One can always count on the French for the best croissants and contrarian points of view, and it sometimes seems like they invented both. A new assessment by a former French general about the limits of what the delivery of tanks to Ukraine can accomplish is more sobering than savory, though, particularly for those who believe that ramping up the supply of modern battle tanks will be enough to turn the tide against Russia in embattled eastern Ukraine. 

Writing in the French newspaper Le Figaro, a retired French general and former commander of the Foreign Legion, Bruno Dary, throws cold water on the notion that the delivery of Western tanks to Ukraine will truly flip force balance along the frontlines and alone allow the country to recapture lost territory. 

That assessment comes as the British ministry of defense says that Ukrainian recruits are already training on Challenger 2 tanks in the United Kingdom, and as a limited number American Abrams and German Leopard 2 combat tanks are slated for delivery to Ukraine. 

The problem as Mr. Dary sees it is less with the high-tech equipment itself than the amount to be supplied. Military history shows, in his view, that tanks only provide a serious strategic advantage when they are introduced to a battleground “quickly, suddenly, and in large numbers.” 

He cited the German tanks that notoriously bypassed France’s Maginot Line through Belgian territory in 1940 and Israel’s successful use of tanks in the Six-Day War to support that contention. 

In another example drawn from World War II, the 1943 Battle of Kursk that ended in a Soviet victory over the Nazis, he wrote that “when the enemy was ‘expecting’ the passage of foreign tanks, as happened with German tanks near Kursk, the matter ended in the death of thousands of tank crews.”

In the general’s view, 200 or even 300 tanks delivered to Ukraine are not likely to significantly alter the current power equation. As if that were not dispiriting enough, he said what everybody already knows: that battlefields today are “transparent” in a way they never were in the past, and that with the use of drones and satellite systems the enemy can be almost instantly aware of the adversary’s preparations for a tank attack. 

Mr. Dary stated that the Russians have already strengthened anti-tank defenses along lines of contact in active combat zones and they “are certainly ready to repel any counterattack once they have conquered the entire Luhansk and almost the entire Donetsk.”

Of course, whether Russia will be able to achieve those goals in the Donbas is not at all a foregone conclusion. On the other hand, President Zelensky has admitted that the situation in the city of Bakhmut is getting “more and more difficult.” 

Situated on the eastern frontline in the separatist Donetsk region, the battered industrial city has been the scene of intense fighting over the past several months as the Russians keep up a relentless wave of attacks amid fierce Ukrainian resistance.

The French general made it clear that he does not fault Mr. Zelensky’s requests for longer-range warplanes and missiles to back up the tanks, but he says neither will affect a real balance of power. 

His views also dovetail with some Republican lawmakers’ criticisms that despite the billions of dollars already spent on aid to Ukraine, President Biden has too often been on the back foot with respect to the pace at which some weapons are actually making their way to the country.

The bigger gamble may be whether more Ukrainian counterstrikes, whatever form they take, will bring President Putin closer to the negotiating table or push him farther away. Right now, despite signs of growing pressure for a diplomatic solution to the year-old war, all bets on that prospect are off.