Why America Should Send Military Advisers to Ukraine

As Ukraine’s counteroffensive enters its fourth month, its armed forces have shown tenacity and adaptability. Kyiv is applying pressure across multiple fronts in southern and eastern Ukraine, and it has made notable progress. In August, Ukraine liberated the village of Robotyne, penetrating the first line of minefields, tank traps, and trenches in the south. Early in September, Ukrainian troops began attacking the second line, an important step toward severing the land bridge connecting Russia with its troops in Crimea and Kherson.

Still, Russia has recently managed to keep its territorial losses to a minimum, and analysts are naturally asking what Ukraine’s Western allies can do next to help Kyiv. It is not a simple question. The United States has provided more than $43 billion in military aid to Ukraine since Russia invaded in February 2022, including the latest artillery, air defenses, and armored vehicles. U.S. allies are planning to send F-16 fighter jets, too, which will arrive later this year. And since December 2022, Western advisers have trained more than 63,000 Ukrainian soldiers in 17 new combat brigades. Instructors have taught individual tactics, small unit drills, collective techniques, and specialized equipment and leadership skills. To some policymakers, it is hard to imagine what else the West could offer.

But there is still an important step the United States, in particular, can take to help Ukraine. Although Western instruction has reached many Ukrainian soldiers, it has missed the overwhelming majority. That is because Western training has been administered outside Ukraine, from locations across Europe. This distance has limited how many Ukrainians can access instruction and how customized the training can be to the terrain of Ukraine and the specialized tactics needed there. It also limits the extent to which the United States can catalyze enduring transformations in Ukraine’s defense establishment.  

Washington should therefore lift the strict restrictions on the number of U.S. government personnel allowed in Ukraine and begin stationing military advisers within the country and across its defense apparatus. Sending advisers would increase the number of Ukrainian soldiers who receive top-of-the-line training. It would enhance Washington’s understanding of Kyiv’s material needs, allowing U.S. policymakers to fine-tune the aid they already provide and offer psychological assurance to Ukraine. Positioning U.S. advisers inside Ukraine would let Washington better champion crucial defense reforms that could pave Ukraine’s path toward NATO and EU membership. Advisers would give the United States an added layer of oversight, as well, ensuring that aid is both optimized and employed responsibly. And, critically, deploying advisers would deliver these results at a reasonable cost.

Some officials might fear that by sending advisers to Ukraine, the United States will prompt Russian President Vladimir Putin to escalate the conflict. If Washington put U.S. troops on Ukraine’s frontlines, it might. But it is possible to send noncombat advisers in a way that would keep U.S. combat troops out of the war. Past Western assistance has not changed Moscow’s behavior. So long as the United States places its advisers inside Ukraine but outside the battlefield, this decision won’t either.

U.S. advisers could, of course, still come under attack: no one in Ukraine is truly safe from Russia. Experts might also fear that—should Washington put boots on the ground—it will invariably lead to an endless American military commitment. But Kyiv does not want Washington to defeat Russia on its behalf; it is not South Vietnam. What Ukraine wants is more U.S. assistance, which it deserves to receive.

STEP INSIDE

The United States is accustomed to providing on-the-ground military advice. It has entire organizations—the Army Security Force Assistance Brigades, Special Forces, and the Ministry of Defense Advisors Program—dedicated to providing guidance to other countries, and it should send these soldiers to Ukraine. There, U.S. forces can serve in three distinct capacities. One type of adviser—tactical-level trainers—could instruct the Ukrainian National Guard and armed forces on basic soldier skills, collective training, and junior leadership from well behind the frontlines. The second type, operational-level advisers, could embed with the Ukrainian general staff and service staffs responsible for the war’s strategy and its execution, where they would focus on improving logistics and gaining insights from the ongoing conflict. The final type, strategic-level advisers, could work directly with Ukraine’s government to lay the groundwork for EU and NATO membership. (Although there are some strategic-level advisers already in Ukraine, the country clearly needs more.) Critically, none of these advisers would accompany Ukrainian troops into active combat zones or help call in airstrikes.

Deploying these advisers would help Kyiv in multiple ways. At the most basic level, the advisers would give Washington a nuanced understanding of the conflict, allowing it to select and provide the most effective weapons, equipment, and training in a precise and timely fashion. These insights would also be valuable for the U.S. armed forces. Ukraine is, at this point, the world’s most experienced military power when it comes to confronting a near-peer adversary on the battlefield. Acquiring firsthand experience and insights from the Ukrainian battlefields could prove indispensable to Washington, especially if it has to fight against China or Russia in the future.  

Training inside Ukraine would also yield immediate battlefield benefits. Kyiv, pressed for time and needing its soldiers on the frontlines, struggles to dispatch the majority of its soldiers abroad for training. This constraint denies its forces the opportunity for high-quality instruction. As a result, many soldiers die for completely preventable reasons, including simple blood loss that most Western troops can treat through tactical combat casualty care training. Bringing U.S. trainers into Ukraine would rectify this unfortunate situation, and it would help well-trained soldiers reach the frontlines much faster than they do today.

The United States has entire organizations dedicated to providing military guidance.

As these trainers help Ukraine win on the battlefield now, strategic-level advisers would help the country get ready for the months and years ahead. Strategic-level advisers, in particular, could guide Ukraine through the process of executing defense reforms, such as establishing a transparent and accountable procurement system for defense equipment. These reforms are necessary for Ukraine’s aspirations to join and integrate into NATO in the future. A 2020 study conducted by one of us (Chinchilla) and the political scientist Paul Poast looked at NATO enlargement in 2004, when the organization added Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, and the Baltic states. The study found that the time leading up to NATO and European Union membership offers a unique window of opportunity for prospective members to establish robust democratic institutions. But to take advantage of this moment, Ukraine needs U.S. advisers who can offer an external push for reform. 

The long-term benefits of on-the-ground training and advising go beyond reforms. If this support is accompanied by high-level visits from U.S. policymakers and military leaders, it will send a powerful message of reassurance to Kyiv. The United States would have “skin in the game” by sending its own service members, signaling to the Ukrainians that Washington is truly dedicated to helping them win. In a long-term war of attrition, such psychological support may prove decisive in helping Kyiv outlast Putin.

The United States would need to limit the size of its advising presence in order to manage the risk of being targeted by Russia. But this limit would be an advantage. According to a new study by the political scientists Liam Collins and Alex Deep, the United States is most successful at bolstering allied militaries when its advisory footprint is restricted. The reason is simple: larger deployments inadvertently undermine the perceived legitimacy of the partner country’s military—or can even build dependence. Washington will want to make sure that Kyiv continues to lead.

LOW RISK, HIGH REWARD

If the United States opts to send military advisers to Ukraine, there will invariably be backlash from analysts worried about escalation. These analysts will argue that Russia—in response to the presence of U.S. advisers—could take extreme measures including attacking another state, such as Moldova. But these fears would be overblown. Russia is in no position to escalate the conflict with conventional weapons given that it has its hands more than full fighting against Ukrainian forces. And Moscow has little to gain by attacking a NATO member, which would draw the United States deeper into the war and put Russia in an even weaker position.

Russia could also escalate by using its nuclear weapons—a prospect that everyone should take seriously. But all available evidence suggests that Moscow will not resort to its nuclear arsenal. A decision by Washington to send noncombat advisers 19 months into the war is consistent with the U.S. policy of gradually increasing aid, which some argue has effectively managed escalation thus far. (Sending combat troops would be a sharp escalation that breaks with this pattern.) Despite the saber rattling that followed Western shipments of lethal aid, Russia has done almost nothing in response.

In fact, the Kremlin has long tolerated U.S. military operations near its forces. During the early days of the Cold War, an estimated 6,000 Soviet military advisers were stationed right across from U.S. troops in South Korea, and these Soviet forces participated in dogfights against U.S. pilots. But the conflict never went nuclear. In 2018, according to The New York Times, U.S. soldiers killed hundreds of Russian and Syrian forces in a single engagement in Syria without provoking any tangible response. And from 2015 to 2022, Washington had military advisers in Ukraine, even as the country fought with Russia in its easternmost provinces. During this period, U.S. advisers helped build a training center at Yavoriv, created Ukraine’s special forces units, and offered guidance to the Ministry of Defense. Only in February 2022 were they pulled out.

All available evidence suggests that Moscow will not resort to its nuclear arsenal.

Some analysts may have a very different escalatory concern: that U.S. advisers could die, igniting a public outcry in the United States and thereby pressuring U.S. policymakers to intensify the conflict. But this fear, too, does not hold up to scrutiny. A 2023 article by the political scientists Paul Musgrave and Steven Ward threw cold water on the power of the so-called tripwire effect: the notion that initial casualties inevitably lead to broader military engagement. History, it turns out, is full of episodes in which Western forces died in a war without causing the conflict to intensify. British forces experienced significant losses in the 1982 Falklands War, for example, but the United Kingdom did not expand its objectives beyond holding onto the islands, keeping the war localized and contained. Similarly, when Americans were killed subduing Islamic State (or ISIS) fighters in Niger in 2017, the United States did not ramp up its operations in West Africa.

Washington can also take steps to reduce the risks of casualties. The United States could concentrate its military advisers at the U.S. embassy in Kyiv, which is protected by Patriot missiles. It could station the rest of them at a safe distance from the frontlines, although still close enough to have a meaningful effect. A recent report from ABC News and verified by a U.S. official indicates that the United States has dispatched a contingent of special operations advisers to the embassy aimed at bolstering intelligence support for Ukraine’s special forces. If this report is accurate, Washington has already decided to provide this kind of support. But its decision still leaves Ukraine’s conventional land forces—which do most of the fighting—without dedicated support or training inside the country.

A final slate of critics will not be worried about immediate escalation. Instead, they will argue that sending advisers to Ukraine will limit Washington’s capacity to exit the conflict, as the United States discovered in Vietnam and then in Afghanistan. The Vietnam scenario would be particularly concerning, given that the insurgency in South Vietnam grew stronger while U.S. advisers were in the country, ultimately pushing Washington to directly intervene in the war.

Ukraine is much more capable than Afghanistan or South Vietnam ever was.

But plenty of advisory missions never lead to broader military involvement. According to ongoing research by one of us (Chinchilla), out of 82 cases of advisory missions by China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States to countries experiencing civil war between 1946 and 2019, 28 ended without accompanying special operations forces or combat troops. An advisory mission to Ukraine would likely be another such example.

Ukraine is not, after all, fighting a civil war, and the United States tends to be even more cautious when dealing with interstate conflicts. Ukraine is also much more capable than Afghanistan or South Vietnam ever was, and Kyiv is not trying to pull the United States directly into the conflict. And unlike U.S. President Lyndon Johnson, who escalated the war in Vietnam to protect his own credibility, U.S. President Joe Biden’s reputation is not firmly tangled up in foreign adventures

There are plenty of historical templates that Washington can follow for how to deploy advisers and avoid escalation risks. The United States, for example, successfully helped the Philippine military put down the Hukbalahap Rebellion, and it helped Greece’s Hellenic Army win the country’s civil war. In both cases, the United States provided crucial assistance without becoming a combatant. But perhaps the best such case comes from El Salvador. During that country’s civil war, Washington helped the El Salvadorian government stand its ground against leftist militias by sending military advisers during the Carter and Reagan administrations. But the United States, wary of escalation, deployed these advisers in small numbers and positioned them away from the frontlines, underscoring their noncombat role. This measured approach kept Washington out of the war while still helping the government survive.

And compared with other governments Washington has assisted, Ukraine would be an exceptional partner. It is led by a government that enjoys substantial popular support and legitimacy. Its formidable military is buoyed by a populace dedicated to Ukraine’s defense. The United States has done much to help this populace by providing weapons and ammunition. But Washington’s experiences in El Salvador, Greece, and many other countries show that military advisers are the best way to bolster battlefield effectiveness and foster a stronger partnership between the United States and the local forces.

BE BOLD

Sending advisers to Ukraine will, of course, require substantial political will on the part of the Biden administration. Biden may struggle to muster such will, especially as he prepares for the 2024 election and faces political opponents much more hesitant to aid Kyiv.  

But Biden should not underestimate the ability of Americans to grasp why it is important to support Ukraine. It is true that recent polls show that U.S. support for Ukraine has fallen, but the dip is slight and to be expected over any long intervention. On the whole, support for helping Kyiv remains remarkably strong. A September CBS News poll, for example, found that 67 percent of Americans want the United States to give aid to Ukraine.

Biden should seize on this support, and he should use his messaging power to keep it high. Effective communication can go a long way toward shaping public opinion, and Biden should explain to Americans why they ought to keep backing Kyiv. The answer, after all, is straightforward and compelling: Ukraine is a bulwark against Russian expansionism in Europe. Were Kyiv to lose, it would jeopardize Europe’s stability, which Washington has worked hard to maintain since the end of World War II. Russia’s defeat in Ukraine is also necessary for the United States’ pivot toward Asia. If Moscow triumphs, the United States risks being dragged back into Europe when it would rather focus its attention elsewhere.

And deploying military advisers is, ultimately, one of the best ways Washington can help Kyiv win—especially given the cost. The routine deployment of a single battalion task force from a U.S. security force assistance brigade costs about $12 million, according to a recent study published by the Association of the United States Army. By contrast, the combined cost of just one Abrams tank and one Bradley Fighting Vehicle is almost $15 million. The training and advising that NATO troops are doing in Germany, Poland, and the United Kingdom shows that such trainers can significantly bolster the Ukrainian armed forces. Western training, for example, taught Ukrainian soldiers how to skillfully use the long-range rockets that help neutralize Russian command posts and logistics hubs. If advisers begin working from inside Ukraine and at multiple levels of the country’s defense apparatus, they will strengthen the country’s democracy and fully prepare it for NATO membership. Advisers will, in other words, help bring about the war’s endgame: a free Ukraine integrated into the institutions at the foundation of Europe.