Massive ESCALATION: Europe Uses Ukraine to Expand War | Prof. Glenn Diesen

## Introduction The exchange examined here lays bare a grim pattern in contemporary great-power politics: gradual escalation by design, normative doublespeak, and a dangerous erosion of traditional restraints that once kept wars from widening. What began as arms shipments and limited support for Ukraine has, in the view advanced repeatedly in the discussion, evolved into a form of collective Western participation that increasingly blurs the line between proxy conflict and direct confrontation with Russia. The conversation does more than catalogue incidents; it traces a logic — incrementalism — that converts cautious steps into strategic momentum, and warns that once deterrence is damaged and narratives are flattened into certainties, the room for de‑escalatory policy narrows dramatically. ## Iran and the logic of deterrence One of the most consequential insights from the conversation is how the Iranian response to strikes reasserted a central truth of international relations: deterrence is regained by credible retaliation. The recent kinetic exchange involving Iran demonstrated that a state willing and able to impose tangible costs on its adversary and their partners can force a strategic recalibration. Where Western powers once relied on the presumption of immunity that came with unipolarity, the Iranian case illustrates that capability, credibility, and a clear linkage between action and consequence restore a threatened power’s standing. This lesson is immediately translatable to the Ukrainian theater. If Russia perceives that its retaliation is constrained by fears of superpower escalation — while adversaries incrementally expand their enabling role — Moscow’s incentives to restore deterrence through asymmetric or direct strikes increase. The conversation highlighted how restraint can look like weakness when observed through the lens of adversaries, and how restraint without credible countervailing mechanisms risks inviting greater coercion. Iran’s strategy — absorb, retaliate against the source and its supporters, and demonstrate that escalation will be met in kind — forced a pause. That pause was not born of moral suasion but of hard calculations about survivability and reciprocal vulnerability. The wider lesson remains: deterrence is not a static virtue; it is an active condition that must be sustained by capability, willingness, and clarity about which actions will trigger which reprisals. ## Sanctions dissent and mass formation A second thread in the discussion deals with the treatment of dissent inside democratic spaces and how uniformity of narrative amplifies international risk. The speakers describe an environment in which criticism of prevailing policies — whether on armaments, sanctions, or casualty counts — is rapidly delegitimized as apologism for the enemy. This social and political mechanism has two effects. Domestically it suppresses debate and concentrates policy choices among a narrow consensus resistant to correction. Internationally, it produces brittle policies that ignore feedback from the ground. Sanctions and political isolation were once tools that attracted normative investment because they purported to be principled instruments. The conversation points out that when sanctions are applied selectively, when human rights rhetoric is marshalled unevenly, and when dissent is stigmatised, the instruments become political clubs rather than mechanisms of principled constraint. This breeds a “mass formation” in which populations and elites move in tandem, leaving little room for nuanced, risk‑mitigating strategies. The result is predictable: states that feel targeted or existentially threatened will search for asymmetric means of reassertion, and external actors will have fewer domestic voices urging prudence. The dynamics of social mobilization and narrative enforcement are not merely cultural phenomena; they have strategic consequences. Overconfident sanction campaigns and blanket moralizing about an adversary’s intent create a rhetorical and moral high ground that policymakers are loath to abandon. That reluctance, in turn, fuels the incrementalism that produces escalation: small, publicly palatable steps that, taken together, transform a distant conflict into a de facto great‑power confrontation. ## Ukraine endgame and security order The conversation presses a stark question: what endgame is being pursued in Ukraine, and what security architecture will replace the one that appears to be unraveling? The interlocutors suggest that the current policy trajectory — arming Ukraine while gradually loosening restrictions on targeting and reach — is not aligned with a sustainable post‑conflict settlement. Rather than strengthening a rules‑based order, the pattern risks institutionalizing a state of perpetual competition and border instability. Two interlinked dangers emerge. First, if Western involvement continues to extend Ukraine’s capacity to strike deep into Russian territory — whether directly or via permissive basing and targeting intelligence — the boundary between supporting a sovereign defense and engaging in offensive operations becomes blurred. That boundary is precisely what traditionally prevented alliance commitments from becoming casus belli. Once it disappears, reciprocal escalation can rapidly follow. Second, the conversation argues that Western rhetorical absolutism — branding all reciprocal Russian measures as unjustified or genocidal while minimizing certain allied provocations — undermines any plausible third‑party mediation. If only one set of actions is ever described as legitimate, negotiation and credible intermediaries become politically costly. What the speakers urge, implicitly, is a reorientation toward stability. That would require rethinking arms deliveries that materially extend the battlefield into an adversary’s strategic depth, restoring meaningful channels for crisis communication, and being candid about the limits of Western capacity and influence. Without such self‑limitation, the Ukraine conflict risks becoming the template for future European confrontations, with the continent losing the ability to define a coherent, post‑war security order. ## Realism neutrality and the road ahead The final segment of the exchange is a call to realism and a renewed appreciation for neutrality as a policy category. The realist argument advanced is blunt: states act to preserve their security, reputations, and interests; when unipolar constraints disappear, actors will expand their power until constrained by others. From this standpoint, the current Western approach — moralizing while expanding military commitments incrementally — is strategically incoherent. It presumes perpetual superiority without accounting for the reputational costs and balancing responses that follow. Neutrality, here, is not a moral abdication but a pragmatic posture that can reduce incentives for escalation. If more European states reclaimed autonomy from alliance dynamics that push them toward progressively entangling commitments, the room for third‑party mediation would grow. The conversation notes historical precedents in which neutral positions allowed states to regulate their relations with both rivals and partners, preserving channels for dialogue and preventing conflicts from metastasizing. Practically, this could mean conditioning further military support on verifiable de‑escalatory steps, amplifying diplomatic tracks, and resisting the siege mentality that shuts down domestic critique. There is also a normative argument: when policymakers wield human‑rights rhetoric selectively, they forfeit the public trust essential for sustaining long conflicts. The speakers warn that when a polity loses its rhetorical coherence, it loses leverage. Credibility depends not only on capability but on consistent standards. If Western actors aspire to shape a new security architecture, they must first rebuild the intellectual and

Massive ESCALATION: Europe Uses Ukraine to Expand War | Prof. Glenn Diesen NATO's proxy war in Ukraine is morphing into a direct EU-Russia war. And the war hawks in Brussels are further escalating by attacking civilians in the Donbas and Russia proper. The doves in the Kremlin, including Vladimir Putin, are running out of options to keep their own hawks under wraps. As things stand now, an all-out EU-Russia war is not only a possible, but by now a likely scenario. But to what end? I'm joined today by my colleague, Professor Glenn Diesen, to discuss what he has learned from his many interviews with top-notch IR scholars in Russia and the West, and where things are headed. Links: Glenn Diesen on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@GDiesen1 Glenn Diesen on Substack: https://glenndiesen.substack.com Neutrality Studies substack: https://pascallottaz.substack.com (Opt in for Academic Section from your profile settings: https://pascallottaz.substack.com/s/academic) Merch: https://neutralitystudies.com/shop Donation: https://neutralitystudies.com/donate Timestamps: 00:00:00 Introduction 00:00:21 NATO escalation and Russian retaliation 00:15:06 Iran and the logic of deterrence 00:20:31 Europe and the self- fulfilling war trap 00:25:28 Sanctions dissent and mass formation 00:31:55 Propaganda censorship and open debate 00:36:52 Ukraine endgame and security order 00:40:40 US decline and proxy war strategy 00:48:44 Realism neutrality and the road ahead #Pascal Welcome back, everybody, to Neutrality Studies, today with the one and only Professor Glenn Diesen. I'm sure I don't need to introduce him to you. He has the most wonderful podcast on YouTube under his name, Glenn Diesen. Glenn, welcome. #Glenn Diesen It's good to see you again, Pascal Lottaz. #Pascal It's great seeing you, too. It's great seeing your channel grow and grow and grow. You are doing stellar work. And actually, that's what I want to talk to you about. You've had a couple of guests on your show who are quite incredible, one of them, of course, being Professor Karaganov from Russia, one of the foreign policy hawks of Russia, but one of the very important ones. You regularly have John Mearsheimer on your podcast and Jeffrey Sachs. And it seems to me as though the alarm bells should be ringing in every single capital in Europe at the moment, but they don't. What are you making out of the very live IR updates that you're getting from everybody? -- 1 of 18 -- #Glenn Diesen Well, my main concern now is that we're a bit like the frog boiling in the water here. Because in NATO, we often pursue this incrementalism. We gradually do things instead of taking these big steps, which creates large... I often use the example of missile defense, because in this one, I remember in the mid-2000s, they were mocking the Russians, going, listen, we're only going to put 10 interceptor missiles in Poland. There's no way this can threaten the Russians. It's ridiculous. But, you know, at the same time, you heard in the think tanks, they were saying, well, we start with 10, put in a system, and then we gradually expand it. And then suddenly those 10 became several hundred, and this is kind of how the incrementalism works. And we did have—well, getting to the point—we do the same in the Ukraine war. We began sending ammunition. I remember the Javelins, which Trump said were sent, also seen as problematic. We had gradually some tanks, artillery systems, HIMARS. I always use the example of Joe Biden making the point that we can't send F-16s; that would mean World War III. If you repeat this today, you would be spreading Russian propaganda. You'd be told that, of course, we're just helping this. You can't possibly escalate by helping, even though most European countries didn't send weapons to countries at war exactly because it would make us participants. This was common sense. This was the consensus. This was logic. These days, you're not even allowed to say it without being smeared. So by doing this incrementalism, small steps at a time, I don't think we realize how far we have gone. Because now, of course, we are deeply involved in attacking Russia. And I made this point last year with these long-range strikes where the weapons are supplied by us. The war planners, they direct the goals. We have our politicians standing there saying, well, our goal should be to do deep strikes in Russia, destroy its energy infrastructure. You have the intelligence being picked by our intelligence services. They're doing the targeting. Our satellites are guiding the missiles. So we are deeply involved in every way. This is no longer even... You mentioned John Mearsheimer. I referred to it as a proxy war, and he said, Glenn, really, we've kind of moved beyond a proxy war. NATO is now attacking Russia directly. And of course, the last step now, which we see, is this new incrementalism, which is the Russians say, oh, well, the drones are now attacking the Baltic region of Russia, the Baltic coast, where a large part of Russian oil is exported. And it goes through the Baltic states, their territory. Given the distance, it's very likely that they're even launched from the Baltic states. And first they denied, no, this isn't happening. And then, of course, they say, oh, yes, it is happening, but we did not permit the Ukrainians to use this territory. And also, it's kind of the Russians' fault, because the drones wouldn't be there if it wasn't for Russia's unprovoked attack. And then now we're moving to seeing the Swedish prime minister saying, listen, if the drones are crashing in NATO countries, we should at least help direct them in the right direction towards Russia. So, you know, it was the same with the long-range strikes. First, we're not going to give long-range weapons. Okay, we are going to give them, but we're going to -- 2 of 18 -- put restrictions on what they're allowed to use them for. Then gradually the restrictions are removed. So we are the boiling frog now, and we have attacked Russia, and the Russians have now reached the conclusion that this can't continue. It's time to strike back and retaliate. #Pascal Yeah. And I mean, the horrible thing is that Mr. Karaganov, I mean, in his interview with you, he said that he used to be the lone voice in the wilderness who said, like, we need to strike Europe. And by now, he seems to have quite a lot of support within the policymaking world of Russia, but also within the general population. And if I listen to what I hear from our colleague Stas Krapivnik, he says the same. Russians are just fed up with being constantly made targets. And then the Europeans are hiding behind, like, we are not part of the war, when they do all of these things and do them out in the open. And over the weekend—we are talking today on Monday, the 25th of May— over the weekend, actually, or on Friday, the Ukrainian side attacked a school, a college dorm in Lugansk, and killed 21 students there. The Ukrainians are saying it was a drone school for drone pilots, which would be like the dumbest place on earth to put a drone pilot school there. Two, Russia is, of course, saying like, no, this was just a teacher, a pedagogical school teaching future teachers that now died. And Europe is actually pretending that this is another one of these things that never happened and that the retaliation that came through Oreshnik strikes and other missile systems was absolutely unprovoked. I mean, Kaja Kallas today published this, another one of her insane tweets. And it's just like the whole logic of it: Russia hit a dead end on the battlefield, so it terrorizes Ukraine with deliberate strikes on city centers. These are abhorrent acts, terror meant to kill as many civilians as possible. Moscow reportedly using or rationing intermediate-range ballistic missile systems designed to carry nuclear warheads is a political scare tactic and reckless nuclear brinkmanship. She says at the same time that these are devastating weapons and that they try to kill as many Ukrainians as possible, yet we know they killed four people in Kiev. It's like, how is it possible that these people put out such tweets and do not understand that what they're doing is just bringing the Russians closer and closer to actually doing something very drastic? Do you think this is on purpose? Are they baiting Russia again to basically enlarge the war the way it was enlarged in 2022? Or is it utter ignorance of, you know, the actual battlefield dynamic at the moment? #Glenn Diesen Well, this is the continuation of the unprovoked narrative where suddenly, oh, how could the Russians possibly do this? It came out of nowhere. And if, you know, like, you would come and introduce some common sense—well, actually, this didn’t come out of nowhere. It was very much provoked. And they always have the same logic: well, that means you’re then legitimizing and -- 3 of 18 -- supporting the Russian strikes. In other words, you are with the Russians, and now any personal attack on you is open. You’re an apologist for Putin, and no one should ever listen to you. So we criminalized all dissent. These leaders can say any nonsense they want, and there will be no dissent at all because their whole argument is everything is unprovoked. If you say it's unprovoked, that means you're backing the enemy, essentially. So this is the narrative we have stuck ourselves in, which is why the water keeps boiling, you know, for our little frog here. But you're right with the condemnation—it doesn't make any sense. I mean, why wouldn't they condemn the killing of all of these students in Lugansk? Why? They struck the school, and then afterwards they condemn the retaliation, you know. When you're only able to condemn one side, what are you doing then? Is this based on principles of human rights, or is this just cheerleading? So whatever the enemy does is evil, and whatever our side does, well, it doesn't matter. Condemnations mean nothing at all when there are no principles. And as I said, they keep referring to the genocide of Ukrainians, efforts to kill as many as possible. How can you strike with 600 missiles and drones and then four people are killed, and the goal was to create as much death as possible? If you strike a massive city like Kiev and the goal is to kill as many as possible, and you have 600 missiles and drones at your disposal, then either the Russians are very ineffective or, as is obvious, this is all nonsense. It's just fueling hatred of the Russians and pushing war. That's all. #Pascal Hey, very brief intermission because I was recently banned from YouTube. And although I'm back, this can happen anytime again. So please consider subscribing not only here, but to my mailing list on Substack. That's pascallottaz.substack.com. The link's going to be in the description below. And now back to the video. The mind-boggling thing is just that this is coming at the same time. I mean, the Europeans are accusing Russia of genocidal intent at the same time as they are the greatest cheerleaders of Israel's genocide in Gaza, right? Where you actually have tens or hundreds of thousands dead in a concentration camp that's being made smaller and smaller by the day. And it comes at the same time when these same European leaders also were, you know, full of praise for the U.S.-Israeli war of aggression against Iran and even backed them. And I think this is where this is coming from — they backed them at the United Nations when it was Iran that was condemned for striking back at the Gulf states. And the European leaders kept saying that Iran is unprovokedly attacking and enlarging the war in its neighborhood. And is it... #Glenn Diesen My theory is that they used to be able to do that. -- 4 of 18 -- #Pascal This is how Europe did its foreign policy, or its jargon and its way of going about business, for the last 500 years. They're just agenda-setting. And that's what's not working anymore. I mean, or then again, I ju