“Western victory illusions – and the Ukraine collapse” was the title of a highly interesting article in “Nachdenkseiten” (August 16th), written by the well-known former UN diplomat and influential peace negotiator involved in the settling of wars in the Mideast, Afghanistan and Africa, Dr. Michael von der Schulenburg. The main thesis of his article has been corroborated by several other analysts (i.e. Alastair Crooke, from GB, Prof. Jeffrey Sachs (USA), Prof.Glenn Diesen (Norway), Alexander Mercouris “The Duran Podcast” (GB) and Prof. John Mearsheimer (US), thus paving the way for a much broader debate around the key arguments that were used by von der Schulenburg. The UN diplomat described the complete “delusion” at the side of the EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who during her recent visit to Kiev end of July, had expressed tremendous optimism concerning Ukraine’s chance for “complete” victory over Russia, along the line that Ukraine would have won back “the initiative” and that Russia would be on the “defensive.” She referred to the Ukraine 40 days “drone offensive” (June/July), where the Ukraine, with the help of the US company “Palantir” received the programming for such autonomous drone weapons, so as to enable it to strike targets deep inside Russia: oil refineries, warehouses and other critical Russian infrastructure.
Yet, the Russian government, whose economy is supposedly breaking down and whose losses have become worse on the battlefield, according to a July 31 2026 Foreign Affairs article by A. Gabuev (Dir. Carnegie Russia- Eurasia Center Berlin et al) has responded with a massive military escalation. Within less than two weeks this has transformed the situation inside Ukraine. In short, Ukraine is economically in a miserable situation, the constant Russian bombing in Kiev as well as in and around Odessa have made the country “landlocked,” unable to import as well as export its grain, while at the same time the country has incurred massive territorial losses in Donbass.
The story of the Leipzig drone leading back to Moscow
In reaction to this the European elite is nervous to such a degree, that it stepped up the rhetorical war of words against Russia. The lead was taken recently by the German Government under Chancellor Merz and its respective Ministers of the Interior Dobrindt as well as the German Foreign Affairs Minister Wadepuhl. In a press conference (Sept. 1rst! – remember 1939) both ministers stated that Germany, giving the overwhelming evidence, it had gathered, is blaming Russia as responsible for the August 4th Leipzig Airport drone incident. The drone found by a low- level airport worker near a parking Ukrainian transport plane and kicked away with the foot, didn’t explode since it was defective. But as the German ministers underlined, “it could have exploded and killed many innocent people.” According to several experts, including Swiss security expert Ralph Bosshard there was insufficient evidence that would prove that Moscow was behind this supposed terrorist attack. Yet, it served as a starting signal to “escalate “and announce German countermeasures, such as the closing of the Bonn Russian General Consulate (the last one), the closing of the “Russia House” in Berlin, accompanied by a list of sanctions against 120 Russian individuals as well as the announcement that Germany, in coordination with its European partners in NATO and the EU, will actively military and financially help Ukraine to fight the war against Russia.
Russia’s first reaction
President Putin at a high-level SCO press conference in Bischkek (Kyrgistan) Sept 2nd responded to a question that asked about the Leipzig drone incident and about a statement by President Zelensky “where he openly threatened our air force several hours ago, saying that civilian aircraft have no place in the sky used by Ukrainian drones”:“I believe that it mostly has to do with the internal political situation. The Chancellor’s political standing is complicated. He is not trusted by his citizens, and it is clear why- because he does not uphold but sells out national interests and because of economic missteps: enterprises are being shut down, people are losing their jobs, and living standards are plummeting. It is not clear why they did what they did. They have only one explanation: they need to stand up against ‘aggressive Russia’. You want proof? Here you are. They have planted it. (….) But now they need to only explain the reasons behind their actions. Considering the falling ratings and the upcoming elections, including in Saxony-Anhalt, this puts the political future of the leading ruling circles into question.” Immediate reaction by the Russian side was the closing of three cultural institutes belonging to the Goethe-Institute.
The West “deceives” and acts in a “boorish manner”
Russian Foreign minister Lavrov in a lengthy interview with RBC TV (28 th of August) underlined the essentially “deceptive” mode of operation of the West, making clear that Russia does no more fall for US and European “deceptive games”: “Deception lies in the foundation of Western diplomacy. And it still does,” Lavrov stated. He mentioned as example the OSCE summit 1999 in Istanbul declaring that NATO would not expand. “But it did exactly the opposite.” He also mentioned Russian Foreign Minister Primakov’s memoirs in which he had mentioned US ambassador Jack Matlock “who in his memoirs had unconditionally confirmed that what was firmly promised: NATO would not expand if Germany reunified. But the alliance did expand, not just to eastern Germany but to other countries as well.” Lavrov also recalled that after the NATO summit in Ankara in June this year US State Secretary Marco Rubio had told him in Manila (ASEAN) that “the US would not be a mediator because it was unequivocally on Ukraine’s side.”
He was particularly critical about the role of Britain that “since Ivan the Terrible has constantly sought to cause trouble for our country.” He recalled World War II, where Britain and France stood at the Russian side, but with his speech in Fulton (1946 about the “new iron curtain in Europe ) given by Winston Churchill, everything changed. The British together with the Americans had begun planning “Operation Unthinkable” together with the Americans before the end of the World War II.” He also referred to the present US attitude vis a vis Iran and its war, by sarcastically underlying: “Now President Trump says they want to talk to the Iranians, but there is nobody there to talk to; he doesn’t know anyone. They killed everyone there.”
Former UN diplomat von der Schulenburg’s sober facts about Ukraine war
Indeed, a sober “reality” check confirms that for two weeks at least reports about the ongoing victorious war in Ukraine have largely gone silent. The reason being that from the USA as well as from Ukrainian side, doubts concerning the “success” of the drone war deep into Russia, are growing by the day. Von der Schulenburg referred to the former Ukrainian Chief of Staff Salushny (today Ukraine ambassador to London) who had stated that “Drone warfare would have little success and is too expensive.” Equally a pro Ukrainian war observer “Dron Bomber” commented that Russia in the meantime has had a high “shooting rate” against Ukrainian drones.
Acccordig to von der Schulenburg a careful look at the “battlefield” leaves no doubt, that there is a military “stalemate.” He referred to a report by the Ukraine “Telegram Canal” which reported that “Armed forces of the Russian Army occupied 728,45(!) square kilometers territory in the Special Operation Zone- which is the best result since October 2024 (…) The speed of the Russian Armed Forces is increasing.” There have not only been Russian territorial gains in Donbass, but also in Charkiv and Zaporizhzhia. This happens at a slow pace, but it’s a war of attrition, whose primary aim is the annihilation of the adversary armed forces. Could this aim be reached with the occupation of the last defense positions in the Donbass cities Slowjansk and Kramatorsk?” he rhetorically asked.
He mentioned that the Russian leadership is now openly speaking about a “war” of “NATO against Russia” and it has significantly intensified the war, in response to the manifold Ukraine drone attacks deep inside Russia.
“In the cruel logic of the war, the destruction rates in Ukraine surpass those in Russia by a manifold. What is also decisive is that Ukraine does not have a significant air defense capability and can hardly defend itself against massive Russian drone and missile attacks, while the intensity of Ukraine attacks supposedly is decreasing. This already has had consequences: The Ukrainian Black Sea ports in and around Odessa have been bombed in such a way, that Ukraine has become de facto a ‘landlocked country.’ If such reports were true, this would be a heavy blow. So far approximately 70% of all Ukrainian imports and exports as well as 90% of the agricultural exports have been managed by way of these ports. Also, important bridges like the Zatoka Bridge, that connects Odessa with the Rumanian Black Sea ports, have been destroyed.” Furthermore, there was a systematic destruction of railways – road connections, gasoline stations, energy grids, industrial facilities and warehouses according to von der Schulenburg. And the “European NATO States can only change very little- given their lack of military capacities. Plans to station a ‘coalition of the willing’ in Poland or install a ‘no fly zone’ over Ukraine, are completely unrealistic,” von der Schulenburg stated. “The US has hardly any more weapons to deliver. They even announced that they want to hand over the Wiesbaden based NATO Center that is to coordinate military assistance for Ukraine, completely to the European NATO states.”
The former UN Diplomat added that there have been clear signals that the Ukrainian Army was facing significant difficulties. At his inauguration mid- January 2026, the(former) Ukraine Defense Minister Fedorov spoke about 200.000 deserters; other parliamentarians even spoke about a higher number. In addition, 2 Mio Ukrainian male persons tried to avoid their military draft. Whatever numbers it may be: “These figures indicate the alarming situation of the Ukraine Armed Forces; a state that can neither be compensated by forced recruitment in the streets, nor by Artificial Intelligence directed drones. Also, the EU idea to withdraw the protection status from Ukrainian men that fled and broke international law, and have them go back into war in Ukraine, only demonstrates the hopelessness of the situation.”
Furthermore he reported that in May this year Ukrainian Social Minister Denys Ulyutin stated “that the population has shrunk in the territory controlled by the government from 52 Mio to possibly 22 Mio(!). Among these there are 11 Mio Social assistance recipients, mostly pensioneers and war disabled people. He estimated that the demographic decline will continue and shrink the population at the end of the war, since young men – once freed from war service – would join their families in the West. He would not expect a return by Ukrainians living abroad. Aside this demographic decline there is an additional impoverishment, deep social injustices, omnipresent corruption, an astronomical state indebtedness and an economic collapse of the country.”
As von der Schulenburg stated, the evident failure of the Ukraine drone warfare to bring about a strategic turn, should make clear to the European NATO States, that “the Ukraine will not be the victor of this war, but develops more and more into a destroyed and depopulated country, that is bleeding itself to death. This should alarm us and raise concern for this badly treated country. (…) Should it not be in the vital interest of the NATO States, to prevent such a scenario? This can certainly not be realized by a direct engagement of NATO. Such a procedure would inevitably bring about the risk of a nuclear war, which nobody could win.”
US political scientist Jeffrey Sachs: “may go into times of financial crash”
Another important analyst that corroborated von der Schulenburg observation is Prof. Jeffrey Sachs who had a discussion with Alexander Mercouris from the “Duran” podcast (September 2nd). Speaking about the “immense crisis of US foreign policy” and the “grave crisis in Europe”, Prof. Sachs stated: “The US was a dominant country for decades; it no longer dominates the world. It’s deeply programmed to act in order to protect a hegemony that no longer exists,” Sachs stated. He spoke about Europe having the “same imperialist mindset” like the US. “What we see is the end of the Western World and the end of the US World while the multipolar order is rising.”
Sachs identified the phenomenon which we observe among the political class in US and Europe as “Angst”: “You can never show weakness. We have won! You can’t have any reality of multipolarity. The result is narratives; there is not any more fruitful debates. Everybody lives in a bubble- a geopolitical bubble as well as a “financial bubble”. “You see the open hand of US Treasury Secretary Bessent, a low- level hedge funding guy”, according to Sachs, “who two weeks ago declared a D-Day of the US against Iran, involving major sanctions against Iran.” The same Bessent, according to Sachs “has been and is the one who has manipulated the bond markets as well as the stock markets. The D- Day strategy has backfired and given the 40 trillion US dollar debt mountain the US government sits on, we may go into times where a financial crash of the markets may occur. So, we may see a gigantic financial crash as well as an implosion of the different bubbles.”
The future of a Multipolar World Order
The reality which however emerges and which nobody in the USA and Europe wants to see, according to Sachs, is what happened in Bishkek (Kyrgystan 31 of August) where according to Sachs 10 countries gathered for the SCO meeting, including XI Jinping from China, Putin from Russia, Modi from India, Prabowo from Indonesia and presidents from Central Asian, an event that will be followed by a BRICS event in India. As Sachs illustrated “42 % of the world population and 34 % of the World output is represented by the SCO and BRICS countries. The West in turn has 9% of the world population, 28% of world output. These above-mentioned countries are in “an overwhelming majority they want peace that enjoys rapid growth in China and in Russia, the core of Eurasia with technological and scientific skills”, Sachs emphasized.
US weaponizing the Dollar System
Describing the “arrogance” of the Western, specifically US elite (which Sachs mentioned in an interview with Pascal Lottacz 30th August 2026) he referred to an expression that was used by George Kennan in a Memo (Febr 24 1948) written then for the US State Department Policy Planning Staff. According to Prof. Sachs Kennan said then that the “US has the predominant wealth of the world! It will lead to envy. We have to be hard- headed to protect ourselves.”According to Sachs this underlines clearly that since the 1940ies the US has followed the line “We must dominate, so that we can stay rich!” Sachs concluded that the world is essentially in a “financial crisis” because the US used “economic statecraft.” That means, since the 2000’s it pushed an “economic warfare” by using the “dollar payment system” as an enforcer for its trade and sanction policies, along the line of thinking: “We can enforce economic punishment through the banking system.”(!) Since then the US has “weaponized the dollar (confiscating 300 bn Russian assets, or impose extraterritorial sanctions, by threatening banks abroad. Like if you go with Iran, we will cut your business, that’s the basis for US sanctions and D -day.” Prof. Sachs stated. “Yet you don’t need the US for settling transactions. It’s not hard n o t to use US dollars. China has figured out, that there are other ways to settle trade outside of the dollars. So, the alternative ought to be clear and there will be a day of reckoning where the entire ‘structure of lies and hoax’ will tumble down being followed by a major contraction.”
