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

You're viewing part of a thread.

Show Context

27 comments

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.
  
  Oh yeah, we won't really know until we see it.
  I hope Europe does rise up to the challenge and replaces the US part of the military help to Ukraine (and I hope to they don't have strings attached to it which was an American inspired things), not just for Ukrainians but also because strategically its the smart move (as if Europe chickens out and Russia succeeds now, they will sooner or later act militarily against EU countries) but we can't really know for sure either way until they do.
  
  It's not looking promising. Even France and the UK, who are the only powerful countries talking about deploying troops on the grounds, would only do it after a peace deal is reached, and only if the US provides a backstop. It's hard to take them seriously as this point.

27 comments