2w ago

Trump’s senseless capitulation to Putin is a betrayal of Ukraine – and terrible dealmaking | Timothy Garton Ash

www.theguardian.com Trump’s senseless capitulation to Putin is a betrayal of Ukraine – and terrible dealmaking | Timothy Garton Ash

As the US and its European allies head to the Munich security conference, Europe must learn from its tragic history and oppose appeasement, writes Guardian columnist Timothy Garton Ash

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I’m starting to think European leaders are relived Trump is putting an end to the war as it hit European economies hard, especially in terms of access to cheap energy. They are happy to let Trump take the blame and maintain a facade of moral superiority.
Or maybe I’m completely wrong and the European leaders really believe Russia is an existential threat to Europe, in which case they will now dramatically ramp up support and actually join Ukraine to fight the war against Russia?
- That would be a correct assumption about 3 months into that invasion.
  All it takes to disprove that idea right now is to listen to what Macron has been saying, and the guy is a Hard-right Neoliberal whose government is supported by the French Front-Nationale (France's main Far Right party).
  By now most of the energetic transition in Europe is either done or the money for it is already invested (with temporary measures in place until the things being built with that money come online), and Europe is already over the peak economic impact point of weaning itself from Russian fossil fuels.
  Further, a lot of the forced transition away from Russian fossil fuels was to energy sources which are cheaper or well on their way to become cheaper than fossil fuels, such as electricity from renewable sources. That transition just hadn't happenned before because it costs a good amount money to merelly do the change and people, companies and governments were content to keep on paying just a bit more for Russian gas than for Renewables to avoid paying a big one off amount to transition, but by now that cost is sunk and large parts the Economy have made changes needed to transition (for example, look at how Germans have been replacing their gas house warming systems with things like heat pumps).
  At this point there is very little to gain in going back to the suckling from Russia's fossil fuel tit (except perhaps for a handful of Chemical Industry Conglomerates in Germany who had massive profits from using that as inputs for many processes) and in a lot of cases it would actually be a net loss in pure Financial terms (so, if not counting the geostrategical and military risks of giving money to Russia) because the energy sources they use post-transition are already cheaper that even Russian gas and getting cheaper by the year.
  Also, lets after 2 years of pretty much all of Eastern Europe as well as the likes of Finland reminding us of what Russia did to them while Russia is trying to do the same to Ukraine, Russian government politicials themselves talking about invading the rest of Europe ("from Vladivostok to Lisbon") and continued coverage of Russian missiles killing civilians in Ukraine who to Europeans "look like us", the idea of Russia as a dangerous out of control beast that Ukraine is holding off from attacking the rest of us is in the minds of the European Public in general, not just politicians, plus like in Canada, European nationalism and anti-Americanism have started ticking up in Europe in response to Trump, so just bending over to Trump and Putin and giving Russia a win in Ukraine wouldn't be a good career move for mainstream European politicians and those who might go for it - Far-Right parties in Europe - mainly get stuck at just over 20%, even in countries like The Netherlands and France where they've been present for decades, so they're not going to be in a position to work in the interests of Russia and Trump's America and if they tried to do it via public pressure, they would open themselves to accusations of being Traitors To The Nation from their very own natural supporters, fragmenting the Far-Right.
  Then there's also all the extra military investment all over Europe that was started with Ukraine as a justification, which makes going back on the justification for all the money already spent and all the pro-military talk a pretty dangerous career move for any politician that did it.
  But yeah, as I said at the start, had this happenned in the very beginning of the war, I agree with you that European politicians would have been relieved and just concede more of Ukrainian Sovereignty to Russia, same as they did back when Russia invaded and took Crimea from Ukraine.
  
  I do not agree with you that European countries have replaced Russian energy with cheap energies. You said some are on their way to become cheaper, which might not be anytime soon.
  Germany is heavily reliant on cheap energy. The country has been in recession since the war started. I would not be surprised if it goes back to cheap Russian gas soon.
  There were peace talks in March April 2022 that were reportedly close to find an agreement to stop the war but Boris Johnson encouraged Zelenskyy to give up the negotiations and fight instead, promising him lots of support.
  Now, let’s say you are right, why aren’t the European countries ramping up support for Ukraine and joining them in the war?
  
  Germany has definitely been spending money in becoming independent from Russia on the energy front, though indeed whether they've right now passed the peak in terms of cost for their Economy and on the other side of that specific hill or not, is something that only Historians will be able to tell in some years' time, and neither you nor I can prove it either way.
  However Germany is not the whole of Europe.
  In fact for all its size as a nation Germany is only about 5% of Europe (8% of the EU) both in number of people and economically. Further, it was one of the most deeply tangled with Russia and is one of the most behind in becoming independent of Russian hydrocarbons (all of which probably explains why Germany was so hesitant to start supporting Ukraine at the beginning of the Invasion and in entering every new stage of military support - like sending tanks and sending fighter jets - since, and why in proportion to their GDP their support to Ukraine is at best mild: the really winners how much of their GDP did they spend in supporting Ukraine are all Eastern European nations).
  You might have had a good point in your original statement if you wrote "German leaders" but you didn't, you wrote "European leaders" and no matter how good the case you make for Germany alone, that's not the same as all of Europe, and Germany being in the worst possible starting position of all of Europe (except perhaps Hungary) when it comes to dependency on Russian fossil fuels means that even if you had actually proven a willingness in the German political class to "just let Russia have it" when it comes to the Russian invasion of Ukraine because of Economic reasons (which you didn't, although you did make a good case for it to be so), that has no relevance for the other 95% of Europe, of which already the leaders of two large countries - France and the UK - who together easily add up up to more than Germany have very loudly voiced their wish of continuing to support Ukraine and started testing the waters with Public Opinion on sending their own troops there, with most of the Eastern European nations and even the Scandinavian nations having also loudly confirmed their continued support.
  Back during the Leave referendum campaign, the Brexiters repeatedly claimed that the UK after leaving was going to still get full access to the single market in almost as good conditions as an EU member, but without obligations such as Free Movement "because German car makers will make the EU do it as the UK is such a large percentage of their Revenue". Ultimately what was proven was that by itself the Economic interest of Germany and its large companies won't move the whole of the EU to do something that's against the interests of most of its nations unless there is a large block of countries predisposed to it, and in this not only is "the threat of Russian Imperialism" an existentialist matter for most of Eastern European nations, but the leaders of most EU nations have come out strongly in favor of continued support of Ukraine, and even the newly elected German Chancellor has made statements to that end (though certainly not as strong as the likes of Macron). Given the proportion of Europe who are EU members, even if all the non-EU European nations sided with Russia (as the likes of Servia have done) it would still be a small fraction of the total and far from enough to justify your broad statement about what "European leader" might be feeling so you would have to show that most of the EU had such a predisposition and as recent History has showing Germany and their interest alone are far from enough for that.
  What has happened in the beginning of the Invasion and in every new step of expanding the types of military support for Ukraine - that Germany kept delaying yet ultimately ended up going along with the rest in supporting Ukraine even if almost kicking and screaming - is likely what will happen now.
  PS: Actually the more I thought about this the more I came to agree that most German politicians would rather just dump the whole affair and have Ukraine accept the loss of territory to Russia. I disagree that it applies to the rest of European politicians, but it does make a lot of sense for that to be the case for German politicians given how many of their top politicians Russia was paying (such as an old Chancellor who was working for Gasprom), how much they fund some of Germany's political parties, given the - as you pointed out - state of their Economy, and the History of repeated hesitance and delaying of the German politicians compared to the rest of European politicians when it came to supporting Ukraine for pretty much the whole of the last 2 years.
  
  I would like to point out that Germany represents about 25% of the EU GDP and as such has carries more weight than most countries in the union. Several European countries have already ruled out joining the UK and France is sending troops, which would only be sent after a peace agreement has been concluded; That's a far cry from actually sending troops today to help Ukrainian soldiers to fight Russia.
  
  I think the point that the Brexit that Britain got made, which is also the point made by the actual support Europe ended up giving to Ukraine even when Germany was very hesitant to do so, including the move away from Russian gas which Germany was even more hesitant about doing, is that the wishes of Germany on its own don't move the rest of Europe whilst the wishes of enough of the rest of Europe together do move Germany.
  As for the sending of troops, I pointed that out because even sending peacekeeping troops is far more interventionist than anything suggested before by European politicians when it comes to Ukraine, so those politicians are at least for the Public Opinion going in the very opposite direction of what politicians would be going if they desired to just dump Ukraine for Economic reasons: in the face of Trump allying himself with Putin, European politicians are opening even more doors to Ukraine rather than closing any.
  
  What doors have European politicians actually opened to Ukraine?
  European leaders can't just drop Ukraine for Economic reasons after all the speeches they've been giving over the past few years, the billions sent to Ukraine and the perception of the moral high ground; but they could simply put the blame on Trump for the war finishing under terms he negotiated with Ukraine and Russia instead of actually providing more support to Ukraine and perhaps joining Ukraine in the war to fight Ukraine.
  
  My use of "doors" was the wrong metaphor - I meant it in the sense of providing increasingly advanced military support with decreasing limitations as well as increasing kinds of pressure on the Invader in a phased way rather than as a continuous improvement.
  As for the rest, you're not actually supporting your original point that they want to do it, you're just saying that they now have a scapegoat if they did wanted to do it and it's not even that clear how well would it work for them to use it since most of the European Public Opinion is turning anti-American and wouldn't react positively to bending over to Trump's will. Anyways, "could" says nothing about "wants" or "would".
  
  Why haven't the European countries already increased advanced limitary support and decreased limitations as well as increased kinds of pressure on the invader? Are they just waiting for more Ukrainians to die and more territories to be lost? Do they want Ukraine to "win" or do they just want to prolong the war as long as possible?
  Clearly I can't state for sure that they want to do it, but their actions certainly do not contradict my hypothesis.
  
  That is the big question since the start of the Invasion, as they didn't went all in from the start and were only increasing military support and decreasing the limitations on its use (such as not being able to use it against Russian Territory) in a drip-drip away.
  Same question could be posed to Biden's America.
  My guess is a mix of trying to avoid the whole thing turning into a nuclear conflict and the edging their bets (no point in giving all kinds of kit up front to Ukrained and then they were overwhelmed for other reasons such as lack of manpower and Russia just got a whole lot of Western kit on their hands). Also if there is one thing most European politicians are definitelly guilty of, is being hesitant and over-cautious.
  There's also the possibility that they were following the Machiavelic strategy of drawing Russia further into that War by keeping the Ukranian military power around the level that defeating them was just barelly outside the reach of Russia. The purpose would be to drain Russian military assets and power to reduce its danger to everybody else and to give time for European nations to grow their own military power back to the level it was at before Russia started to be seen as a peaceful partner which no longer held imperialist dreams. If that was the intention, it seems to have worked wonderfully on the first part and so far so good on the second part, though the Ukranians would have been sacrificed beyond what they need to for it (hence why I called it a "Machiavelic strategy")
  Independently of that, at this stage going back on all of that sunk investment is a completelly difference level of changing their actions than the slow, step by step increase in supportting Ukraine of the last 2 years, and somebody having a history of hesitation and step by step change does not in any way form or shape support a thesis that they desire a sudden large scale change in exactly the opposite direction of the one they have been following for two years in a step by step way, quite the opposite (people who are extra cautious in increasing their investment into something don't just dump 2 years of increasingly investing and accept failure just because one of the "partners" wants to quit)
  
  For your last paragraph, let's wait and see what happens. I doubt European countries will provide support for Ukraine much longer if the US withdraws its support completely.

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