Outside the West, there is some amount of sympathy for Russia and antipathy towards Ukraine in their ongoing war. The Ukrainians are seen as stooges of the West and Russia the old bear fighting to maintain its ‘rightful’ sphere of influence that NATO is encroaching on.
This is a myopic view because if it is acceptable to settle one’s grudges by force of arms, we are casting aside the lessons that were painfully learned through the terrible World Wars of the 20th century and returning to the dark ages of might is right.
NATO powers and others have poured billions of dollars into propping up Ukraine’s military and, so far, the latter has done an admirable job, even if it continues to lose ground to the Russians.
That military support, however, could soon vanish.
He is unlikely to ever say so publicly, but there was probably no one who was more disappointed with the election of Donald Trump over Kamala Harris in the US presidential election last November than Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. That is because Trump has made no secret of his wish to end the Russia-Ukraine war even by pulling the plug on the billions of dollars in arms that the Americans have shipped to Ukraine since 2022.
Western Europe is now scrambling, perhaps too late. While the Americans hold talks with Russia (a betrayal of the cold shoulder that Vladimir Putin’s odious regime has been subjected to for three years), the Europeans are holding a summit of their own to provide a counterweight, to show that Ukraine still has friends among the democracies of the world.
But what are these friends prepared to do? The end of the Second World War has meant that there are no peoples less able, willing or desirous of war than those of Western Europe. From once being all-conquering soldiers, Europe is weak in spirit and military strength. To be fair, Russia is also frail. It is not beating Ukraine through superior technology, great military leadership or tactics but through sheer numbers of troops. But it is winning and it has nuclear weapons to fall back on if push comes to shove. Western Europe does not have the stomach or the ability to fight Russia and it may not have the pockets to continue to back Ukraine if the Americans pull out.
It might be tempting to give up on Ukraine. But the precedent that sets is a dangerous one for any weak nation out there. The Russia of Putin has crushed internal dissent, violently stamped out dreams of Chechen independence, already invaded one sovereign nation in the form of Georgia back in 2008 and seized Crimea from Ukraine illegally years before the present conflict. Letting Russia get away with this aggression will only embolden it and other bullies out there to wage more wars in future.
