Western countries should treat Ukraine's defense industry as an extension of their own, jointly producing weapons, resolving supply chain bottlenecks, and guaranteeing Ukrainian troops the quantities of strike capability they need, former Google CEO and chairman Eric Schmidt argues.
According to a column by Schmidt published in the Washington Post, the U.S. needs to recognize that Russia is pursuing a total-war strategy, mobilizing its factories and manpower.
He said that for most of the full-scale invasion, Ukraine's great advantage was its ability to adapt and innovate, while the enemy had greater numbers of troops, funding and industrial capacity.
"That advantage is rapidly shrinking. When Ukraine developed interceptors capable of destroying Russian Shahed drone swarms, Russia adapted by fielding faster, jet-powered Shaheds that are much harder to intercept," the former Google CEO said.
He said Russia is now deploying a satellite constellation that could rival Starlink, which Ukrainian drone units use to strike Russian forces in occupied Ukrainian territory.
He said that for years the enemy's strategy was to counter Ukrainian innovation with its own industrial scale, but Russia is now combining scale of production with its own innovation as well.
Schmidt also pointed to the rapid pace of technological competition in the war, in which a drone can be effective the moment it appears but lose its edge within a few months as the adversary adapts.
He said Ukraine is successfully adapting to such changes, but that innovation alone is not enough to scale production and meet the demands of a full-scale, high-intensity war.
"A brilliant drone built in the hundreds is interesting, but a good drone built in the hundreds of thousands can change the course of a war," Schmidt said.
He stressed that Russia is preparing for total war, considering a large-scale mobilization and building up industrial capacity for weapons production.
According to Schmidt, Ukraine cannot withstand these Russian capabilities on its own.
"The coming winter will be decisive. Russia is already exploiting Ukraine's lack of defenses against ballistic missiles to strike power plants and substations, aiming to soon plunge Ukrainians into darkness, cold and suffering," the former Google CEO said.
He said Ukraine now needs more interceptors, ammunition and long-range strike capability, as well as investment to expand its own production capacity.
"Closer engagement with them (Ukraine's military — Interfax-Ukraine) would let Western militaries help secure Ukraine's victory, absorb hard-won lessons about modern warfare, and strengthen the international order against the threats that will shape events in the decades ahead," he wrote in the column.
At the same time, he said that praising Ukrainian resilience cannot be a strategy, since courage alone cannot defend cities or win a war.
"We cannot allow it to face another winter alone under Russian bombs," Schmidt added.
