The Ankara Illusion: Europe’s Strategic Defeat in Plain Sight

The NATO summit in Ankara was designed to project unity. Leaders reaffirmed their commitment to Article 5, pledged €70 billion in military aid to Ukraine through 2027, and announced new defence-industrial initiatives.

Yet beneath the surface, Ankara revealed something far less comforting. The summit reinforced the impression that the Alliance increasingly sees the war as something to be sustained rather than politically resolved, while Europe scrambles to rearm. It confirmed that the United States is transforming NATO from a community of shared values into a transactional contract, where loyalty is measured by financial contributions rather than strategic alignment.

For Poland and other frontline states, the summit exposed a growing strategic dilemma rather than a clear victory.

The Ankara Summit revealed three uncomfortable truths that European governments would prefer not to acknowledge.

First, Russia has not been strategically defeated. Whatever long-term costs Moscow continues to bear, Ankara demonstrated that NATO’s assumption of imminent Russian exhaustion has not materialized. The country’s armed forces have gained unique experience in conducting large-scale combat operations, which is now being incorporated into the military training system and military doctrine. The war has shifted from a conflict Russia was supposed to lose quickly into a prolonged contest of attrition.

Second, Europe has not emerged stronger from the war. The continent has spent billions on rearmament, yet its industrial base remains fragmented, its defence production insufficient, and its political cohesion uncertain. The rearmament programmes announced by European governments will take years to implement and, even then, will depend on American technology, American supply chains, and American political will. Europe is not........

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