Wednesday, 21 October 2026
Professor John Mearsheimer’s positions on the Russia–Ukraine war raise academic and methodological questions that go beyond disagreements over the West’s responsibility for NATO enlargement. These questions concern the consistency of his interpretations with the fundamental principles of his own theory of offensive realism, and whether he applies the same analytical standards to Russia, Ukraine, and the United States.
Mearsheimer has emphasized the West’s responsibility for creating the conditions that led Russia to war, arguing that NATO’s eastward expansion and the prospect of Ukrainian membership represented fundamental threats to Russian national security. Although this factor is important, his interpretation raises questions about the insufficient attention given to Moscow’s responsibility for its military conduct, the motivations of Russia’s neighbors for seeking Western protection, and the potentially selective interpretation of decisions made by different actors.
My purpose in raising these criticisms is not to deny Russia’s security concerns or overlook mistakes in Western policies. Rather, it is to examine the analytical consistency of Mearsheimer’s interpretations and distinguish between explaining and justifying the use of force, as well as between states’ legitimate interests and their actual ability to impose them.
First: Russia Drives States Away from Its Alliances Rather Than Merely Being a Victim of NATO Enlargement
I have previously challenged Mearsheimer’s emphasis on Russian concerns about NATO enlargement without giving sufficient consideration to the reasons that led neighboring states to distance themselves from Moscow and seek Western protection.
I argued that Russia has adopted an aggressive and offensive approach, resorting to the occupation of neighboring states’ territories by force and imposing faits accomplis. Meanwhile, numerous neighboring countries voluntarily joined Western alliances, rather than being occupied by Western powers or militarily compelled to join them.
Had Russia not been a power that alienated potential allies, and had it possessed an attractive political, security, and economic model, it might have persuaded Ukraine, Georgia, Moldova, and Eastern European countries to remain within the political and security frameworks that had previously linked them to Moscow, whether the Soviet Union in the case of former Soviet republics or the Warsaw Pact in the case of Eastern European states.
At the very least, following the dissolution of those structures, Moscow might have persuaded these countries not to join NATO or the European Union, or even to withdraw from them and join Russian-led alliances.
However, Moscow failed to establish an alliance system capable of maintaining its attractiveness and stability. Even the Collective Security Treaty Organization has experienced the withdrawal or non-renewal of membership by some former members, as well as Armenia’s suspension of its participation. These developments reflect Russia’s limited ability to preserve the cohesion of its regional alliances.
This raises a fundamental question: Did NATO enlargement cause Russia’s hostility, or was Russia’s aggressive behavior itself one of the principal reasons neighboring states sought NATO membership?
In reality, the two factors may be interconnected. However, Mearsheimer’s interpretation assigns considerably greater weight to the former than to the latter, thereby diminishing the significance of the independent political and strategic choices made by Eastern European states.
Second: Russian Security Concerns Versus Ukrainian Security Concerns
Offensive realism assumes that states seek to protect their security and maximize their power within an international system lacking a supreme authority capable of guaranteeing everyone’s security.
Yet Mearsheimer places Russian concerns about NATO enlargement at the center of his analysis without assigning comparable importance to Ukraine’s security concerns regarding Russia, despite Ukraine having experienced the annexation of Crimea in 2014 and the full-scale Russian invasion in 2022.
If security concerns explain Russia’s behavior, the same logic should also explain Ukraine’s efforts to join alliances capable of providing protection.
Admittedly, differences in the balance of power constrain the freedom of action available to smaller states. However, acknowledging these constraints does not mean disregarding their security interests or reducing their decisions to expressions of great-power preferences.
The problem arises when Russian security concerns become the principal explanation for the use of force, while Ukrainian security concerns are treated primarily as a consequence of Western influence rather than as a response to Russian threats.
Third: Denying Russian Expansionist Ambitions Despite the Annexation of Ukrainian Territory
Mearsheimer has rejected interpretations of the crisis that portray it as the consequence of a Russian expansionist project aimed at rebuilding an empire. He has continued to question whether sufficient evidence exists to establish that Putin intended to occupy Ukraine in its entirety.
However, Russia annexed Crimea in 2014 and subsequently declared the annexation of four additional Ukrainian regions in 2022, despite not exercising complete control over them.
Establishing expansionist behavior does not require proving that a state intended to occupy an entire neighboring country. Seizing and annexing parts of another state’s territory by force constitutes territorial expansion, regardless of the geographical extent involved.
Therefore, denying the existence of a Russian plan to occupy all of Ukraine does not, in itself, disprove the existence of Russian expansionist objectives.
Fourth: Preventing NATO Enlargement and the War’s Counterproductive Strategic Consequences
Mearsheimer argues that one of Russia’s principal motivations for the war was to prevent NATO from moving closer to Russian borders.
Yet the war itself resulted in Finland and Sweden joining NATO, an expanded Western military presence in Eastern Europe, and deeper military cooperation between Ukraine and Western countries.
It is essential here to distinguish between the motivations behind a decision and its consequences.
Moscow may indeed have intended to prevent NATO enlargement. Nevertheless, the outcomes reveal a Russian strategic miscalculation that contributed to producing precisely the opposite result.
If Mearsheimer criticizes Western governments for disregarding the foreseeable consequences of their policies, the same analytical standard should logically be applied to the Russian leadership, including holding it accountable for the consequences of its decisions.
Fifth: Great-Power Rationality and Russian Strategic Miscalculations
Offensive realism explains great-power behavior through calculations of power, security, and national interest. However, it does not assume that great powers are immune to mistakes.
Nevertheless, Mearsheimer places considerable emphasis on Western strategic miscalculations while assigning less weight to the possibility that Russia itself miscalculated when deciding to invade Ukraine.
Russia launched its military operations in 2022 with forces that failed to achieve their initial political and military objectives. It encountered substantial Ukrainian resistance and extensive Western support, forcing Moscow to adjust its operations and objectives on the battlefield.
If the Russian leadership underestimated Ukraine’s capacity to resist or the scale of the Western response, these miscalculations constitute fundamental explanatory factors rather than minor operational details.
The question, therefore, is why Western decisions are interpreted as strategic mistakes while Russian decisions are explained primarily as rational responses to perceived threats.
Sixth: Mearsheimer in 1993 Versus Mearsheimer After 2014
In his 1993 study, “The Case for a Ukrainian Nuclear Deterrent,” Mearsheimer argued that Ukraine should retain a nuclear deterrent because of the possibility of Russian aggression threatening its independence.
His reasoning at the time was that Russia represented a potential security threat and that Ukraine required an independent capability to deter it.
However, since the 2014 crisis, his emphasis has shifted toward the necessity of Ukrainian neutrality, opposition to NATO membership, and assigning primary responsibility for the crisis to the West.
These two positions are not necessarily contradictory, since neutrality and deterrence can theoretically coexist.
Nevertheless, the comparison reveals a shift in analytical priorities.
In 1993, the Russian threat to Ukraine was central to his argument. In his subsequent interpretations, the Western threat to Russia became the dominant explanatory factor.
This shift warrants a clear academic explanation, particularly because the Ukrainian security concerns Mearsheimer identified in 1993 did not diminish. On the contrary, they intensified following Russia’s subsequent military interventions.
Seventh: Selective Use of Evidence Regarding Putin’s Intentions
Another methodological problem emerges when Mearsheimer questions whether Putin’s statements concerning Russian-Ukrainian history and identity constitute evidence of expansionist objectives, while assigning substantial weight to Putin’s statements about NATO-related security concerns when identifying the motivations behind the war.
Political leaders’ statements should neither be accepted nor dismissed selectively. Instead, they should be assessed against actual behavior, political decisions, military capabilities, and battlefield outcomes.
This does not mean that all Putin’s statements are contradictory or that his objectives have remained unchanged over time.
Rather, identifying the motivations behind the war requires examining Russian security considerations alongside the leadership’s historical and political perceptions of Ukraine and the territorial objectives revealed by military operations.
Consequently, relying exclusively on Russian security concerns does not provide a sufficient explanation for the full range of Russian decisions.
Eighth: The China–Taiwan Test and the Consistency of the Theory
The consistency of Mearsheimer’s interpretation can also be examined by applying the same reasoning to China and Taiwan.
If the expansion of a Western military alliance toward Russia explains Moscow’s use of force against Ukraine, would increased American military involvement around Taiwan similarly explain a Chinese decision to use force against the island?
From the perspective of offensive realism, Chinese and Russian security concerns can indeed be interpreted within the same theoretical framework.
However, the real test extends beyond explaining the motivations of great powers. It concerns whether the security concerns of weaker actors are also acknowledged and whether a clear distinction is maintained between explaining and justifying the use of force.
Recognizing the differences between Taiwan’s and Ukraine’s legal and political status, the comparison raises a broader question about the limits of great powers’ claimed right to impose regional security arrangements through military force.
Ninth: Trump’s Pressure on Ukraine and Inconsistent Standards in Interpreting National Interests
The potentially selective nature of Mearsheimer’s interpretations becomes particularly significant when examining his recent statements regarding American pressure on Ukraine over its strikes against Russian energy infrastructure.
In his discussion with Tom Switzer on 18 October 2026, Mearsheimer stated:
“Trump is trying to put enormous pressure on the Ukrainians to get them to stop attacking the energy infrastructure inside Russia.”
He explained that Trump’s motivations were connected to economic considerations, particularly diesel supplies, prices, and their effects on the global economy.
He further argued that Europeans, Ukrainians, and substantial elements of the American national security establishment were aligned against Trump.
In his discussion with Andrew Napolitano on 13 October 2026, Mearsheimer also argued that the “deep state” remained committed to inflicting as much damage as possible on Russia, despite Trump pursuing a different course.
These statements raise four observations.
First: Mearsheimer interprets Trump’s pressure primarily through American economic interests, an explanation that can be understood in light of the global economic implications of energy prices.
However, he does not assign comparable weight to Ukraine’s military considerations in targeting infrastructure supporting Russia’s war effort. Among their objectives, Ukrainian strikes seek to weaken Russia’s economic and logistical capacity to sustain the war.
Second: If American economic interests help explain pressure on Ukraine, Russian decisions should logically be subjected to an equally multidimensional analysis incorporating economic, political, and expansionist interests, rather than focusing almost exclusively on security concerns related to NATO.
Third: Mearsheimer uses the expression “deep state” to describe elements within the American system that oppose Trump’s policies.
However, the term itself does not establish the existence of a unified decision-making center capable of imposing a particular policy.
There is a fundamental difference between national security institutions possessing divergent interests and assessments and assuming that those institutions operate with a unified political will and independent authority capable of obstructing presidential decisions.
Fourth: If Mearsheimer acknowledges the influence of institutions and domestic economic and political interests on Trump’s decisions, the same analytical approach should logically be applied to Putin.
This would require examining the influence of Russian institutions, military and economic elites, and domestic political calculations on his decisions, rather than explaining them primarily as rational responses to external threats.
In my assessment, the problem is not Mearsheimer’s recognition of the influence of energy prices or American national security institutions on US policy toward Ukraine.
Rather, it lies in the imbalance between the factors he emphasizes when explaining American behavior and those he considers when interpreting Russian and Ukrainian behavior.
Furthermore, explaining Trump’s pressure through economic considerations does not necessarily mean that such pressure does not constrain Ukraine’s military capabilities or simultaneously serve Russian interests.
American economic motivations and military consequences favorable to Russia can coexist.
Tenth: Why Does Mearsheimer Adopt These Interpretations?
I consider the most likely explanation to be Mearsheimer’s strong commitment to his theoretical framework and his conviction that NATO enlargement was the decisive cause of the war. This may lead him to assign greater weight to evidence supporting his central argument than to evidence challenging it.
This tendency is reinforced by offensive realism’s emphasis on great-power calculations and his inclination to criticize American foreign policy as a major source of disruption to the international balance of power.
In my assessment, his approach is more plausibly explained by theoretical and methodological bias, possibly reinforced by confirmation bias, than by deliberate partisan bias or personal support for Russia.
There is insufficient evidence to establish that other political motivations underlie his positions.
Sayed Ghoneim, PhD
Major General (retired) of the Egyptian Armed Forces
Chairman, Institute for Global Security & Defence Affairs (IGSDA), UAE
www.igsda.org
Cover image: John Mearsheimer at Chatham House. Photo: Chatham House (CC BY 2.0).
