But Ukraine did not, as I had feared, turn out to be the France of 1940. It was more like Britain, prepared to fight, as Churchill put it that May, “however long and hard the road may be.” The Biden administration, for all its fatal hesitation about letting Kyiv take the war to Russia, at least helped ensure that Ukraine didn’t lose. Ukraine has also held the technological edge, pioneering equipment and tactics that are finally stimulating a long-overdue rethink about how wars of the future will be fought.

That’s the good news. There’s far more by way of bad news.

First, as in the 1930s and ’40s, the spheres of conflict have multiplied and are merging.

Russia’s battlefield reversals seem to have done nothing to diminish Putin’s appetite for risk as he expands his campaign, in barely concealed attacks and threats, against Moldova, Poland and Germany, among other states, while his political allies repeatedly call for direct strikes on Europe and the use of nuclear weapons against Ukraine. Hamas’s assault on Israel in 2023 became, in stages, a war between Israel and Hezbollah, the Houthis and Iran; then a war between Iran, the United States and the Gulf states. More recently, Ukraine has directed long-range strikes in the Caspian Sea to disrupt Iranian military supplies to Russia. And decisions in one theater directly affect outcomes in the other: The expenditure of missile interceptors in the Middle East means that few can now be spared for Ukraine.

Second, the Axis of Authoritarians has become a fully operational military alliance.

Russia is providing North Korea with help to modernize its armed forces, while the North has returned the favor by sending millions of artillery rounds and is now reportedly prepared to send thousands of additional troops to fight for Russia in Ukraine. China supplies Russia with most of the electronic components used in its drones and other military hardware. Russia has given Iran critical targeting intelligence to strike U.S. bases and ships in the Middle East. In the event of a Chinese attack on Taiwan, Beijing could call in its chips with Moscow by engaging the aid of Russia’s powerful Pacific submarine fleet, as detailed in a new paper from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.

Third, the West is a mess.

President Trump complains of our allies’ weakness. The allies complain of Trump’s bullying, capriciousness, callowness, mendacity and incompetence. Both sides are right. The latest U.S. tariff salvo on Canada is a case in point: politically ill advised, economically self-defeating, strategically enervating.