Kaliningrad Oblast would face direct military pressure from Poland.

The primary threat is political: would conventional strikes that cause almost no significant damage cause panic in Europe? Unlikely, especially in light of the fact that he hasn't been able to successfully intimidate the Europeans yet. Putin would be taking an enormous gamble with a lot of risk and no clear immediate payoff.